The easy and safe way (by drone!)

Air Ops Mast Inspection
http://Air Ops Mast Inspection https://youtu.be/T6merBg1G2Y

(Yes, I know — one can’t really do a proper mast inspection this way – but it is a great preliminary tool)

After waiting for parts and doing many repairs, we successfully left Honolulu this am for Vancouver Island.

Garry has just finished 2 videos and uploaded them. They are about our trip from Nanaimo, BC, to Puerto Escondido, Mexico, to Cabo San Lucas (unexpected stop) then to Hawaii. Voice over will be added later, but for your immediate watching pleasure, please follow this link…

videos from home to Mexico to Hawaii

We made it to Honolulu, safely, and cleared customs on March 3rd. We haven’t posted much since we have all been busy with repairs, work, and other matters. Work and repairs continue, but I wanted to at least get this post out to let everyone know we are safe.

A number of people have reached out about International news of the floods on Oahu. So far, we have avoided any major issues with this. The good news is we are safely moored, although the current is running by us fairly fast. There are storm alerts and flood warnings daily. We also avoided the tsunami that we were warned about on day 2. All told – all good.

I hope to post more over the weekend.

After water maker delays in La Paz, then engine overheating approaching Cabo San Lucas, we ended up meeting more mechanics, visiting more marinas and facing more delays than we thought.

By Tuesday afternoon, we thought we had the engine overheating solved (faulty lines in the circulation system from the engine through the hot water heater, causing the coolant to run out of the engine heat exchanger every 30 minutes – took awhile to figure that one out). So we departed Cabo for Hawaii. And turned back after 5 nautical miles. The engine was overheating again. We discovered that the raw water pump belt kept slipping off the pump. We babied Air Ops back into port by midnight, just making it to the berth at Marina Cabo San Lucas before the belt cracked in 3 places and popped off again. After the engine cooled Garry and I took off the 2 outer belts and replaced the raw water one. After finding the last new spare in town, we were ready to depart for Hawaii again.

However, Rob let me know this am that he and Phia had decided they should head home. So Rob and I spent another 3.5 hours running (literally – Rob) back and forth amongst Marina, Port Capitan and Mexican immigration offices to get Rob and Phia off of our crew list and Zarpa, and with New Mexican immigration cards so they could leave. They won’t be continuing with us but I hope they learned lots in their time with us.

So now, the 3 of us are off to Hawaii!

Moon rising over the Sea of Cortez. On our way to Hawaii.

Had some delays in Mexico – water maker critical repairs, holiday on Monday, 6 hours and 5 government offices to check out of the country on Tuesday. Planking to head out tomorrow.