As sugar shack is a boat, there is always something to do, maintence or repairs or modifications to make her more home. These last few months in St Lucia were no different. The difference between us and full time cruisers is we go back to work and let someone else take care of the chores. And trust that they get done correctly. Rodney Bay marina is run by Edwin, who used to run the yard, and always took great care of us and have definitely earned our trust. The new yard manager is Frederic and he is no different. They are always available to answer emails and questions and to make sure things get done on time/budget/schedule. Thats not to say its always ahead of time, but its is island time after all.

This trip, they hauled the shack out of the water and put a fresh coat of Island 44 bottom paint on her so she should be good to go for a while. This time Christine wanted red so the bottom of the boat changed from blue to red, course most is underwater so you will only see it when swimming at anchor.

While she was out of water they also washed/waxed and polished her, so we should just have to rinse her off a bit and be underway after getting some provisions and gasoline for the dingy.

We also had some wood work rejuvenated, the teak on the sugar scoops should be updated and the few places that were varnished revarnished. We were going to have the cockpit table redone as well, but waited a little too long to start that project and it wouldn’t be done in time for us leave the island. We shall see how that work turned out, we got photos of the polish and bottom job along the way, but never asked for or received the wood work photos.

We also had a cap tube filter installed on the freezer. We had a dickens of time tracking down the right guy to do that work. Finally when I was there in February, I made contact with Prudent, the expert, as I was just about to leave for the airport. We had the boat put back in the water 3 weeks ago, so that the freezer work could be done, Prudent is a super nice guy and eventually got the work done, yesterday morning. So much for leaving it running and testing it out as our original plan was, but hopefully the educated guess of what was up with the keel cooler and capillary tube will go well. The boat has to be in the water to use the freezer and refrigerator as they use the ocean water to cool off the compressed gas that makes the freezer cool.

A little more than an hour till touch down, its along way down, but the water is blue and the bahamas water sure is beautiful.