Spare parts in place and time for a swim

Finally, after 3 weeks, we have now got the hydraulic furling gear working, without leaks, mounted to the mast, boom in place and with no damage to body or boat. We are always extremely careful when working on the boat. The boom weight is approx. 150 kg, the hydraulic unit 35 kg producing 150 Nm torque. Reason for the time to get the hydraulic to work was that the technicians recommended did not deliver. Finally this week we got hold of a new professional technician who did the job in 2 days. Unfortunately he, by mistake, configured the motor/gearbox to the wrong type of pump (it all has to do with liters per minute), which gave us a headache, but today Saturday, he were here and made the changes. Anyway, now everything except sail is back in place, with no leaks, and we have learnt a lot of new things about hydraulics.

Thanks to our sailing friends of S/Y Hurah we were advised to get “Spanish for Cruisers”, an extremely useful book to aid communication with a focus on sailing terminology. It surely helped conversation about technical matters. After a full week of work on the mast, tomorrow we will take some “time off” and do some snorkeling on the west facing “Playa Las Canteras” beach. Weather is very nice with about 25 C air temp and 24 C in the water. We have extended our stay at Las Palmas Marina for a week, so our plan is to sail over to Tenerife by next weekend.