We lifted the dingy and readied
Magnum for the off. Mark noticed that the engine smelt odd so gave it a quick
once over to find that a rubber moulding on the cooling system had split
dumping water in the engine bay.
This left us stuck again, Mark
stripped down and removed the offending article and made a temporary repair
using self amalgamating tape, but there is no way we could trust it to hold for
the 400+ miles to Gibraltar. A new part was needed.
It was Saturday afternoon and
being Spain
everything was shut so we were stuck until Monday.
Alan kindly came and picked Mark
up to run around the local marinas in the forlorn hope of discovering somewhere
open, but to no avail.
The plan was to stay put and then
sail around to Ibiza town and the dingy in to
try and get the new part.
However the weather had other
ideas ! Cala Longa is sheltered from every direction except east, so obviously
the wind blew from the east sending in a large swell. We looked out to sea in
the morning and all we could see was breaking waves, so not trusting the
temporary repair and feeling safe, but not comfortable we decided to stay put
and abuse Alan’s good nature and his hire car again.
Amanda popped ashore and the two
of them managed to establish that the part wasn’t available on the island L but that they could order
one from Madrid to arrive by 10.30 the following morning and that this could be
delivered to the local Volvo dealer in
So we waited another day, hoping
for Spanish efficiency ?!!??
Tuesday morning we started the
engine and gingerly motored to Santa Eulia, we dingyed ashore and tracked down the
required office, the part wasn’t there, but we were assured it would be at some
point that day !
So we disappeared off to do some
food shopping, and buy Mark a shirt as he had been so keen to get the new part
he had left the boat without one and was now feeling like a proper Brit abroad
tourist shirtless in the high street !
A couple of hours later we had a
phone call, our part had arrived !! Mark rushed to the port to confirm the part
was correct and to see what they would charge us.
Two surprises,
1/ it was the correct part
2/ they didn’t charge us any
delivery fee, despite 24 hour delivery from the mainland and also they
delivered it to the port from their main depot to save us time and a 40 min
walk in the 30 deg sun
Excellent service
We fitted the new part and were on
our way …………….at last !
No comments:
Post a Comment