Wednesday, March 6, 1996 - Last Log

Busy day. When we were at IMS, Roy took the mainsail to the sailmaker there to have it repaired. Yesterday, when he unrolled the sail to put it back on the mast, he saw some broken plastic pieces that needed to be replaced. Also, neither of us could figure out how to put the batten holders back on. On this morning's VHF net, we asked if anyone knew of a good, reliable place to get a sail repaired, and someone told us to take it to Barrow Sails at Powerboats. Roy talked to them on the VHF, and they said they'd try to fix it for us this week, and they'd pick it up if we'd take it to the dock. So we rolled the sail back up (no easy task), Roy inflated my good old rubber rowboat, dropped the sail into it, and towed it to the TTYA dock. Then he took his bicycle ashore the same way, much to my amazement. The rowboat was too small for the bike, but he put the bike in it anyway. I thought either the boat would sink or the bike would fall off it, but neither happened, and he got his bike ashore successfully. He came back to the boat to get his clothes and heard someone calling him on the VHF. He thought it was Barrow Sails, so he told them he'd come ashore as soon as he could. Instead, it was his friend Rudy, who had brought over a friend who was interested in buying the extra Speed/Log that Roy wanted to sell. Roy thought everything was complete and brand new, but when he opened the box, he was embarrassed to discover that he had used some of the new parts as replacements. Rudy's friend is going to see if he can get it to work with the old parts. If he can, he'll buy it. Under the circumstances, Roy is only going to charge him $50 instead of $150. Rudy drove the mainsail to Powerboats, and Roy followed on his bicycle. The sailmaker had never seen batten holders like the ones we have before, but he's going to check around and see if he can find suitable replacements. In the meantime, I paddled around Point Gourde to returnt the charts that the man on Tanamara had loaned us three weeks ago. I didn't know the color of his boat or the length or whether it was a sloop or a ketch or a schooner or a yawl or a cat or whatever. All I knew was the name and that it was anchored somewhere in the vicinity of Powerboats -- among 300 other sailboats. It only took me an hour to get over there (including the time spent hiding in a cave out of a sudden shower), but it took more than an hour to find Tanamara. I paddled all over the anchorage, looking at boat names and asking people if they knew where Tanamara was anchored, but no one did. Finally, I asked a man in a rowboat, who was just pulling away from his boat. To my surprise and joy, he was the one who had loaned us the charts! Another two minutes, and he would have been gone. He returned to his boat, and I handed up the charts. On my way back to Jofian, I checked out Little Alcatraz and was surprised to discover it wasn't abandoned at all! A supply boat was just leaving the dock, and a line of strong young men were carrying heavy sacks on their shoulders up the long flight of steps. When I was within about fifty feet of the shore, I got shooed away, so I went out another hundred feet and paddled around the backside of the island. It was three o'clock when I got back to Jofian. Roy had eaten lunch but I hadn't, so I gulped down whatever was handy and then went to the grocery store. (This is the last log mom wrote, the next day she went for a walk on a nature trail and never returned. Her body was found three days later.)