No croissants until the butter arrives!

Just a quick update this week. We are still waiting for the transimission part, but at least now it has been ordered and scheduled to arrive on Tuesday. Then the mechanic will fix things and we should be ready to sail at the end of this week! Fingers crossed.

We spent the week much the same as the previous, doing lots of boatwork and doing schoolwork. We did treat ourselves to a day at the beach on Saturday. Paradise beach is their most popular beach on this island. We had to go into Hillsborough to pick up a package from their Fedex office, more boat parts, so we had lunch and then went to the beach. We walked home from the beach. Paradise beach was truely paradise. It is perfect white sand with mangroves to provides shade near the edge. The water is just the right temperature to stay in long term and still cool you off. It was a much needed break from boatwork.

We have managed to get the boat that much closer to being ready to sail. While we wait on the transmission part, we took the opportunity to get even more upgrades done here. For example, we managed to get updated ropes for much of our running rigging (the lines used to control the sails). We had plenty of ropes in our bowlocker and we kept what we could, but many of them were too worn for our liking. Those that are being used currently will be stowed for back-up. We will spend the next few days replacing the running rigging. We also learned how to splice our ropes so we could create new dock lines from some rope we found in the bowlocker. Our old dock lines were too small and were actually getting worn through under the weight of our boat. Plus, they were super noisy! Problaby because a) they were under too much strain and b) they were worn out and dirty. Splicing is an essential skill on sailboats because many of the lines are spliced at their attachments points. It was tricky because the rope we used was stiff. We have bought some more that we will use to make new bridles for the anchor as well. The anchor bridle is attached to the anchor and helps absorb some of the loading and minimizes achor drag.

The problem with being on such a small island, as mentioned before, is that it is difficult to get things here! Getting the parts delivered by Fedex required to that we hire a customs agent and clear it through customs first. We had to take our boat papers and the receipt to customs to show them that we are a ‘boat in transit’ after the parts were ordered and before the parts arrived. We then had to watch the tracking of the package to make sure it didn’t get stuck in customs by sending them our papers again and asking them to release the package based on the paperwork they already did and make a payment. Then we had to pick up the package in Hillsborough once it was cleared by customs (4 days after it arrived). It was a frustrating process. The other big frustration about this island for Kevin, with respect to getting parts, is the fact that our boat was made by a French company and therefore has metric parts; which we generally like. However, for some reasons, on this island they only carry U.S. sized parts (not even true imperial). Which is strange because they are a metric country and have a ton of visitors with boats that likely also have metric parts!

The best example of our struggles to get things here is our struggle to get butter! There was butter here when we first arrived but there hasn’t been butter for weeks now. We had neighbours in the slip behind us who were preparing their boat for 6 months of storage on the hard and they offered up some of their provisions that they will not need that are difficult to get here. Fortunately, they have told us that provisioning is much easier on other islands. They even offered up any butter they have left when they leave. We are eager for butter because then we can make cookies and our favorite cakes for birthdays and events. The grocery store had a funny sign where they normally sell croissants made by a local baker “Sorry no croissants. They will be back when the butter arrives!” And so it seems this is a good saying for our last few weeks on the island.