Wednesday the sun came out and the wind died down! Clark retied the boat lines closer to the dock, so I can now get on and off by myself. Yay! Without the winds, however, I can pull the boat over by myself. It is just so much nicer to be able to step on and off without a "leap of faith".
The gasket for the engine did not come in today's mail, so the engine repair is on hold for one more day. Given that, it was back to the anchor project yet again. Of course the first item on the anchor agenda was a trip to West Marine for more epoxy to complete the sealing job. This time Clark bought the 8 packets for $40 instead of 2 packets for $20 since the smaller size only did half the job. (What a rip off! These holes are just not that large.) Anyway, we figured it was cheaper per packet this way, and we will have some on hand for next time we need it.
Normally the epoxy starts to harden before Clark has a chance to finish the job he's working on. Then, shortly after applying it, he is ready for the next step. The epoxy from the first application took all night to harden. Maybe a heat and humidity factor in there somewhere?? We wondered how long it would take for the second batch to cure.
Since we had a reasonable stopping place, we decided to eat lunch and check back on the anchor prep work afterwards. Before making lunch I took a stroll up to the marina's main building to use the head and got quite a surprise on my return trip to the boat. In the short time I was gone an iguana had decided to come out and soak up some sun from the hot pavement.
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| Long-tailed Iguana in my way |
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| Looking at me |
I don't know much about reptiles. I know I did not like this iguana looking at me. He made no inclination to move out of my way, and between him and his tail, he covered the majority of the walkway. I needed to step around or over him to get by and neither option was too appealing. I decided to walk around him and kept my eyes on him the whole time. He did the same - we had a stare off! Once past, I briskly walked back to the boat and sent Clark out with his camera to capture this guy's mugshot for my blog!
Related to reptile stories, (I hope Denise doesn't mind) I found Denise's post on Facebook about an iguana sunning itself on her boat quite funny. (Glad it was not on my boat!)
Denise posted on Facebook: "We chased him off the boat. He jumped into the water, swam across to the other side by the jet ski rental place, climbed up the dock, the stairs, and eventually a chain link fence to the roof of a shed....startling 3 women who were preparing to rent jet skis. It was hilarious to watch. One woman ran half way down the parking lot hands flailing in the air!"
At least I didn't run through the marina screaming!
After lunch, Clark checked the epoxy and found it needed more time to cure. I decided to take my Kindle and sit by the pool to get some sun. I was more than sick of being on the boat. Somehow I just could not convince myself to get on my swim attire. The breeze was just cool enough to be demotivating. Besides that I saw no real fun in playing in the pool by myself.
When I got up to the pool, I saw no one I knew even though the pool area was packed with people. Given that in February I couldn't go anywhere at the marina without stumbling over someone I knew, I found it somewhat depressing to sit there on my own. How depressing can it be though to be by the pool in March soaking up the sun? I got over my loneliness in no time.
I never opened my Kindle. I am addicted to a couple of games I play on my phone. I played my games by the pool until Clark called to ask me to come back to the boat to print tax forms. Yuuuckkkk! What a bad way to end a leisurely pool-side afternoon! Besides the call for help, I saw that my phone battery was desperately low. Time to head back to the boat for a recharge anyway.
We have a small Canon printer on board the boat that we bought special for the Great Loop trip. It has proven itself worth more than its cost multiple times over. It copies, scans, prints and send faxes - all in a rather petite package. Only my laptop "talks" to the printer, so I printed the tax forms. We signed them and then Clark scanned them (with my help) back into my laptop so they could be sent. Yay - taxes done!
Clark checked, and had me check, multiple times for the engine part we had ordered, but even by late afternoon no package had arrived, so it was back to see how the anchor project was doing. Fortunately the epoxy batch from the second application had hardened allowing Clark to re-drill his holes. When he was out and about on errands the day before, he stopped by The Home Depot and purchased extra long drill bits to get through the thickest portion of the bow pulpit. Today he got his chance to use his new tools.
Mostly I offered moral support. I did climb up on the bow pulpit a couple of times to check the angle of the drill bit to verify it lined up appropriately, so I added some small amount of value to the project. Eventually, though, I left him to his assembly and went to make dinner. I had planned on making Cornish Pasties out of meat, potatoes, veggies, and Bisquick. Everything was ready except for the pastry part of the meal when I realized I had not even a drop of milk on board. Sigh! No milk equals no biscuits, so now what? I had the insides of a Cornish Pasty without the outsides.
While I worked on dinner, Clark continued the anchor-roller installation. There seemed to be no convenient stopping point for his work. I checked multiple times. For a while I left my food "on warm" while I went to check on him, but after almost burning dinnrt, I eventually just turned off all the burners for my food "concoction" to wait until he was ready to eat. One bad thing about Daylight Savings Time - Clark has daylight until 7:30 at night. He hates to waste daylight by eating.
He finally decided he was done for the day and must have had his camera out there on the bow because he took a picture of the completed roller installation.
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| Installed Anchor Roller (on right) |
While he was out there, he also snapped a picture of the sunset.
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| Sunset P.O.D. |
We ate well after sunset since, after finishing his work, he needed time to clean up. With no other brilliant ideas, I poured the meat / veggie gravy mix over the potatoes I had mashed and called it a day. I actually found it not only edible but quite delicious. Clark likes anything that has potatoes and gravy in the recipe, so he enjoyed it as well.
Later that night, I got a call from my friend Janet and we talked for almost an hour. Feeling a need to connect with my friends back home, I had reached out earlier in the day to several folks. None of them were available when I called, but Janet said she would call me later and did. We had a great talk and a few good laughs.
Time to call it a night!
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