Monday, March 2, 2020

Turks & Caicos
21.45.631N
72.13.429W

Today finds us knocking on wood at every opportunity.  Dale installed the replacement water maker control valve yesterday but wanted to check with his tinkering consultant to ascertain the direction the cleaning valve should be pointed in order to make sure we didn’t accidently do something wrong and find ourselves right back to where we started.  Once that was clarified, he went down this morning, told me to throw the switch, made a couple of trips hither and yon to make sure brine was flowing overboard and ‘product’ was coming out of the right hose before very, very quietly stating:  “we’re making water”.  Halleluiah!  The saints be praised!!  We’re finally making water. 

We also have insurance to continue our trip.  Yep!  Got a copy of the policy today; everything is printed, paid, all I’s are dotted, all T’s are crossed, all surveys accepted, approved and we are now free to move about the world’s waters excepting a list of forbidden areas.  We had no intention of visiting those areas anyway and there are a few more that we were surprised weren’t on the list.   All this was just in time to find that our weather window is starting to slam shut.  There is still about 36 hours which is  open enough to continue to the Dominican Republic, so we are planning on leaving Thursday morning at day break to make the hop across and then wait for the next 24 hour opening to finish the trip to Puerto Rico. 

The remainder of the day was spent going to the grocery store to stock up on fruits, vegetables and snacks for the trip.  I also needed something for the Monday night pot luck offering.  Apparently, everyone liked it as there wasn’t anything left.  Thank heavens it was easy to make as Dale really liked it. 

The rest of the evening was spent chit chatting with the other boaters who are also making the transit as we’ve all been bemoaning the horrid weather we’ve had to contend with. 

Now keep your fingers crossed that we can actually make it this time.