Saying goodbye to the showers, hello to Dyneema®

Our time at Port Louis Marina is quickly drawing to a close. Although we’re paid up here until the 23rd of this month, we know we’ll be more comfortable when we’re once again back at anchor. As such, it’s our intention to say goodbye to the awesome marina showers and cast off our dock lines on Sunday. We might head directly back to the Hog Island anchorage or we might stop for a day someplace closer to clean our boat’s bottom.

I am happy to report that when we do ultimately leave the dock, we’ll be doing so with a brand new set of running rigging on board. Yes, our package cleared customs at the Fed Ex depot yesterday and is now in our possession. Of course, many of the line colors we received are different than what we were expecting and several of the lines were unmarked making for a bit of a puzzle. In spite of that, the new Dyneema® lines sure do look sexy. No, we won’t be rigging the boat here in the marina. I think we’ll wait for a nice calm day(s) at anchor to tackle that job.

No bikini pics today… today, it’s pics of Dyneema® line!

A note or two on shipping things here to Grenada (and perhaps other islands). Duties on imported goods can be quite significant so failing to do this correctly can add 30% or more to the price of your goods. We were told to do the following:

Have our stuff shipped to the Fed Ex depot, addressed as follows:

• Yacht in Transit Zero To Cruising
  Fed Ex Express
  Hold For Pickup
  Carenage, St. George’s
  Grenada
  xxx-xxx-xxxx (Your telephone number – a local one preferably)

Included with the shipment must be an invoice (make sure the invoice is not for Zero Dollars – that will cause other problems). The invoice should also include a value for the shipping costs on it. Because the shipment is being sent to a Yacht in Transit, it should only be subject to 2.5% duty (as opposed to 35% or more). You may* need to go to the customs office and get a C14 form from the officer there (in our case, this meant only a 3-4 minute walk over to Grenada Yacht Club to speak to an officer). The C14 form will be given to the Fed Ex people when you pick up your package.

Of course, you don’t need to use Fed Ex. You could use another courier or even the post office. If anyone wants some info on those options for Grenada, just let me know.

*We have had two shipments come in. On the first one we weren’t asked to get the C14 while on the second one, yesterday’s, we were. This might have had something to do with the value of the shipment, I don’t know.

In addition to acquiring our shipment of lines yesterday, we spent a good chunk of the morning cleaning out our garage. Yes, in case you didn’t know this, every boat has a garage. In our case, our garage just happens to be our one and only guest berth and as our friend Carl is going to be arriving next week to stay for a bit, we figured we’d better sort out a place for him to sleep. The trampoline gets a tad wet during the regular rainy-season showers.