High and dry for repairs

On Thursday, WW rented a little white car and we set off for English Harbour. The first bit of the drive was a long a glorious coastline. Then we turned inland and travelled past Fig Tree Hill. In the Caribbean, figs are short fat delicious bananas, and the hill is aptly named since it is absolutely coated in fig trees. At the Roman Catholic church in Sweetes, we hung a right and it was a clear run to English Harbour. At the Slipway Dock, we collected the propeller papers.

Then it was off to St. John's, capital of Antigua, for a brief explore and to get chips to put in our phones, rendering them non-long-distance on the island. We also have chips for St. Kitts and Nevis. We lunched in St. John's on Redcliffe Quay. I was delighted to learn that this area is named after one of the loveliest churches I have ever visited: St. Mary Redcliffe in Bristol, England.

Then we drove to the airport. Foolishly, I had brought a book that I was planning to read while WW dealt with customs, propellers and associated red tape. Hah. The customs shed was not at the airport but a mile or so beyond. And it was a shed. A very big shed, but a shed. It featured seats only for those involved in generating red tape. Actually, to be fair, it all went rather quickly. As we waited, WW confessed to me that he hoped he'd ordered the right propellers. He knew the ones on Django were to big and had the wrong pitch. He wasn't sure which way they were supposed to turn and whether two or three blades was optimal. He'd done a lot of research on the Web and had taken the plunge. Shortly, we loaded a heavy box of propellers into our car and drove back to Jolly Harbour.

Grungy, old, too-big, wrong-pitch propeller.

Oxtail stew for dinner and some preparation for our haul out on Saturday.

Friday was more of the same, plus a hunt for accommodations while our home was on the hard. We found a couple of dramatically expensive all-inclusives and finally rented a waterfront Jolly Harbour villa for just over half the price. Even with eating out, it would be less expensive.

Django on the hard in Jolly Harbour Boat Yard.

Leader of the painting team, he's a singer,
so his cousin calls him Bob Marley. And so did we.

I will not go into details of the next few days. Haulout was Saturday and we were back in the water by Tuesday afternoon. WW managed to install the props and the paintwork was done by a crew of very professional fellows. WW also managed to repair a problem with the port engine that was overheating. My only contribution was to adjust the trampoline and tighten its bindings. For a full explanation of his mechanical awesomeness, please visit his blog at aboarddjango2.blogspot.com

Shiny new propeller.