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Eleytheria Journal: June 2005

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June 1, 2005: Getting ready for the trip Home

In order to leave Eleytheria for 4 weeks or more, we have to prepare her. We have quite a list of things to take care of before leaving. For those interested, here it is:

  • Biocide the watermaker - we have to treat the watermaker with Biocide to prevent bacterial growth on the membrane.
  • Fresh water flush the Lectra/San - this is our waste treatment facility on the forward head. Don't want to leave it sitting in salt water.
  • Clean our refrigerator - Trinity's been lucky. They got our eggs (non-refrigerated, but 4 - 6 weeks is too long even for un-refrigerated eggs), some onions, half a loaf of bread, and cheese.
  • Close all thru-hulls except those that are deck drains. This cuts down on the possibility of one of them leaking and sinking our boat.
  • Put out bowls of vinegar water to help prevent mildew growth.
  • Remove the headsail from the furler. In case we get high winds or hurricanes coming through, we want as little windage up as possible.
  • Strap the dinghy on board as if we were setting out on a passage. We don't want it sitting in the water.
  • Bring the outboard motor on board and flush with fresh water. It's water cooled, and doesn't hurt to clean out the salt water.
  • Fresh water flush the aft head. This head dumps directly overboard, but we don't want salt water in the lines. It won't necessarily damage the hose, but it tends to smell with all the little plankton and such that would die over 4 weeks.
  • Close all hatches and windows.
  • Put Sunbrella covers on all deck items. We'd taken some of them off on this last passage and need to replace.
  • All deck items to cockpit and below. Some items can stay in cockpit such as the anchor, dock cart, and outboard fuel tank. Others need to be put below in case the wind picks up. We do have the hard dodger, but that doesn't mean something in there is protected completely. We'll put our empty gas cans, storage bins from the cockpit and other such items below.
  • Double our mooring line - in case one breaks we have another tied on. We'll also leave another line in the cockpit in case the marina manager needs it for our boat.
  • Unplug all electronics possible in case of lightening strike.
  • Fill fuel tanks. This will prevent condensation from building and contaminating our fuel with water.
  • Fill water tanks.
  • Put up the flute stopper. This is a strap that covers the slot in our mast where the mainsail unfurls. The flute stopper is a UV protectant and prevents against the wind making noise against the mast that sounds like someone blowing on a very large coke bottle
  • Leave key with office in case they need it.
  • Give away our outboard fuel. We don't have biocide for our gasoline like we have for diesel. We'd rather not use the fuel after we come back. It's already 2 months old. Old fuel turns to varnish and hurts engines.
  • Bird-proof the boat. This means covering all holes possible to discourage birds from building nests. We already had guests from our trip into Mexico. We'll cover the end of the boom, our engine exhaust hose, and other various holes on deck.
  • Remove staysail. We normally leave this sail hanked onto the inner forestay. Again, in the case of high winds, we want as little up as possible.
  • Take our flag down. Sorry to leave our boat without a US flag flying, but again with the winds. We'll leave the El Salvadorian flag flying from our spreaders.
  • Awning - since the boat will be completely closed up, we will leave the awning up to help keep it cooler down below. The marina manager has said he will take it down if needed.

We've been working on these items over a couple of days so it hasn't been too much trouble. And the excitement of seeing friends and family has made the jobs go quicker, too! Back to the top.

 

June 2, 2005: What we want to do in the States

I am the master of lists. Abe and I started thinking awhile ago about things that we wanted to do while in the States, things that we've missed while cruising. I started making a list of these to make sure we didn't miss a thing! I know some of these sound kind of strange, but we've been without a lot of the comforts of home since we've been cruising, and it will be nice to get our "fix." In addition to all the friends and family that we want to see:

  • Go to an Atlanta Braves game.
  • Visit the French Consulate (not because we need a fix, but because we want to try to get a yearlong visa instead of the normal 90 day visa for our trip next year to the Marquesas)
  • Eat at Checkers in Atlanta (especially the fries! Yum)
  • Visit Patrick Air Force Base - Abe needs his eyes checked and a new pair of glasses. This will be the closest base that we'll be for longer than a day.
  • Make a West Marine run. In addition to needing stuff, we also have things to return.
  • Play with Echo, Mom and Dad's new dog. We miss having a pet out here. For us, it's just isn't fair to any pet that we could have because of all the inland trips we want to take. And we can't easily visit the South Pacific with an animal.
  • Sand and reseal Mom and Dad's bench. This was a 40th wedding anniversary gift to Mom and Dad made by my very talented cousin, and it needs to be tended to in order to protect the wood. A gift shouldn't mean work for the recipients so I offered to handle it. Besides, I have skill in that area now that we own a boat with lots of wood!
  • Visit Disneyland
  • If we make it to San Francisco (due to the military hop routing), eat loads of our favorite sushi at Kabuto!!!
  • And Ice Cream at Tuckers.
  • Even if we don't make it to San Francisco, we have a lot of ice cream to research. Maybe a new one every day.
  • Find some new books on tape for our passages.
  • Visit Blockbuster or Hollywood to replenish and renew our DVD collection. They have a great deal on previously-viewed movies.
  • Abe said he wants to go to the movie theater every day. I'm not sure there will be enough movies out to sustain that, but I'm sure we'll be going two or three times a week. When we're not there, we'll be in my sister and brother-in-law's new home theater watching whatever we can get our hands on.
  • Since it sounds like we'll be eating a lot of ice cream and microwave popcorn and fast food and pizza, we'll need to run often so as not to gain weight. Small price to pay for the yummy food!
  • Take a shower in a real shower every day. And maybe two times a day.
  • Drink real Diet Coke, not Coca Lite. It tastes different in Mexico and Central America, and I don't care for it.

The thing we look most forward to, though, is seeing friends and family. We miss you guys! Back to the top.

 

June 3 - 4, 2005: We sleep near the President

We had some excitement in San Salvador even though we were only there for a day and a half. We've noticed a marked difference between Mexico and El Salvador. Not bad or good, just different. It's kind of fun to be exploring a new country after 7 months in Mexico. It's a little bit disjointed journal entry, but it's a quick update.

The hotel in San Salvador that was recommended by Heriberto at The Compound was Myer's House Hotel. It was an old house, converted to a 9 room bed and breakfast. It's a beautiful place. It's in a good part of town, only blocks from the house for the President of El Salvador! We could even see over the wall to his house from our hotel. There was a quaint coffee shop a couple of blocks from the hotel where we spent rainy afternoons with me getting her behind kicked at cribbage (it certainly isn't my strategy. The cards simply weren't going my way. Even Abe felt sorry for me losing game after game after game.). Great coffee and yummy chocolates, though.

We were walking back from the mall where we had watched a movie, and had seen part of a fashion show for Father's Day (how surreal is that?) when we strolled past the President's front gate. All of a sudden, the gates swung open, 4 motorcycles came streaming out, leading 2 SUVs and a trail car. The President was on the move! The back window was down on one SUV, and a nice gentleman with a machine gun (versus the shotguns we've normally been seeing) was scanning the cars, sidewalks, etc. with the gun pointed in our general direction. When a US President is on the move, I think the Secret Service guys point the guns from behind tinted windows, don't they? It made us both want to drop what we were carrying and put our hands in the air just to show that we were not a threat! A little bit of excitement in our lives.

Nelson, the hotel manager, drove Abe and I to El Centro to find a birthday present for my nephew. We've been looking for something very specific in Mexico, but hadn't found just the right one yet. Steven will get the first present we bring from El Salvador. After we picked up said gift, we had to stop at a department-store type store. I stayed outside near the package claim because we didn't want to leave our two cameras where someone might get them. Abe and Nelson walked inside and I people-watched. Within 5 minutes, two gentlemen (separate from one another), walked to the armed guard at the door, and handed him a personal sidearm. He took it, walked to a small podium just inside the door, locked the handguns and gave the gentleman a claim check number. Then I noticed on the door that no cameras and no guns were allowed inside. This guard was also doing double-duty to check in non-gun packages and backpacks. He noticed me standing and asked me if I wanted to go inside where it was cooler. I told him I had two cameras, implying (since I couldn't say this part in Spanish) that I didn't want to check them into the bookcase with other backpacks.. He said that it was no problem and locked them in with the guns! Cool. Back to the top.

 

June 3 - 8, 2005: Our Mastercard commercial

  • June 3, 9 am - van from The Compound to Usulutan, free, 40 minutes
  • June 3, 10:30 am - almost a chicken bus from Usulutan to San Salvador, $3 USD, 2.5 hours, no movie
  • June 3 - June 4, hotel stay at Myer's House Hotel, $89 USD, 2 nights
  • June 3 - June 4, 15 cribbage card games, free, score Abe 10, Amy 5 (my luck started turning bad. Couldn't get the crib card to help me whatsoever!)
  • June 4 - movie Out of Time and popcorn, $12, 2 hours (it was a yucky, rainy day)
  • June 5, 2:15 pm - bus ride from San Salvador to Tegucigalpa, $85 USD, 6.5 hours, movies, Pirates of the Caribbean and Something's Gotta Give
  • June 5, 5 PM - border stop, $7 USD, 45 minutes
  • June 5 - 6, hotel stay at Marriott, $160 USD, 2 nights (most expensive hotel we've seen since leaving the States. And this was with Abe's military discount, yes, US military discount in Honduras)
  • June 5 - 6, internet connection in the room, $10, unlimited surfing and AIM'ing my Mom, sister, and sister-in-law for 24 hours
  • June 5 - 6, long, hot showers with lots of water pressure, a bathroom all to myself, plenty of room to shave my legs, worth at least $50 out of out $160 hotel bill, 2 hours
  • June 5 - June 6, 15 cribbage card games, free, running score Abe 25, Amy 5 (my luck has gone completely sour. I'm getting skunked in my games now - that's losing very badly)
  • June 6 - McDonald's hamburger, fries, hot apple pie and US-flavored Diet Coke (not sure why here, but it was goooooood), $7, 30 minutes (this McDonald's had free internet connection on 3 computers, free wireless connection to said internet. Pretty impressive). Coke and Pepsi have different flavors in different parts of the world. The Diet Coke is similar in Mexico and Central America, but not quite right.
  • June 7 - 7 am - taxi ride from Marriott to the base at Soto Cano, Honduras, $50 USD (oh my gosh it was expensive!), 1.5 hours. There was no bus that would take us there; taxi was our only choice.
  • June 7 - 8:45 am - ride in someone's Explorer from front gate to air terminal, free, 10 minutes
  • June 7 - 9 am - finding out the flight had been delayed a day, Big Sigh, 5 seconds
  • June 7 - 9:30 am - securing a room to sleep for a night on base, free, 15 minutes
  • June 7 - card games and TV in the rec center on base, running score on cribbage Abe 30, Amy 5. Then I got smart and we played a new game. Abe 2, Amy 1. Not great, but at least better than cribbage. I figure this bodes well for my luck in Vegas. Bad cards now, luck changes, we'll head to Vegas Baby!
  • June 8 - 6 PM - military flight to Charleston, free, 3.5 hours
  • Being back home in the United States, priceless

Back to the top.

 

June 9, 2005: We make it to Florida

Flying on military aircraft is a great way to fly, but you don't get peanuts to eat. We rented a car, paying extra for the insurance since we no longer carrying car insurance, and got on the road headed to Florida. Our first order of business was to eat; the idea was to get out of the airport and to eat. We started seeing signs and businesses that we hadn't seen in 7 months. Big, beautiful American flags were the first thing we noticed. Of course, we've seen American flags in Mexico and El Salvador on many boats. But those huge flags that fly at car dealerships we hadn't seen in ages - a beautiful reminder that we were home! Bank of America, Waffle House, Chick-Fil-A, Waffle House and smooth roads.

We stopped at Chick-Fil-A, and I was in heaven with my waffle fries and real ketchup. Mexico has salsa ketchup that tastes funny to me. I haven't had fries with ketchup since leaving. The guy behind the counter taking our order said y'all. Not that I heard that when we lived in California, but since I grew up in Tennessee y'all always reminds me of home.

The drive to Florida was a 7 hour drive and we weren't sure we'd be able to stay awake for the entire drive. We called my sister and told her not to expect us until we got there. Abe and I took turns driving and sleeping and stopped at a Waffle House for a cup of coffee. You know, Waffle House may not have the greatest food, but at least it's consistent. You know what you get will be the same at any Waffle House. And you can always count on seeing great characters there if you go after midnight. We weren't disappointed.

We arrived at my sister's house in Florida at 4:44 am. That is way too late (or early) to be knocking on someone's door - even if they're half expecting you. So we racked out in the car for a couple of hours. We were awakened at 7 a.m. by dogs barking and my niece following them around the side of the house to find what the commotion was all about. The dog wasn't bothered by the car, but by my foot hanging out of the window. Abe and I were able to keep our eyes pried open until 10:30 am, when we took a nap. We put my niece and nephew through the ringer making them suffer through our 5 hour nap. Poor kids. We get here, then go to sleep! Back to the top.

 

June 10 - 16, 2005: Our Florida visit

For those keeping track, we went from 32°56'45" N, 80°03'28" W in South Carolina to 27°58'05" N, 80°35'13" W to be here with family in Florida.

We had a wonderful time visiting here, staying longer than we expected. Abe was really enjoying playing with Jeff setting up his new home theater. We ate lots of ice cream, getting the kids into a nice sugar fix each night right before bed. Hey, what are aunts and uncles for? The kids love for aunts or Grammy & PopPop to visit because they get to eat all sorts of bad stuff (read that: good stuff!!) that they normally don't get! And they get to stay up late. Lisa (their mom) says that it takes them weeks after a visit to get back on schedule again. That means we're doing our jobs right!

Steven's birthday was going to fall while we were in Tennessee, so in order that he could have more ice cream (and celebrate with his Dad), we had a Florida birthday party. We brought Steven a guitar from El Salvador. Abe plays the guitar, and Steven is very interested in things that the men in his life (his Dad, PopPop (that's Dad to me), etc.) are involved in. This is a good time in his life to see if he enjoys learning and playing. And it's kind of cool for a kid of any age to get something from a different country.

Abe and I took (dragged) the McCowns to West Marine to gather some stuff from the list. We needed lug nuts, wire (to wire a battery connector to the windlass), 5 gallon sun shower (our 8 gallon is too large to hang), sound/heat insulation (to close off our refrigerator compressor because it's heating the cabin), paint (don't know how we'll fare getting it on the airplane), HSB/Nema/SeaTalk cable to connect our radar to the autopilot, Creeping Crack Cure (liquid epoxy), and gasoline biocide (to protect the outboard from the gas going bad). We returned a number of circuit breakers we hadn't used during our revamping of electrical, an extension cable for our forward-looking probe, and other small items. Not a bad trip.

Jeff and Lisa turned the 3-car garage that was built with the house into a home theater. Since they moved in last September, they've been working on getting a new garage (to actually house the cars!) and getting settled into the house. They began work on the theater in April or May, but I think Jeff picked up the pace to finish the theater because he wanted to have it ready for Abe. It's a beautiful piece of work. I think Abe is drooling over getting one of those in the house we eventually build. Jeff has all the science down - how large to make the screen (painted with a special paint right onto the wall), how far back to put the seats, where the speakers all belong - it's amazing. We were there for the opening night complete with pizza, popcorn and admission tickets. The "real" seats hadn't been delivered yet so we made do with the kitchen table and chairs from around the house. Abe, Stacy and Jeff had gone to see Star Wars III at the real theater. Since Episode I, II and now III started coming out just about the time it was appropriate for the kids to see movies of this kind, Jeff thought he'd hold off showing them Episodes IV - VI until they'd seen the first three. Both of them knew the plot and all sorts of stuff from each episode from playing the Lego Star Wars game, but they hadn't see the movies. The opening night showing was appropriately Episode IV, A New Hope.

We ordered a new laptop. Not because the Dell isn't working anymore, but because we're finding a use for having two laptops so that we can both do internet work when at a cafe. And it's a good excuse to get a new one with a 17" widescreen to better watch movies. We'd been doing research on-line since El Salvador (and talking about it since we saw Pam and Scott with two in October). We had a very old Toshiba that took 5 minutes just to boot up. The one to use is was the slow one on the draw to get the Dell, but would cuss at it since it was so slow. Just as an FYI, we had a very poor on-line shopping experience with HP. It seemed like one thing after another happened and HP wasn't too keen on making things better. We had a much better experience with Dell when we bought my laptop 2 years ago. The reason we didn't buy a Dell again this time was because they didn't offer the big widescreen that we wanted. I'm not sure the hassle we had with HP was worth the screen. And our computer shipped (read that: was built) in China. Abe and I try as hard as we can to not buy anything Made in China. It's getting harder and harder, but we prefer to support free nations. I didn't see anything on HP's website saying that they were made in China (not that I looked for that specifically), but we were surprised to see it shipping from Shanghai. Enough of my complaint. We have the laptop now and it's nice. HP does make a good product.

By Thursday the 13th, it was time to head to Tennessee. Most of our stuff that we'd ordered online to date had been delivered and it was time to see Mom and Dad. Stacy is the navigator, Steven is in charge of snacks. With 3 drivers, Stacy didn't have to do too much this trip. But with the extra people in the van, Steven was kept busy with orders for sodas or snacks. With 3 drivers Lisa said the 12 hour trip wasn't bad at all! Back to the top.

 

June 17 - June 30, 2005: Movies and Ice Cream

We're now in Tennessee at Mom and Dad's house. Lisa and her kids are here for a week along with us. We celebrated Steven's birthday (of course you have to celebrate with Grammy & PopPop - they give great presents and birthday cake!) and relaxed at home. We met their new dog, Echo, a beautiful Lab mix. We continued our barrage on daily ice cream and started sneaking out to watch movies. Mom and Dad have a big house, a little bit of land and we've enjoyed having so much space after living with so little on the boat. We helped out with some housework, painting some external window frames, sealing the deck, etc. It helps us feel like we've earned our keep. There wasn't much going on other than card playing, relaxing, little bit of house work and general visiting. The McCowns headed back to Florida, and we celebrated my birthday. It's been years since we've been in Tennessee for my birthday and it was great to have Mom make my favorite yellow cake, chocolate ice cream and my Grammy's fudge. Nice celebration. Abe got me a Rio Karma MP3 player. This is the same MP3 player he got for his birthday. Now we have one just for music and one for books on tape. We use the MP3s on night watch to help keep us awake. Now we're able to hold twice as much. Plus I can put what I want on mine and not have to ask permission to use disk space on Abe's! Back to the top.

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