Cliches

There are lots of cliches about cruising a small boat around the world. One of the most common is the cruising is just fixing things in exotic locations. This one seems to resonate the most with us so far this season.

We mentioned some other items in our last blog. I was able to get our AIS system working by switching the wiring from the NEAM 2000 network to the 0183 network. That solved that issue. Garmin Tech Support confirms that the radar has likely been killed by the lightning strike on the neighbour’s boat. No way we are fixing that.

Now we are having issues with our port side engine. It can seem to hold RPM and will decide to drop off power when ever it feels like it. The problem is that it’s usually when we would like to have it the most. Like anchoring in a shallow lagoon or navigating a narrow cut through the reef.

We inspected our fuel tanks for diesel “bugs” or debris and they seemed ok. More on this later. We checked the fuel filters, engine mounted and the Racor fuel water separator, and made sure they had fuel in them. Checked the fuel lines for leaks. They looked good. Air in a diesel fuel system will cause a similar engine response. After each “check” we would head off to the next location and the engine would run for a while and we would think we found the fix only to have it go wonky again. Sometimes in 30 minutes sometimes in 3 hours. 4 different places, 4 times it happened

Derick was at his wits end trying to troubleshoot this one. Mike on the boat Double Exposure came over to see what’s up. “You know we had the same thing happen to us”. Turns out it was the check valve inside the Racor filter housing. It got debris in it and the ball could not move and starved the engine for fuel. With Mike’s guidance we pull the Racor apart and viola! One gummed up check valve ball. Cleaned the check valve and the engine is running properly again.

The other thing that is “interesting” with fixing things in exotic locations is getting parts. The concept of “in stock” parts in marine stores like we are used to in Canada and the USA is nearly nonexistent here. Over night delivery. Not going to happen. We ordered parts to be delivered to a freight forwarder in Houston TX. It takes 2 weeks by boat from there. One of our packages missed the cutoff for this week’s shipping so it will take 3 weeks to get here now.

I know it sounds like complaining and its not meant to be. I mean we are in cool mangroves and coral Cayes and we even saw our first Manatee. For the most part the weather has been good, but we have been affected by the crazy cold front that washed down the eastern US and northern Caribbean. Temperatures were cooler that normal last week but at least it wasn’t like Havana Cuba that saw lows of freezing 32/0 degrees the other day.

We went into Sapodilla Lagoon to spend a night and anchored in 8 feet of water. We were out exploring in the dinghy and checked out the very nice marina there. Aside from three boats, it was empty. It’s part of a 14,000-acre master planned subdivision that hasn’t quite got off the ground yet. There was a ton of money spent on the infrastructure and then it went into receivership. Apparently it’s been purchased by a Canadian businessman with intentions of bringing it back to life

We had to get directions to even find the pool. After snaking our way through the mangroves, we finally found the beach and pool. While there our entertainment was watching 5 young workers fix a palm frond roof on a palapa. They had to haul the cement topper up a ladder, one guy pulling and one pushing. All in bare feet, no safety gear, it was pretty sketchy to say the least. We were all holding our breath, but they were successful and nobody got injured.