After waking up and squeezing in some sunrise yoga to reduce my stress level, I called up Lance Fox to ask him which electric priming pump he would recommend (Facet) then got online to see if any local auto parts stores had one in stock. It turns out that a NAPA store a few miles away had one in stock. I was in luck! I also made a list of the other components I would need (fuel hose, hose clamps, crush washers, and an on/off switch, etc) then I pumped up the leaky paddleboard, paddled the half mile to Caribbean Jacks, locked up the board, and walked 2 miles to NAPA to pick up the pump. I didn’t plan to walk everywhere I needed to go to that day because I’m not in the best of shape right now, and the heat was really oppressive. And it wasn’t really possible to carry my bicycle on the paddleboard, even though it folded. And, launching the dinghy wasn’t an additional project that I wanted to deal with, even if there were a place I could dock it (which there didn’t appear to be. I could get away with leaving the paddleboard tied up to someone’s dock much more easily than I could a dinghy with a motor. So, it would be paddleboard, walking, and Ubering.
NAPA had everything I needed except for a couple of hose connectors, so I walked across the street to O’Reilly’s, who did. Lastly, I needed a couple of things from Ace Hardware, which was closer to my boat, but about 3 miles away. It now being around noon and in the 90’s, I was unwilling (and probably unable) to walk another 3 miles, so it was time to hire an Uber to take me there. Fortunately Ace had what I needed, so I walked the mile back to Caribbean Jacks, and paddled back to the boat, arriving around 2 pm.
It was a very hot day, with very little wind. The cabin was reading 94 degrees inside, and it was evidently my brain because as I laid out all the components and tools of the project, I had the sudden very frustrating realization that I had failed to purchase two critical components! They were on the list I had created on my phone, but for some reason I had failed to consult the list when I was ashore. I felt like screaming! Come to think of it, I did scream. But that wasn’t fixing my engine. So, I topped off the paddleboard yet again and headed back ashore. This time I was hoping I would only have to go to Ace hardware, and didn’t want to paddle all the way south down river to Caribbean Jacks then walk north back to Ace.
I decided to chance a landing almost abeam the boat near Ace in some unimproved/abandoned areas along the shore. I found some property that was evidently up for sale and found a place to sort of hide the paddleboard a hundred yards or so from the road and locked it to a tree. I figured the odds of someone wandering on that property in the next hour who would both discover and want to steal or destroy my paddleboard would be pretty slim, and it would save me at least an a half hour and a mile of walking and a half-hour of paddling.
So, I took the chance and walked the 15 minutes to Ace, only to find they did not have the crush washer that I needed! I would have to go all the way back to NAPA! I felt that And that meant another Uber. The good news was that they did have the part, so took another Uber back to the paddleboard, and finally arrived back at the boat too tired to do any actual work on the project, the entire day spent just getting the necessary parts. Total in parts was $170, and $40 for all the Uber rides.
Ugh!!!!