The good news part is that Mike is pretty sure he has figured out what is wrong with the engine. I will try to explain it. The problems are two-fold. First, the engine is installed on kind of a slant, which makes reading the dipstick difficult. Mike noticed it would read almost empty, so he would add oil. It always seemed to be empty when he would do a routine check. Then we noticed the oil pressure gauge was always falling way down, indicating a lack of oil pressure. So he would add more oil. Then we had a problem one day with the engine making white smoke and revving itself up and refusing to turn off. Scary. Yesterday Mike discovered that oil was coming out of some hose or pipe or something near the air intake thing. (As you can see, I am sort of hazy on the whole thing.) Then we noticed that when the engine is off and the gauge should be at zero, it is almost half an inch below zero. Mike then noticed that if the dipstick showed empty, a tiny tiny bit of added oil caused it to immediately register full. So the bottom line (hopefully) is that we have been adding too much oil, causing an overflow, which got into the air intake thing which caused the smoke and the runaway engine. This can be handled, which has caused a HUGE relief to us here on the boat.
The other good news is that we found a new water pressure pump in Loreto that Mike is going to install, so no more problems there.
Lets hope this engine thing is as he has postulated - the disappointment would kill him. Plus this is not an expensive fix and can be handled.
We are having a really good time here. There are three other boats here with us - Sundancer, Raindancer (no connection, just coincidence) and Big Wonderful. We met Sundancer at Agua Verde, where we all took a hike to see some cave paintings. (I cheated and accepted a ride in a passing truck up a big hill.) We met Raindancer in Ensenada, and then caught up with them again in La Paz. This was our first meeting with Big Wonderful - who, interestingly enough, are originally from Wisconsin. We had a great time swimming at the beach after we anchored - talking and drinking beer and floating along. Raindancer has THREE miniture Australian Shepards, two of whom like to swim. The dogs swam out to our dinghy as we were approaching shore with welcoming barks. It is great to spend time with really smart, interesting people.
One thing about being out here is that at night, there is so little light pollution the stars are amazing. I have seen more shooting stars in one night than I have in my whole life.
No hurricanes on the horizen, thank goodness.
We had a wonderful sail getting here yesterday - for once, the wind was in the proper direction and blowing about 12 knots. We were sailing along with full sail at about 6.5 to 7 knots - which is just about at hull speed, which means the boat is not supposed to sail faster. The only time is does is when it is surfing down waves. This was just one hell of a sail, and we loved every second of it. We usually poke along at 2-3 knots.
One piece of bad news - we saw some roaches on board, and we are not near anywhere to buy roach traps or boric acid. I am going to ask around and try to find out if anyone has anything we can do about it. Of course, that means we have to admit having bugs aboard . . .
Well, that will do it for now. I am going to try and post some pictures before I lose internet connection. Everyone have a great day!
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