The blood in my veins ran cold. We had some rough weather all night and were finally just 20 miles off San Diego when something told me to go check the bilge. When I opened a floorboard the shock of seeing water sloshing against the bottom of it gripped me by the throat.  I knew Charisma has a four foot deep bilge, so water within an inch of the top was a LOT of water. Instantly I pulled off the rest of the floorboards exposing the manual bilge pump and started pumping like hell.  Almost right away it jammed.  A problem I was having as I tested it two months ago before leaving, but I thought it was solved. There had been a lot of shavings and junk in the bilge and the filter kept jamming.  I had cleaned it six times while in Berkeley and it seemed to have cleaned the bilge out, but now the same problem again.  Probably two months of sailing and some small sloshing had dislodged more “gunk”.  I ran to the electric bilge pump and turned it on.  It started running, but watching the bilge, there seemed to be no reduction in water.  I could hear that it was primed and pumping, but not fast enough!!  That possibly meant a BIG leak.

Quickly now, my only alternative was to tear down the filter to the big pump and clean it.  Jumped to it, cleaned, put back together, pump more.  Air was leaking through the filter so the pump wasn’t working.  Broke down the filter again, cleaned the gaskets and back together.  Some air still leaking, but pump working to about half capacity.  Now I’m pumping for all I’m worth and envisioning evacuating the boat into the liferaft I had bought but never intended to actually use.  Thinking my arm is now getting really tired and sore and I’m not sure how much arm strength I’m going to have left, and then I noticed that the water was slowly decreasing.  Yes, definitely getting lower.  I’m making progress!  Another couple minutes and I finally heard that awesome (at this point) sound of the pump pulling only air.  The bilge had emptied.  For now.  Watching deep into the bilge for more water coming in I saw none.  Hmmm.  A mystery.  Looks like we’re not sinking, at least for now.

With a reprieve, I took apart the filter in the large manual pump more thoroughly, especially the gaskets which seal it from air being sucked in and put that back together for the fourth time.  Another look in the bilge, still no more water, so I can finally relax a bit and really start looking around inside the boat to see what the water damage might be.  Turned out we had been on starboard tack all the time so it was the port side that received the water (not the starboard side where my clothes drawer is!)  Unfortunately the port side is where a lot of the food is stored near the floor.  Oops.  Pulled up the cushions looked under the seat into the big bins and…oh yeah, water got in here big time.  Soaked all the vegetables and other stuff, but fortunately most of it was sealed in plastic.  Tortillas, crackers, cereal, rice, pasta and other such “long term” stuff were all protected.  In fact the only casualty was a box of macaroni that had soaked through and “sloshed” its way through the food locker with some no doubt making it to the bilge.  OK, clean the locker, dry the veggies (turned out this didn’t matter too much as most of the citrus, miscellaneous vegetables and apples were confiscated by customs in San Diego a little later that day).

OK, clean up done, still no water in the bilge, time to find out how the heck somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 or so gallons of water made it into the boat.  Boats are supposed to keep this much water OUTSIDE.  Started the mental checklist; chainplates, toe rail, deckplates…too small… anchor hawsepipes… (!!!)  Ah ha, maybe the little holes where the chain went through the caps were sucking down water when we were burying the bow in the big waves all night.  I went forward to have a look and found it big time.  The port anchor chain hawsepipe had been knocked completely off leaving a gaping four inch hole right down into the chain locker with subsequent draining into the bilge.  Yipes.  How did that happen?  Every wave must have dumped a couple gallons of water as the bow went under.  A closer look revealed that the foot or so of chain running along the deck from anchor into the pipe had been getting knocked around by the big waves (I saw chafe on the deck) and finally one wave must have bumped it so hard it knocked the cover up and off.  Actually a big relief to discover the problem.  Now I can fix it and not worry about some invisible leak in the boat.  I have now put a clip on the cover and attached it to a couple feet of chain hanging into the locker, so it’s now weighed down pretty well.  I might yet also put a pin on it when I get back, but that should work for now, especially if I check it periodically if we get into some big seas again.

I think I’ve just found out what they say; “you can never have enough bilge pumps”.

Yup, today was a workday.  Since we’re officially halfway on our voyage, mileage-wise at 1752 miles, it was time for some boat maintenance before we leave tomorrow to begin our trip back. Actually, we’re not heading “back” for a few more days, as the next two or three days will be at Islas Espiritu Santos, about 20 miles East of La Paz.

Technicalities of the trip aside, there was work to do.  Charisma badly needed a fresh water wash, not having seen same since San Francisco.  She is much better now thank you very much.  I even thing she’s smiling now that all the salt has been rinsed off.

Down below, I changed the oil, oil filter, and the primary and secondary fuel filters.  Diesels will run forever IF they have clean fuel and oil (knock on wood).  We have used 114 hours since leaving SF on the engine.  Most of those hours have been “easy” hours used to run the alternator to refresh the batteries for power for nav instruments and lights, but as we move up the Sea of Cortez, we do less sailing and more motoring (less wind and when we have it, it’s right on the nose), so at least 20 of those hours have been in the last week.  We did very little motoring from SF all the way to Cabo.

Geoff started the day by going to the Mercado.  He had a fun time getting supplies and returned with stories of how to butcher a pig (apparently today was “pig day” at the market) as well as lots of fresh vegetables which down here means various peppers, some tomatoes, avocados, limes and sweet potatoes.  We stripped all the cardboard off, washed all cans and fresh veggies in white wine vinegar (the object is to wash/kill any pest eggs) and then stored all the provisions.  Hopefully this will keep Charisma pest free.

Geoff also made the supreme mistake of asking; “what else can I do?”  The Supreme Commander (yes, I still wear that hat occasionally) with an evil glint in his eye innocently said; “the ice boxes could use washing down”.  In reality, the Supreme Commander had discovered earlier, while changing the oil, the source of flies in the boat. They appeared to come from some fish that had gone bad a couple weeks ago and which run-off found its way into the bilge (the iceboxes drain there).  This resulted in maggots in the bilge, etc, etc.  The upshot: Geoff cloroxed the heck out of the ice-boxes, the drains into the bilge and the bilge itself.  All mentioned are now so clean, we could drink out of them.  In fact, after pumping the bilge, I think the marina is pretty clean now too!  The flies persist, but we’re eliminating them one at a time.  Not all is paradise in paradise.

For my part, I made a smallish mistake.  I decided that the best way to completely clear the bilge was to use the hand pump under the cabin sole.  It drains the bilge completely, whereas the electric pump stops a little short of clearing the bilge.  Anyway, as I said, I wanted to drain the bilge to get rid of the maggots.  The problem is or should I now say; “was”, we also use the manual bilge pump to pump out the holding tank at sea (for landlubbers, it’s where we – well – in the marina – well, it really stinks when we have to pump it out!  OK, I’m not admitting to anything here, I’m just saying; once I cleared the bilge, I had to leave the area for a while as I didn’t want to have to answer any questions from our neighbors or the dock police.  Back at the boat a half hour or so later, there appeared to be no repercussions.

We also discovered that Geoff is excellent at killing flies and bees.  For some reason, some bees had decided that Charisma was a good place to nest.  Probably the cereal Geoff brought back attracted them.  We weren’t as comfortable with them as they seemed to be with us.  Deadly force was exercised.  With dispatch!  The bees have retreated for now.

Boat projects have a way of expanding.  I won’t bore you with all of them, but suffice to say there were a ton of; “tighten this, fix that, etc, etc” and before I knew it, it was MARGARITA TIME.  Geoff is back in town for the evening and I went to the Beach Club for a shower (probably the last one for a while) and a cocktail overlooking La Paz Bay at sunset.  Beautifull!  Then treated myself to a last dinner ashore. I had Carpaccio de Salmone and Salad Rustico or something like that.  My waiter was the highlight:
Omar Fabian Hernadez Mondragon.  He was very, very good.  Really knows his wines and is trying to get into an exchange program to work in Canada.  I gave him my email address and told him I’d be an enthusiastic reference for him.  He seemed genuinely pleased.  My Spanish and his English made conversing an experience!  I hope I didn’t tell him by accident that he could bring his family and live with me in San Francisco.

Opps, almost forgot to mention that in the middle of all the work-Geoff made some excellent fish tacos from the Mahi we caught a couple days ago.  Fresh tortillas, avocados, peppers, salsa, mahi, onions∑.  We’ve been carefully keeping the Mahi and the two tunas on ice, so they are fresh as can be.  Yum.

So, tomorrow, we get up at a reasonable mid-morning hour, motor to the harbormaster and check out.  By then (late morning) hopefully the wind will kick up a bit and we’ll sail the 15 or 20 miles to our next destination.  We’ll see where the weather allows us to anchor (many of the bays at Isla Espiritu Santos are exposed to NW wind).

More once we get there.