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Melissa & Dave - Adventures at Sea

A good deed

Dave was getting frustrated by the fridge and freezer as they were running a lot and sucking down battery power which is causing us to run the noisy generator more than we would like.  A bit of forum research indicates that the drain hole in the bottom of the fridge simply spills into the bilge without a trap.  That means we are trying to cool the whole bilge!  The forums recommend a wine cork to plug the drain except when you defrost and need to drain the water.  So last night we open a bottle of wine and Dave put the cork in the drain only to discover that the cork is smaller than the opening and it drops way down the hole.  Ug.  This could get ugly if he can’t retrieve it.  Jim suggests a pin or needle might be able to hook it by pressing at an angle (where something like a fork will just push it further into the drain).  This worked like a charm and Dave was able to retrieve the cork.  So Jim suggests the top from the Grand Marnier bottle that has a rim on the top that won’t drop through the hole.  We have a bottle that we’ve about emptied as you can’t make good Margaritas without a shot of Grand Marnier.  So we donate the top.  But alas the cork on that top is still a bit small and isn’t making a good seal.  A bit of duct tape solved that problem.

None the less, Dave was thinking that we still had another problem which he initially diagnosed as likely the freezer thermostat as the freezer wouldn’t get to the right temperature.  However, it turned out that the freezer thermometer was broken.  Fortunately Dave had a hand held infrared thermal sensor which showed that the freezer thermostat was working correctly after we defrosted it.  None the less by then we needed more power to refreeze all the freezer contents, so we moved to the dock for the night so we could hook up to shore power.

While on the dock, a couple came by to inquire about the kayak rental shack which should have been open, but wasn’t.  They were clearly disappointed at not being able to rent kayaks as planned.  So Dave told them to just take ours and have fun.  A few hours they returned and were very grateful.  We were both thinking “Nice kids”.  Then they came back a while later with a case of beer.  They said they had planned to rent the kayaks and thought our lending ours deserved some beer.  They were on their honeymoon.  Ok, now we feel old.  But we did our good deed for the day!

Dave went to take a shower and was finally frustrated enough by the slow drain to try and fix it.  He got out the hose and attached it to the dock water system and put it down the shower drain and blasted out all the gunk that had accumulated for the past 15 years.  Did the same with the aft head drain.  And Voila!  Now both drains are working properly.

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