Pierless Adventures - March 28 - A Bounce to the Rubber Room

Today's plan was to hop a bus south to the central district "Centro" in search of epoxy, a hose adapter, thimbles for rope, caulk and belts for the engine.  Most of these items were to be shipped UPS to us here in MX, but that didn't work out...  So, off to the maritime district where most of the commercial shipping activity happens.  

We took the green bus south.  The green buses are among the finest in Mazatlan public transportation.  The windows are not painted, they are quieter and they have A/C!  Also more leg room.  They cost 2 pesos ($0.10) more, but worth it.

We exited the bus at the Monumento al Pescador (monument to the fisherman) roundabout.  From there we walked a few blocks to the "rubber room".  This is the establishment recommended to us for engine belts.  I had looked many places closer to the marina last spring - to no avail.  Though small, they had just what I needed.  One item off the list.

We walked farther along in the direction of the maritime center, hoping to find a plumbing store where we could buy a fitting.  Eventually we tired of this and took a cab to the what we thought would be a marine hardware store.  It was an "open air" cab, so we enjoyed the breeze in the warming sun.  The cabbie had a little trouble finding the place, but eventually dropped us off at our destination.  It turns out the shop was more for power boats and fishing vessels.  Not small sailboats.  The staff were helpful though, and directed us to another store about 5 blocks away.

After a few wrong turns and an introduction to some particularly nasty odors emanating from a parked truck, we found the Accessories Marine store.  They actually had a good assortment of items for boaters. We picked up caulk, fuses and bulbs.  They had epoxy, but only in larger quantities than we needed, so we passed on that.  The attendant gave us directions to a plumbing store, so we headed out following the map he had drawn for us.

This is where I started having flashback to last spring when I was here working on the boat.  I would get advice from someone about where to go to find something I needed, and most of the time it would just be flat out wrong.  We followed the directions and found all the expected landmarks, but no store.  We continued walking for some time in the general direction we know would bring us back to the boat, but found nothing.  Lots of shops - no plumbing.

Eventually we caught a bus, hoping it would take us back toward the monument, but it continued south and west, so we just went along for the ride - it was air conditioned...  We saw the old market area and other sights.  Eventually, we got off where we got on - must have made the driver curious.  By now we were hot and footsore, so flagged down a cab to take us back to the marina.  It was a nice ride through town and we topped off the trip with a good cup of coffee at the local coffee shop.

While we did score needed items, the primary goal was to get some epoxy, so the trip was mostly a waste of most of the day.  It was nice getting out and seeing more of the town, but we still needed the materials.

Fortunately Juan (our Argentinean neighbor in the yard) was doing his own boat repairs and had extra material we could use, so we will be using his epoxy tomorrow morning to fix the rudder.  

We made good progress on the head this afternoon, so hopefully we can splash later this week!  Dave, our third crew member, is scheduled to arrive on Monday.  I am looking forward to a different face to look at!

Town pic from cab:

Scott leading the way like he knows where he is...

Artificial turf - with weeds:

From Scott:

"If we can't get it with a little lube and a couple of yanks, let's just collar it." There have been a number of these unintentional double entendres lately and I wonder what anyone passing by the boat would think. We already stand out like two thumbs at a pedicure and when we go out to eat we are automatically given English menus before we even open our mouths to speak. We passed a young girl coming home from school in her blue blazer and skirt with white socks and she smiled at Brian and said, "Hello" in perfect English. Not Guten Tag, or Ni Hao or How's it goin', eh? Just "hello."

On our travels in the Industrial Park today we happened by a beautiful green lawn, well kept and manicured, but on closer inspection it became evident that it was AstroTurf. The great thing was that it was covered with weeds that had poked through enhancing the reality while still blending in with the surrounding area. It was an odd jumble of heavy industry, shops, abandoned buildings, homes and sidewalk food vendors crammed together in a large urban area completely devoid of street signs.

As we are roughly at 23 degrees north latitude, at noon the sun is pretty much directly overhead and I slithered along whatever walls provided even the slimmest ribbon of shade until we got back to the boatyard. Chester was there to say hello. Not Guten Tag, just hello.