End of the Season Seven

Our time in Belize had come to an end. We anchored off Punta Gorda and went into check out with all the different officials. Lots of paperwork is involved! Each office requires their 2-3 pages all stamped and signed. Pay fees at one office and more fees at the next. All total we spent 79 days in Belize and all the fees amounted to around $1450 Cdn, definitely not an inexpensive place to visit by boat. But we did enjoy our time there.

Like last season, we made arrangements with Raul for the check in process to enter Guatemala. We anchored off Livingston and the officials all come out to the boat in a panga. This time 6 of them came aboard Stray Cat. They all sat in the cockpit, asked us a few questions and filled out their paperwork. We had heard Livingston’s new Port Captain was more of a stickler for protocol so we were not surprised when they all came aboard. An hour later we went to Raul’s office to collect our passports and pay our fees of 1400Q or $253.50 Cdn for 3 months, then we will have to pay 2800Q or approximately $500 Cdn for the balance of the year.

We returned to the same slip at Happy Iguana Marina and started in on the boat work. We hired a diver to grease the props. Normally we do this when the boat is out of the water. With the boat in the water, you need a diver with steady hands. The process involves removing two small set screws from each prop, inserting a grease zerk fitting in their place, use the grease gun to apply the grease and then reverse the process with the zerks and set screws. Easy peasy on dry land, not so much under water in limited visibility. Dropping parts is not an option!  We also had him do a quick clean on the bottom to scrape off any sea life and dirt buildup, which surprisingly was very minimal.

Jessica did some repair work on our tramp and sail cover. The sun and UV light in the tropics is brutal on fabrics and stitching. Time to get seams resewn, velcro connections and snap fittings were replaced too.

The big-ticket item was removing the boom and goosenecks to have new bushings and pins made. The gooseneck is the mechanism that creates the right angle join between the vertical mast and the horizontal boom. It allows the boom to swing from side to side and provides some articulation of the aft end of the boom up and down to allow for when the sail fills with the wind. Our boat is now 26 years old, so the manufacturer no longer makes replacement parts.

 Cesar the welder who made the air intakes for us at the beginning of the season has a machine shop. He was able to take the existing pieces and machine new pins and bushings. Getting the pieces off was the usual boat chore. It required the removal of 52 screws and 12 rivets. Of course, the screws and rivets were stainless steel and the mast and boom were aluminum. Mix the two different metals and 26 years of saltwater environment and you have the recipe for corrosion. To the point that we stripped the heads on 3 screws so badly that we had to weld nuts onto them then use a wrench to get them out. Eventually we got the job done and its all back together now. This is the stuff they don’t tell you about in the glossy sailing magazines 😊

Angel once again washed and waxed the boat for us, so the decks will be protected from the UV rays until our return. One of our other chores is to wrap any deck hardware in tin foil and tape it on. This protects those items from the sun. We find in this 30-35 deg. heat, and high humidity (over 80% some days), we’re not very productive and have to take it slow. Afternoons are spent at the pool. It does cool off at night so sleeping has not been an issue.

We did take a day off and went to the El Paraiso hot spring waterfall. It was a 40 min. collectivo ride and then a short walk into the falls. The waterfall is 12 meter high and the hot thermal water cascades into the river basin below. We spent a couple of hours enjoying the water and lunch nearby.

 Riding a colectivo is always an experience. On the way out we got lucky and had about 10 people in the van. However, the guy in the seat behind us was packing a rack of cotton candy. He kept falling asleep and Barb was being attacked by wayward bags of confectionaries. The ride back had 22 people in the van and Barb sitting on my lap for part of the ride. Fortunately, at one of the stops a group of people got off and Barb got her own seat.

We took a table at the last swap meet and got rid of more stuff than we brought back so that’s a good thing. What we did’nt sell we donated to the local charity.

We’ve been to a couple of Margarita Mondays, Barb did lunch with the Women Who Sail group and we have enjoyed some meals out but mostly we’re just trying to stay cool on the boat in this heat.

A few more days and we’ll be back in Vancouver saying hi to all our friends and family and then we’ll make plans for the next season.

Stay tuned for a few surprise updates coming in June !!!