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South/West Caribbean « Aboard Dignity (Lagoon 420) Blog

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Back to the Old Town

We have decided to go with stainless steel for the wind gen support. It will match what is already there and be sturdy. At the same time we’re going to replace the old shower rail we used to create supports for the grill as they are looking decidedly patchy. Given that the s/s is not that cheap we’ve decided to hire a well recommended local to do the install. This we all arranged yesterday morning. Not that we may benefit much from it here. The winds have died down making the place very hot. Also, what wind we have is quite fickle as it churns around the nearby buildings. This sets the boats in the anchorage pointing in all directions.

Later in the afternoon we set off for the old town for a second time. This time we wanted to find some cheap wine, visit the cathedral and to visit the old town as the light fell. We also figured we’d eat out again.

We revisited “Contraband Alley” where the cheap wine is supposed to be. The lowest price found was $5 a bottle. We’ve seen better but we vowed to pick up a couple of bottles on the way back to try out.

Next stop was the cathedral. We picked up English audio tours for the place and were able to learn a little about the history of the place; how Drake almost demolished it and the French ransacked the town later on to pay for the Palace of Versailles. It was quite ornate and well looked after inside.

We continued our walk around town as the light fell. Right outside the cathedral in the park there was some dancing. Not sure what it was all about but it was certainly quite energetic.

As dusk fell, the lights came on and the old town changed in appearance. Perhaps because it was Friday evening, the place filled with locals. Very popular were the horse drawn carriages with young couples.

Our quest soon became one of finding a restaurant to eat at. All the restaurants had waiters/owners standing outside encouraging us to see the menu and come inside. The menus were hard to decipher being all in Spanish but somehow we got a sense of it all. At one courtyard there must have been six to eight outside restaurants all next to each other really trying hard to draw us to their table and their menu which looked just like the ones beside them.

In the end we did find somewhere to our liking. It was a small place with just a few tables. I think what swayed me, at least, is my tired feet and the offer of the first beer being free. We shared a mushroom dish cooked in cheese for an appetizer while for main course I had another fillet steak while Helen had a mixed kebab. All very nice.

We just about made the wine shop before it closed while walking back and bought a cheapo red and a cheapo white. We’ll sample them soon and see if it’s worth buying more.

Windgen is on the boat

Ok, so Fed Ex tracking page was a little misleading. We were worried that having been out for delivery from Bogota the packages were listed as being back in Bogota with an exception.

After buying a SIM card and calling a local agent he advised me to go to the local office. We left after lunch catching our first Colombian bus. What an experience? They are even more manic and aggressive that the busses we have experienced to date. Except they are busses too? Imagine medium sized busses decorated internally with fluffy mirrors and enormous amounts of chintz, conductors hanging out of the door while the bus, in the overtaking lane, cuts to the right at high speed to pick up passengers, the conductor having to run each stop as he’s last on and the driver won’t wait – then you’ll have half of it.

Anyway, we arrived in one piece and promptly walked nearly five blocks away from the Fed Ex office which was across the road from where we alighted. We eventually recovered from this error and found, to our surprise, our packages were in Cartagena. Less to our pleasure was having to pay 25% import fees. To our mixed pleasure the mounting kit ordered turned out to be everything but the tubes. No wonder it was so cheap. That being said we’re better off getting the tubes here.

Another hair raising bus ride back to our local and we were back on the boat. We spent a while planning where to mount the unit. I also went to the local chandlery to see what pipes they had. With them speaking no English and me no Spanish I did manage to get a quote from them. It was a rip off. Fortunately I sought and received some advice on the net and we’ll be off today to the main suppliers where it is all much cheaper – we believe.

The remainder of our barracuda went into a curry last night. The chef did well.

I have spent this morning catching up on publishing our tracks. Three more blog entries (probably below this one) catch us up from Grenada through the Venezuelan islands, Bonaire and to here. Enjoy if this is your sort of thing.

We also moved the boat yesterday morning. The boat in front of us was much closer than they were when we first arrived. They said it was their chain straightening and not their anchor slipping but it was not worth a debate. We had wanted to move anyway to get a better internet connection. We’ve ended up right next to Whiskers so we can yell at them rather than use the radio and have everyone listen in.

INSERT_MAP

Bonaire Tracks

At this zoom level, this map shows you our tracks around Bonaire as we moved the boat around on some of our further dives. If you zoom out, way way out, you’ll see our passage to Cartagena.


View 2009 Bonaire in a larger map

Venezuela tracks

Here is our track through the Venezuelan offshore islands.  Again – first part was reconstructed due to loss.  Enjoy.


View 2009 Venezuela in a larger map

Repairs, shopping and happy hour

Wednesday morning was taken up with having our freezer and air cons looked at. Around 9am I went ashore principally to pick up our passports and paperwork from the agent/fixer. At the same time I mentioned we wanted to get hold of the guys who fix freezers. Ours runs continuously and I suspected it needed a freon recharge. Davide immediately called the freezer guys and asked me to hang around as they were now on their way.

They arrived within 15 minutes and I dinghied them out to our boat. The freon turned out to be way down. It’s pressure was 4 somethings as opposed to 10 somethings. They slowly recharged the unit carefully checking for leaks which they could not find. They also deduced that the thermostat was faulty so this was replaced. I also had them look at a couple of our A/Cs. We don’t use them much, if at all, but it was a good opportunity to have them examined. The one in our hull has a temperamental start. This turned out to be air in the pump caused by a small leak. Now I know this I know how to get it going as well as what to focus on to repair it properly.

In the starboard forward cabin the A/C was dead as a doornail. They removed the control circuitry to have the local electric wizard take a look.

I haven’t yet spotted the freezer motor switch off so who knows.

Early afternoon I responded to a request for help from someone trying to hook up a VCR and DVD together. It turned out he needed a remote to control the VCR to see the DVD. We ended up chatting and I learned a lot about the San Blas where we’re heading in December.

After this Helen and I walked a couple of miles to the Caribe Plaza mall. It looked like just about any other mall but it did have a large supermarket where we picked up some provisions.

Back on the boat we had scant minutes to clean up before heading back to the dinghy dock to head off to a local restaurant for happy hour. We bumped into Dianne and Gerald who were on their way back having found the place empty. They had gone half an hour too soon which explained things. We all went their together to find the place very unempty. We had a good time their and ended up eating pizza there too.

Finally our windgen seems stuck in Bogota. This may mean some beaurocracy ahead of us so that will be our focus this morning.

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At 11/17/2009 12:27 (utc) our position was 10°24.47’N 075°32.54’W