Trip Payment, LPG Gas, Jetty Work

Male seal lions having a rest

Beach just to the south of the harbor

Bargain Boat Section

Unannounced Jetty Gap and Leaky Boat

Trip Payment, LPG Gas, Jetty Work

Photos:  IMG_6775, DCF0030, DCF0027, DCF0025, DCF0024, DCF0022

After three daily trips to the ATM's followed by visits to the tourist office we have the final payment of 768 pesos to make this morning.  We will then receive our tickets, vouchers, and itinerary. 

I got annoyed when Brenda was able to extract funds from a ubiquitous Banelco ATM using her MasterCard followed by the rejection of my Visa card, so I sent a message to my bank.  I got a form letter response overnight which included the URL of a useful web site showing Visa friendly ATM's all over the world.  By then we had figured out that any ATM's displaying “Link” will probably work for me. 

When we arrived from Buenos Aires the gas cylinder appeared to be empty so I switched to the small reserve one and two  days ago took the one that I had swapped out on the way to the Horn to a hardware store that would send it out for filling. 

Yesterday morning the electric kettle stopped working just after we had had our breakfast.  It didn't take long to figure out that the boat was not getting any shore power.  We had noticed two men working on a section of the jetty so we figured that it was a temporary outage.

We walked into town, paid our next installment to the tourist agent, then set off for the fishing boat harbor with the intention of walking the long outer mole to see the colony of sea lions.  Instead we visited a small nature reserve and discovered a long and wide beach that had a lot of potential but seemed to be treated as a neglected backwater. On the way back to the boat we purchased a kilo of fish fillets that turned out be very good eating.  We also spent some time watching the sea lions both at rest (when they looked like they were sleeping off hangovers) and at work, finding fish with seemingly effortless ease.

Back at the marina we found that a section of the jetty had been removed and two men were working on it.  We stood there looking at the gap and asked Salvatore how we would be able to get to the other side.  He said that there was a boat.  Sure enough there was an old wooden row boat with a rope spanning the gap.  Brenda and I got into the boat then I started to grumble that it was not set up for pulling the boat back once we had made our crossing.  Luis the yard boss came by and I asked him about the setup.  He threw a rope to me which would allow him to pull the boat back after we made our crossing, but when I asked him how we would be able to pull the boat to our side he casually waved me off.  Brenda had to put up with more of my grumbling. 

Later I started to load the other large cylinder cylinder that I had judged to be empty on our return from BA and it felt heavier than it should.  I shook it back and forth and could feel a hefty amount of LPG sloshing around.  I hooked the cylinder up again, tested it, and found that the stove worked fine.  I figure that the solenoid connected to the gas sniffer must have jammed up momentarily after being shut while I was in BA.   When I returned to the gap on my way to pick up the filled gas cylinder I found that the boat had been properly set up with fixed ropes on either side and a center rope with blocks at either end so that the boat could be pulled back and forth as required. 

The cylinder took a whopping 8.6 kg (19 lb) of LPG and the cost was $30, probably twice the cost of Mexico.  I humped the full cylinder on my back in the marvelous US Navy duffel bag and even managed to pick up a bottle of red wine on the way back. 

As I approached the jetty I saw Luis on his way home and I asked him when we would get power and water.  He thought that it would take 2 more days. 

Fortunately the boat 's battery banks are full and we still had plenty of fresh water on board.  Having said that, I don't think that it requires an MBA to think of posting a sign a few days ahead of time advising that there will be no power and water for 2 or 3 days, and that there will be a gap to be negotiated in a leaky wooden boat.  Looking back, it took me using my blog to tell the office the date of when I had motored into the marina. 

My LPG gas situation is now good.  I have a full cylinder, which alone would probably support me to South Africa.  I figure that the other large cylinder is half full.  I'll keep using the small (3.4 kg) reserve cylinder, hoping to empty it before leaving MdP.   I expect to fill both the reserve cylinder and the half-full large one before leaving MdP to ensure LPG will not be one of the things to worry about when provisioning in Brazil.

Last night we had a tasty dinner with good red wine and watched “Shall We Dance?” with Richard Gere.
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We made the last payment for the package tour to the Iguazu falls and received our vouchers.  The bus leaves at 8.30 AM on Sunday morning and we will travel all night and be dropped off at the hotel on Monday morning.  We will be on recliner beds which have been very comfortable in the past. 

While we were in town I purchased a wire brush for a project that had sprung up unexpectedly.  The cylinder that had just been filled was fairly rusty.  It was a steel one that I had purchased in Hawaii and had had a tough life in the sloshing waters of the lazarette.  My interest was to protect the cylinder enough to get me back to Australia without developing a potentially disastrous pinhole leak.  Just before lunch I wire brushed the problem areas then washed the cylinder in soapy water.  After lunch I dug out the large plastic “paint department” container and found that the only paint I had was the remnants of 2-part International brand paint that I had brought from Australia.  I had plenty of paint but the catalyst had turned into a gel with a small amount with syrup like consistency at the bottom.  I decided on the desperate measure of putting 5 tablespoons of paint into the catalyst then stirring it using a small artist's brush, hoping that enough catalyst would leach out to achieve something close to the ideal 3:1 ratio.  I had enough mixed paint to treat the problem areas, namely the seam around the middle, the bottom, and the top where the protective rim joined the body of the tank.  Two hours later I went onto the jetty to check on the paint, half expecting to find a sticky goo, but to my delight the paint had hardened nicely.  Gotta win a few.

During the day there was very little work done on the jetty.  One guy worked alone at dismantling the old section of jetty.  My guess was that they were waiting on a crane for lifting into position a new section that they had built a few weeks ago.  I wasn't too worried because we were leaving on Sunday morning for the week away, but it would be nice to not have to transport our luggage on that leaky boat at 7 AM.