While we were on the mooring ball a couple days ago, the generator started making a horrendous noise. Of course, Peter shut it off immediately and quickly discovered that the fresh water pump was not working. The last couple days, Peter and Willy from the South African boat two slips away worked on it. Peter was able to find a spare among the great number of spare parts stashed in various places throughout the boat. A bolt broke as he was removing the old one, but the two mechanically inclined men managed to drill a new hole and carefully reassemble the works so that it works better than ever. Even though we have shore power here, it’s 50 cycles and the refrigeration prefers 60, so we are running the generator an hour or so a day now just to keep our food fresh.
Another cruise ship came in to port for a few hours, disgorging hundreds of tourists. When a cruise ship is here, the square in front of the north pier where it is berthed fills up with vendors of arts and crafts. Although there is some kitsch, there is actually nice hand-crafted jewelry and other items at reasonable costs. The kids and I strolled through in the late morning on the way to the post office and the grocery store. We go to the store daily with our own bags since it’s hard to carry too much for four or five blocks.
After snorkeling with Matthew in the afternoon and reading a book lying on the foredeck as I dried off, I walked the few blocks to the market on my own. It was quite a treat to be by myself. I enjoyed talking with the friendly vendors, one of whom told me about a couple good snorkeling spots I haven’t visited yet, and actually buying a few items. I stopped on the way back to make reservations at La Flamboyant, where we went for dinner with Willy and his wife Lynn in the evening.
Snorkeling continued to be wonderful. Yesterday I saw an extraordinary shrimp with a tiny body, smaller than a penny, and disproportionately long legs. Today, Matthew and I spotted the white-spotted filefish in its orange phase again as well as dozens of various kinds of parrotfish, which delight Matthew. There were juvenile, intermediate and adult yellowtail damselfish. The tiny young ones, just a couple inches long, are oval-shaped and their dark blue bodies are covered with iridescent light blue spots. The tail is translucent. At the intermediate stage, the jewel-like blue spots are found only along the top, but the tail has become bright yellow. By adulthood, the speckles have faded, but the yellow tail flashes distinctively at the back of the bluish-black fish.
We also found a large permit swimming over the sandy bottom, the first we’ve ever seen, and tiny fairy basslets on the reef. Returning to the boat, we found a large snapper under out keel as well as a great barracuda. I’m told there are turtles and toadfish at the two new snorkeling areas. More to look forward to!
April 17, 2008 – Today it was quite windy, making it nice and cool on the boat although it still felt hot away from the waterfront. Most of the day was spent with school work.
The UPS man finally delivered the package with the autopilot. Upon opening it, Peter was quite dismayed to find that the circuit diagram and the spare parts had not been included, meaning we have waited and Peter has dealt with the bureaucracy of customs only to get nothing other than the malfunctioning autopilot back. Peter diligently worked with it most of the day, and it seems to work right now. The fault has always been intermittent and has just been occurring more and more frequently. The man at the repair facility in Canada responded to Peter’s scathing e-mail today with a mea culpa, offering to send the parts at the company’s expense. He just has no idea how long it takes to receive packages here, and we can’t wait another week or two before heading north. We hope it at least keeps working for the next couple long passages.
Peter and I escaped from our boat maintenance and teaching duties around 5 p.m. and snorkeled for a while. There were about four dozen squid under the dock in a couple groups. We found a number of large horse-eyed jacks with bulging black eyes and yellow tails swimming around the boat. Swimming south along the reef bordering the waterfront, we saw numerous eels, mostly green and spotted morays, but I also encountered a chain moray. There was also a tarpon, the big permit, and a barracuda, not to mention the usual suspects—parrotfish, tangs, doctorfish, angelfish, yellowtail snappers, etc. There were quite a few orange-spotted filefish with white spots on the upper base of their tail and pail horizontal stripes (not to be confused with the larger white-spotted filefish in its orange phase). Around Karel’s pier, we saw many schools consisting of hundreds of small fish, probably herrings, as well yet another new fish for us, about a two-foot black margate. We both saw a porcupine fish, but Peter missed seeing the reddish, prickly balloonfish hiding under a ledge.
April 18, 2008 – Peter continued to fiddle with the autopilot, trying to locate the source of the intermittent fault. The kids and I kept busy with school, although we took a long break in the early afternoon so that Matthew and I could snorkel. Katya just swam a little since she does not enjoy looking at the beautiful fish. (This is totally incomprehensible to the rest of us.) We saw a lot of bicolor damselfish and bar jack and white mullets and one rock hind as well as two black margates. Around the pier, there were rivers of fish, as Matthew called them, which he repeatedly tried to join by diving into the midst of them, only dispersing the schools of herring. Matthew found an interesting caterpillar-like creature on the coral rubble.
Right before sunset, Peter and I snorkeled along the waterfront. This is when nocturnal creatures begin to stir. Black-spined sea urchins were creeping out from under the ledges and coral reefs. Many eels had left their hiding places, and we spotted a goldentail moray in addition to the usual spotted morays, green morays, purplemouth morays and chain morays. In addition, we found a blue and red shrimp snapping its pincers at us and a crab with a tiny body and skinny golden legs. The only fish not around today was the permit.
I’m sure that many of the fish I “discover” each day have been present before. However, every day I study the fish book, and as my knowledge of the variety of fish increases, my perception rises.
We went to dinner at La Guernica again in the evening. As usual, the food and service were excellent. Peter raved about the sauces and the perfection of cooking of the fish. The kids rushed back to the boat to enjoy the internet while we have it as soon as they finished eating, and Peter and I took our time and then walked along the waterfront. This place has a wonderful, relaxed ambiance. We plan to leave the day after tomorrow. Bonaire will be one of the places in the Caribbean which we would look forward to visiting again.
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