2025-05-11 A Busy Week in Vero Beach

A short motor up the 12 miles to Vero Beach, and we got a mooring ball for the week.  We had many projects to do, and packages to receive.  Monday we took the bus into town and got groceries, and then Dean went further in to Home Depot for some parts, and Kris went to the chiropractor.

Back to boat, and gathered our first round of package arrivals.

It's just like Christmas - but we don't get near this much at Christmas

 

Unpacked and ready to put away - not all projects, some fun stuff.

Not all the packages are boat parts for projects, some just fun stuff.  New cutting boards, new shirt for Kris, new sauté pan, new rug for boat entry, vitamins, Instapot, food, cover for Kobo reader, footstool, pizza pan, bread pans, water hose, sunglasses and some other miscellaneous small stuff.  

Also boat stuff, but more was stuff for us that we "needed".   

Kris did engine maintenance, changing the oil and filters, fuel filters, and replacing the port raw water pump with a rebuilt one.  Dean helped rebuild the pump.   She has an irritating oil leak on the starboard engine, but needs parts and time to fix that one, so ordered the parts in, specifying they had to arrive by Friday, which she was told was no problem - remember that.

Another major project was removing our starboard forward salon window, which leaked a tiny bit in heavy downpours - we are talking less than a teaspoon - but it irritated us.  So nearly a day to remove the well sealed in window - clean, reseal and re-install the window. 

Kris working on removing the sealant from inside the window.  She had the easier part, Dean spent about an hour slowly pounding a putty knife in the gap to loosen the sealant

We got it out in one piece, no damage.

Cleaning up all the old sealant and loose material around the window frame before installing the window again.  Umbrella for sun protection

Tuesday we went out to dinner with our friends Scott and Tina who used to own Sangaris, a Manta 42.  We met them in the Bahamas over 10 years ago, and see them every time we come through Vero Beach.  It was great to catch up.

Thanks to Scott for the photo

Dean tried out our new bread pans, they work great, much less sticky than the old ones, and prettier too.

Dean made poppy seed bread that he has for breakfast

 The new sail arrived - YEAH 😀.    Dean is happy, he has wanted one for several years.  

Dean happy about the new sail arrival

We removed the old sail, all the battens and hardware, and folded the old one up.  Then put the new track sliders on the new sail - short one slider - oh well, ordered that, it will function minus one slider, as we had added 6 more sliders than the old sail had.  Then put the battens in - but of course they would not fit correctly with the new hardware, so had to modify the ends of all the battens, then cut them to a new length and install them.   Finally, new sail installed, but too windy to raise it while on the mooring, so will have to wait on that.  

Unfortunately, with more sliders the sail rests higher up on the mast, and the old sail cover won't fit, so now we have to modify the sail cover.

The new sail sits up higher on the mast.  Kris can't reach to attach the halyard, so we will leave that on all the time now, and will have to figure out a new method of storing it.  Will also have to figure out how to modify and install the sail cover because it goes up higher now.

Our new helm seat arrived, so installed that, should have been simple, but no.  We live on a boat, so that means every project must be more difficult.    The mounting holes did not line up, so had to drill new holes.  Then the seat was too high, as the old seat was much less padded, so had to cut down the mounting post.   

Old seat on right, new one on left.  Quite the difference.  We had painted the old one, and Kris made new cushions for it a couple of years ago, but the paint is wearing away, and the cushion foam is worn out, so finally splurged for a new seat.

Dean removed the sling seat, took out all the old rusty grommets, and foam that was slowly disintegrating, and put in new grommets and foam and re-installed.

It doesn't look any different from a distance, but no rusty grommets, no foam falling out, and nice and comfy again.

We did 4 loads of laundry up at the laundry room, and got eaten by no-see ums.

Kris took the dinghy over to the chiropractor whose office was near a dock she could use, and got her back worked on a couple of times - doing better, but still not completely healed up.

We also made another trip to the Home Depot for miscellaneous stuff - it is about an hour bus ride away, but the bus is free.   Had time for lunch out while waiting for the bus.

Fine curb dining

We also took the bus on the shorter route to the UPS store to do some Amazon returns that did not work.  One return was our new (refurbished) Surface Pro we wanted to use for navigation to replace our old one.   Going cheap did not work, as it would not hold a charge, so returned that.  Also got some more groceries.  Our friends Scott and Tina offered use of the car for our errands, but we hate to impose, and the free bus works really well - and gives us a bit of a relaxation break from boat work.  Plus, people watching is always interesting.

Our last package was due to arrive on Friday, so we planned on leaving Saturday.  Those engine parts that were going to arrive on Friday - will thank USPS, now arriving Monday, so we will hang out a couple more days, and as soon as the package arrives, will head north to St. Augustine.

In the meantime we will work on the dinghy - which has a leak somewhere - probably the patch we did when it was shot needs to be redone or something new.   The fun continues 😖