March 12.

Well, the shaft was bent badly and so we had to have a new one made, which happened amazingly fast. The mechanic had it reproduced within two days for under $350 including the coupling which broke when Sid tried to get it out. The yard called a specialist in to align the shaft. That took a while, he didn’t want to come thinking he wouldn’t make any money on a small boat. He works on giant ships, but Victor managed to talk him into coming. He was working for about 3 hours and charged us 65 bucks. Then we noticed that the stuffing box was missing. Someone in the yard took it. Once again we couldn’t splash, had to somehow get a new stuffing box. It took Sid three days to find out there was none here in Venezuela. Just as he was sitting on the computer starting to order one, Victor called and told us the Mechanic was in the yard with a stuffing box that might fit. I don’t think we ever raced faster to the yard. It fit and the mechanic was happy that he could help and we were happy to pay him 38 bucks for it. The bottom then was painted and Paradise was splashed yesterday and is happily floating in front of the house looking just beautiful.

By the way when you need some work done on the boat whether it is the mechanic, canvas guy, diver, painter, carpenter, you name it, if he tells you he’ll be there at 9 you have to ask him which day and which 9 am or pm or you will wait forever and still they will not show up till days later. Nobody ever shows up on time. As a matter of fact the first month we were here we had a dinghy cover made by Orient Canvas, it took a whole month to get it, even though he told us four days. But still to this day we haven’t paid for it. Yet we run into him daily reminding him to bring us the bill, nope haven’t paid for it yet. But as soon as you go into town like the mechanic that made the new shaft they get it done right away. Also had the wickers in our cabinets replaced, it took three days for that including carving grooves into back to fasten the wicker.

Last Thursday was not my lucky day. Our roommate was telling me that she finished sewing her cockpit cushions, motioning towards the balcony and walking towards it. I was so excited for her and of course wanted to see the cushions and followed her. She opened the sliding door and I attempted to walk out to the balcony when I bounced right of the window. What happened??? You have to know we have two huge glass sliding doors and one was all the way opened and doubled up with the other. What I thought I saw was her opening the door but was actually closing the open door. Even Sid and Gerry thought she was opening the door. I (Manuela) shattered my nose. The next day’s X-rays showed three broken parts and when the plastic surgeon saw how crooked the nose was she told me she had to break it some more to get it back into shape. Two options under anesthetic in hospital or right there in the office. So I told her to go for it right there. She gave me two pills to swallow, (I want to know what they are) and sent me back to the waiting room ordering me not to walk around just to sit there until they come and get me in twenty minutes. Jim who drove me to the hospital and the doctor were waiting out there for me. Not even three minutes later I told him that it was feeling funny and that I saw everything double, he grabbed me and leaned me on his shoulder and I was out cold. I woke up getting lifted onto my feet and with wobbly legs half walking half being dragged back into the doctor’s office. With several injections, very painful by the way, she numbed the area around my nose and told me to trust her. That didn’t sound good but I had no choice, she then wedged my head between her arm and body and started to break my nose over and over again. I think a total of five times while my legs kicked wildly into the air. The pain was excruciating but I heard her say that my nose wasn’t just broken on three parts it was shattered. Well I now have a cute white cast over my nose for seven days and it hasn’t hurt a bit, so far. My brother was teasing me because as a kid I never liked my nose and told me that this definitely was the wrong method to change the shape. I totally agree. Next Wednesday we’re going for Pizza and Karaoke night again, guess I will have to sing some French songs.

Other than that life in Venezuela is great, we’re still in the house and will be a bit longer as Paradise is getting a new varnish job inside out. Lockers will get painted with anti mildew paint. Sid will also paint the foredeck himself as they wanted way too much money for that. Manuela has been busy sewing. All the zippers on dodger are replaced. New covers made for various things on deck. Yesterday the new sun-awning was finished. Next project will be new shade for hull along refrigeration area, new cockpit cushions and new interior and so much more.

Yeah, we finally are having some friends come and visit. Our cruising buddies from the Seas Cortez Steve and Marsha on Spirit are flying out from San Francisco area and will be here for a week. Poor guys I hope they have room for some of their cloths as their suit cases are full of stuff for us. The day they leave we have our next guests Shanna and Roman arriving for also one week. So we will get a chance to relax between all the boat work, Sid is really in need of that as his sore shoulder hasn’t had a chance to heal. And they say cruising is fun LOL.

Now to Politics: El Presidentethreatens to arrest anybody who is charging more than he allows. Result, the affected people can’t afford to buy supply they then have to sell under cost, so beef, pork, poultry, milk and other things are hard to come by now days. Only the toughest cuts of meat are to be found. There is still no sugar, maybe every two months a small ration will be placed on the shelves which will be gone within minutes. Last week the public market’s meat section was shut down for three days because of charging too much. Rumor has it that they want to shut down the whole market completely, which is the income of too many poor Venezuelans and too many can only afford to shop there.

Also we had no water in four counties for the last three days, reason they had to do some work on a major water line. We have a big water tank on the roof which should give us enough water for a week. We hardly used it and yesterday the second day the tank was already below half and this morning barley anything was in it, we have a huge leak but have no idea where. Well the water came back for some 20 minutes, enough time to fill the tank before it shut off again. But we’re used to the drill as the water goes off at least three times a week.