What day is it? I’m so confused. Late Tuesday night I left the house in heavy downpours and climbed on a bus headed for Guaymas. It’s a twelve hour bus ride, but fortunately not the chicken buses of old. These days we get wifi and two clean non-stinky bathrooms—and not a chicken in sight. The only real downside to the overnight bus is that there seems to be a stop in some small town about once an hour so that just about the time you fall asleep the bus stops and the lights come on for five minutes. Enough to knock me off my game. I arrived in Guaymas exhausted.
I arrived at the boat down the road in San Carlos and was happy to see that it had been moved to the work yard as promised. I walked wordlessly past the guard at the gate and climbed aboard wondering if all gringos got a free pass. A quick scan of the boat showed no major problems. The rain had found a place to leak through on one of our skylights leaving a small dirty dried puddle on our kitchen counter. But aside from that the boat looked good—exactly as I’d left her.
After an hour, Omar, the mechanic a friend had referred to me, showed up. We went right to work. Surveying the engine I asked how long he thought it would take to remove the head and pull the transmission? “Couple hours.” This would have required a couple of days of my time I’m certain. At least the first time around.
And he was right. In ninety minutes he had the head off. We were pleasantly surprised by the condition of everything. He confirmed that the problem had been the head gasket. There was one very distinct spot where water had been getting past the gasket to the piston.
We went and grabbed some lunch from the grocery store and then sat under a tree near the beach like kids on a first date.
Then back to the engine where we pulled the transmission in just a few minutes. Lifting it out of the boat and lowering it down to the ground with the boom was the part that took us an hour.
With that done we called it a day. He’s bringing the head to a shop to have it tested. Fingers crossed there won’t be a crack in a cylinder. If there’s not then we should just be looking at replacing the gasket and putting things back together again. There didn’t appear to be any other issues. He’s going to take the transmission back to his shop and take a look at that. From the looks of it, it seems that the nut inside that holds the shaft coupler section to the tranny simply came loose. Probably because of improper alignment of the shaft or engine mounts or whatever by me. Anyway, he’s going to have a look and make sure everything else is good in there.
Engine projects completed I put the boat back together again, showered, and headed straight back to the bus terminal. I was thirty minutes late, but managed to walk up to the desk and ask just as the bus pulled up, also thirty minutes late. And there was exactly one seat available. Sometimes the universe helps a brother out.
On the bus I got an e-mail from Ali saying a hurricane was coming somewhere north of Mazatlan, i.e. somewhere right along my bus route. Perfect. This is what happens when you don’t watch television and you don’t ever think about the weather because it is the same every day—a hurricane sneaks up on you.
As I type this we’re driving through Culiacán which is where the little picture of this category one Hurricane Manuel is coming ashore. It’s raining pretty good, but our driver isn’t slowing down for no stinking hurricane.
With a bit of luck I’ll be arriving home in a few hours. Thirty-three hours I will have been gone, twenty-six of which will have been spent on buses. Sometimes I have to shake my head at my life.
While I was out traipsing around Mexico Ali was back in Mazatlan where Ouest was home from school—cancelled due to rain yet again—and the two kids were both going a little stir crazy. She was also battling a bat that had decided to spend the day hanging off the ceiling in the back bedroom. Good times all around.
16 Comments on “To the Boat”
I just commented on your last post which would have been a better comment for this post!!!!!!! Where is the pic of the bat????
Blurry. Presumably Ali didn’t spend a lot of time hanging around to focus. 🙂
PAT— brother… those are some hard times my friend… Seems to me like you escaped a few sudden-death’ moments– A Hurricane and a near Cracked head— lol… both would have set you back a few weeks… Someone upstairs is looking out for you… Glad things worked out for ALL YOU guys down there… Have a great weekend…. Thomas & Kelly… P.S. Tell Ali– we REALLY would have loved a pic of that ugly lil feller (giggle)
All right, everybody wants a picture, so I’ve added it. Gross.
Yeah, Mexico is getting pounded on both shores. Heads up!
this time of year can be very hard in Mexico. First, in tourist areas you have Septihambre, and then the flooding seasons. Chiapas, Oaxaca and Tabasco states will have horrific flooding and hurricanes will hit Tamps and the pacific coast. We have flooding here where just 45 km away the garbage trucks are almost under water.
Open all the windows and the doors as the sun is setting and it will fly right out.
Omar is The Man! Guy’s a great mechanic and a nice guy to boot.
Seriously, I feel very grateful that he was recommended to me by my Bum friends. Feels like we’re on the right path to getting this boat fixed and back out on the water.
Viva Omar!! to the rescue!! again!!
Viva!!
Pat,
Blown head gasket? Might as well just buy a new engine, or better yet a brand new catamaran…
Sorry, had to make fun of the previous stupidity.
I’m not quite ready to declare victory, but when I do… 🙂
I’m not quite ready to declare victory, but when I do………I prefer Dos Equis and eat pizza….:) “Stay thirsty, my friends.”
You should have instigram!
That would require a phone! We don’t do phones. In fact we are now a decade behind on the phone front and if you handed us an iPhone we wouldn’t know how to make a call, much less take a picture. 🙂