Waiting on Shaft

The new propeller shaft was supposed to arrive today, so I made a point of spending most of the day in the boat.

In the morning I did rearranging the Racor fuel filter and raw water fuel filter.  This addressed a problem that I've been having with the Racor.  It had been sited on the left side of the photo in Port Townsend on my decision not to have a vacuum gauge.  Later it was deemed highly advisable to have a vacuum  gauge so we fitted it to the left of the filter.  The gauge was so close to the galley bulkhead that I was forced to chisel out a slot on the sliding engine cover lest it shear off the gauge when I pushed it into position.  Even so, I worried about the possibility that on a port heel in a rough seaway the cover might start banging against the gauge and damaging it. So this morning I took my time to figure out an improvement and wound up swapping the positions of the filters.  The Racor, which is a pretty heavy unit, is now supported on a wood base and the lighter raw water filter is bolted directly onto the aft bulkhead.  Note that the gauge is now out of harm's way.

After that I removed the 3" (75mm) frame at the bulkhead which the engine cover had been meeting.  That had been necessary to accommodate at the front of the Sabb engine the 160 amp alternator that had been installed in New Zealand.  Removal of that frame allowed the cover to rest directly against the bulkhead and restored the half step  that we had lost from the last step into the cabin.

At 12.30 PM I followed the routine of making the 5 minute walk to the hotel, grabbing a cold beer from the refrigerator as I passed the kitchen, then having a shower after being revived by the Pacifico Clara beer.  The kitchen and dining area is really part of the veranda which is cool yet part of the landscape of pot plants and palm trees with birds darting all over the place.  In the background we can see the bay.  After lunch with Brenda in this pleasant setting I had my usual short nap then headed back to the boat which we both knew would be like an oven.

I checked with Luis as I passed by the office and he assured me that the shaft would arrive that afternoon.  I told him that I would be inside the boat and to knock on the hull when it arrived so that I could pay Ernesto.  I was carrying about 12,000 pesos in my backpack to cover the payment.

Unfortunately the boat was indeed an oven this afternoon.  The breeze was not to arrive until after 6 PM.  Because my main switch panel is dead I could not run the fans.  I was sweating so hard that I could not see and had to keep wiping my head with paper towels and later a real towel.  I did a bit more work setting up the latches for the new engine cover setup and at 5 PM I headed back to the hotel by way of the office where Luis told me that the shaft would be in tomorrow morning, maybe 8AM and maybe 9AM.  (Thanks, Luis, but why didn't you tell me as soon as you knew so that I didn't have to feel like a baking patata for so long?)  He asked me if I was hoping to get the back into the water tomorrow.  I replied with a restrained "Yes, as soon as possible" instead of the more direct "Hey, is the Pope Catholic?  What do you think?") 

Tomorrow will mark the 9th day on the hard stand.  It will be Friday the 16th of July and we haven't started the actual engine installation yet.  It's not like we are suffering because Brenda and I enjoy life at this hotel very much, but Brenda must return to Australia in early September and I want very much that we be able to do 3 or 4 weeks of travelling before her departure.

Here are some photos that we took around  our little hotel world.

Brenda's Bird of the Day does not need a photo as it is so well known, occurring over most of North Ameica and much of the rest of the world. According to the Bird Book it is 'omnipesent in populated areas' and this definitely applies to La Paz. The bird is the House Sparrow. Of course these sparrows have won the hearts of many including the men of the palapa of knowledge (morning breakfast group) who make sure that a little sparrow that cannot close her beak properly has some choice crumbs.