Grenada
Prickly Bay Anchorage
11.59.985
N
61.45.818
W
12/17/2020 Dale kept busy today running the water
maker, ice maker, and then finally tore the two staterooms completely apart
trying to figure out why the switch for the fans that blows the hot air out when
the engines are running, would trip.
Come to find out, one of the fans was binding up. Tomorrow he will purchase another to replace
it.
In the meantime, bless his heart, he ran
the engine for about an hour so that I would have warm water for my
shower. Not that I mind tepid showers
but I prefer warm ones. I also used the
occasion to scrub the floors on the port side as it seems we grind dirt into
the white floors of the shower/bathroom with our bare feet. I’ve mopped the entire boat since coming out
of the dusty yard; so how do we still manage to track muddy footprints all over
if we haven’t gone anywhere?
He also managed to find the Christmas tree that we have for the boat. Last year at this time, we were transiting and never pulled it out. This year when we pulled it out, we realized that where I would normally string it up is now used to suspend the shade cloths. We both studied the various possibilities and then decided that the best place would be on the hard top between the solar panels, suspended from the topping lift. As night fell, I saw that there are a few lights out and started thinking about how old it was as we had used it on our Hunter on our last visit here. Dale and I thought about it for awhile and figured that it was about 17 years old. I guess we’ve gotten our money’s worth and we’re lucky that it only has a couple of lights out. Gerry teased us that we’re all getting older, more brittle and not all of our lights come on at the same time. Nuff said!!
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| One of the locals |
12/18/2020 Shopping day! Nicky and I have our lists and enter into the chaos that is in every grocery store around the globe prior to a holiday. The guys go in search of pieces and parts at the computer store. They find a cable that they think might be long enough to connect the AC to its remote on the wall. The salesman is certain that this is what they need and agrees to take it back if it isn’t.
12/19/2020 Happy Birthday Dad!
Dale does a trial run with the newly purchased computer cable which does,
in fact, work for the AC. He and Gerry
will tear apart the salon, and pretty much all of the starboard side on Monday
to install it.
12/20/2020 Gerry decides to cook breakfast for all of
us today. It was wonderful! All of my favorites (bacon, eggs, sausage,
hash browns,) plus a few British ones (baked beans and roasted tomatoes.) Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it—it was
actually quite delicious and I may have to add baked beans to my breakfasts
from now on.
12/21/2020 Dale and Gerry run the cable for the AC
that they purchased from the computer store; it runs down the wall, behind a
cabinet in the aft stateroom on the starboard side, under the flooring, through
the bathroom behind the salon settee, along the backside of the washer/dryer
before heading up back to the salon area into the space for the AC. It’s about 6” too short. Six inches huh? Since they’re men, I ask them if I should
remeasure.
Charlotte from PLM responded to our e-mail
from last week wherein we told her about another possible vendor for the gauges
asking if she is willing to pay the higher price as they are in stock. She wants us to contact the store to find out
shipping charges and then she’ll call it with the credit card number. Dale is adamant that she call the store to
find out the charges and give them the credit card information at the same
time. I write a rather pointed e-mail
back to her relaying that we’ve done all the legwork thus far while she was on
vacation, so she needs to make the call.
12/22/2020 Due to the rising positive CoVid numbers,
the Prime Minister has reinstituted curfew and tightened restrictions on going
out or gatherings during the holiday.
Gerry received word that his watermaker part is in.
12/23/2020 Gerry picked up his water maker part and
we hired Joel (our taxi driver) to do a quick run around the island for last
minute items prior to the holidays. I
needed just the basics; milk, butter, eggs, flour, and green beans. We grabbed a quick lunch at the Container
Park and invite our driver to join us.
When we get to the supermarket in town, they are asking for photo IDs,
taking temperatures and asking that you sign into a book so that they can track
you, should the virus spread further. Really? A photo ID to go grocery shopping is ridiculous! Nicky didn’t even have a photo ID with
her. They still let us in.
12/24/2020 Dale
helped Gerry install the water maker part that Gerry had been waiting for. I divide up my Christmas cooking so that my
little oven can cook up everything on my list.
I’ll prep what I don’t cook today, so that it will be easier to cook
tomorrow. We’re aiming for a 2 o’clock
meal.
12/25/2020 Merry
Christmas Everyone!
Over
on Opal, Nicky was doing the same thing.
She made a turkey breast, a small ham, roasted potatoes, carrots,
parsnips and brussels sprouts (apparently, they’re an English or Australian
Christmas thing (I’d never heard of brussels sprouts for Christmas dinner,
she’d never heard of not having them)) cranberry relish and Christmas pudding
flambe with rum sauce! She had mentioned
earlier that she wanted left overs so that we wouldn’t have to cook the next
couple of days. Obviously, there was no
worry in that department.
About
1pm Nicky texted that she needed a bit more time but it gave me a chance to put
in the second pan of rolls into the oven, so not a problem. Dale put Christmas music on the stereo and we
listened to Bach, Buffett and a couple of Australian groups that had their own
take on Christmas classics i.e. the Twelve Days of Christmas in the Outback, my
personal favorite. By the time they
arrived and we had everything on the table, with the food plated, it was closer
to 3 but it was a feast none the less and enjoyed by all.
After
dinner, we sat (because we couldn’t move) and listened to our music until dusk,
tried to fire off the Christmas pudding flambe (it never would light) but it
was delicious as it was. Then Nicky and
I divided up the leftovers into the plastic Chinese containers I save for just
this reason. I had made a red velvet
cake but ended up just putting it in their left over containers as no one had
room for any more food.
Dale
and I ended the evening watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas (what else?)
and checking out the Jupiter/Saturn phenomenon taking place. We’ve been watching it since Monday. It’s considered a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity as the last time it appeared this close and visible to the naked
eye around the globe was in 1226. The conjunction
is sometimes nicknamed the "Christmas Star" or "Star of
Bethlehem" for its connection to the Christian nativity story. Hope everyone got a chance to see it
as it won’t be visible to everyone this close again until 2080.
12/26/2020 Happy
Birthday April!
It
was a great night! A light breeze, just
enough swell to rock you to sleep and no rain!
I was exhausted, so maybe I just slept through everything. The Tinker Twins were back in sync today and
installed a small fuel pump to our genset.
It’s been becoming more and more temperamental in starting and Dale felt
that the pump would help. It did seem to
help so I’m guessing my thought about a new starter was in error.
12/27/2020 Dale
has started polishing the bright work early in the mornings before it gets too
hot. He does just a few stanchions each
day. It should take him about a week to
do the whole boat. We saw the “Christmas
Star” (Jupiter and Saturn) for the last time.
12/28/2020 Laundry
day. Today Gerry and Nicky sent their
laundry in while we fired up the genset and did ours on board. Dale and Gerry took a walk about to dump
trash, hike up to the mini market between here and True Blue and then a quick
visit to Budget Marine just because it was there. We finished the day with having dinner on
Opal and discussing the world’s problems.
12/29/2020 Today
when I checked our e-mails, I was surprised that PLM actually contacted us to
say that most of the remaining parts are ordered but that one was back ordered
and not due in until after our most current visas expire. We went back and forth and hopefully have
come up with a plan that we can both be happy with. With luck, we won’t need to extend our visas
again.
Gerry
and Dale went in to the little grocery store we had discovered earlier in
Prickly Bay to purchase a few items needed on our boats. Later Dale and I decided to walk to the
Container Park for a little exercise, taking the back way in via the dirt road
we first discovered when they were repaving their entry. For walking, it’s a much shorter path. Unfortunately, our 2 favorite stores were
closed, so we settled for a hamburger and fries instead of the gyros we had
been thinking about before hiking back. I did learn from one of the vendors that the
Brewery is rumored to be opening next week.
Let’s hope so. I miss our
brunches there on Sunday and I really miss buying my eggs there.
We
finished the day listening to the resort on the beach blasting out music. I find it interesting that we’re all supposed
to be sheltering in place with a curfew until the latest “cluster” of CoVid
cases resolves but some places are still going strong. Just our favorite places are following the
rules. I’m sure they are all wearing
their masks and social distancing.
12/30/2020 Guess
I wasn’t the only one questioning what was going on at the resort on the beach. There was a comment left on the Cruiser’s Facebook
page and suddenly the music was gone. I
don’t condemn the local businesses for trying to stay afloat though all of
this, I wish they all would. We all know
to stay 6’ apart and wear masks if you’re not eating/drinking. My question reverts back to why only certain people
are allowed to party heartily, while the majority of us are under curfew. It just doesn’t seem right.
Today
was deathly still. No wind; hot and
miserable. It was overcast a good
portion of the day as well. I hosted
dinner tonight and Nicky brought a delicious dessert; one I’ll try to duplicate
in the future. One of the topics
discussed was that Gerry apparently was caught in a downpour that drenched him
to the skin earlier in the day. Those of
us on our boats only got drizzle and spits.
Kind of amazing that at the end of the channel (maybe a half mile away)
was an entirely different scenario.
12/31/2020 New
Year’s Eve. No special plans for this
evening and it rained all day, so we spent much of the time watching a period
piece on Netflex called Bridgerton. I
was surprised that Dale appears to like it too.
This
afternoon, after he had run the genset for 3 hours (no sun, so we needed to charge
the batteries) it sounded as if it was dying out, right when he started to shut
it down. Reminded of our problems a year
ago, I thought possibly it was starved for fuel, so I suggested that we run the
fuel polisher for a while tomorrow. Dale
is hoping that it was just getting hot.
We
tried something different this evening.
The 2 boats ordered Indian food to be delivered to the dock where Dale and
Gerry were to dinghy in to pick it up. Unfortunately,
the delivery guy was running late, so they were forced to kill time with their
noses pressed up against the Budget Marine windows as, sadly, the store was closed. Our dinners finally arrived with the many
apologies only East Indians can offer; Dale had Chicken Lazeez with rice, I ordered
Chicken Saag with Naan but the container said I had Chicken Palack; in any
event I ate chicken with spinach which was what I had intended regardless of the
name.
Finally, with regard to the resort that had the “cluster” of positive CoVid tests, it was shut down, the guests sent home and the island instituted a curfew in addition to various restrictions previously implemented. Today, Gerry sent us a posting from the Cruiser’s Facebook page, wherein it stated that 432 people were tested/retested and all were negative. Of the 11 guests who were the “cluster” at the resort on Grenada, who were sent back to the US where they were retested, not only did they not have CoVid, the antigen test showed that all, except 2, (whose tests had not been reported on) had never had CoVid—ever! Gerry pointed out that the original tests are the same tests the whole world is using. In essence, an entire nation closed down over false positives. And to add to the further absurdity, nothing has reopened!
In any event, 2020 is finally in the history books.
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| Every so often I take a really good photo! |
