Saturday - D5P1

I never sleep well when I have to get up early for a specific reason. I routinely get up before 6 am on any given day but when there is something happening that I have to be "in motion" for it plays havoc with me. Friday night was no exception and I had both difficulty falling asleep and then awoke early and tossed for a while. Saturday was going to be a big day beyond the trip back to Isla Colon and we really needed to hit a number of critical markers if we were to finish this up by Monday. I got up around 5:30 Saturday morning to catch the boat back to Bocas to go hardware shopping. Mike and I had put together a shopping list for Maderas Richards and Elizabeth was going to accompany me. In addition to the hardware Ambrosio had offered to make a special luncheon for us to express the communities gratitude for our efforts. He had a shopping list for us but his wife would do the cooking. The big items on our list were the additional 90 degree 3/4" PVC elbows (20 of them just to be safe) and several more sheets of corrugated sheet metal ("zinc" in local parlance) as well as a number of specialized brass fittings such as threaded reducers and tube barbs, U-nails, UV resistant clear plastic tubing and more PVC cement. Ambrosio's list included chicken, potatoes, peppers, onions and salad greens. On top of this, Daniel had put in a request for chicken and rice, and I wanted to get some chicken and mortadella for Ramon.

I heard stirring from the student's side of the hall and Elizabeth and Mike met me on the porch. Mike and I reviewed the list but, in a classic example of a medical "scotoma" neither of us noted that several of the crucial items that we had discussed were not present on this list. This would come back and bite us badly, and sooner rather than later. Elizabeth and I headed down to the dock and waited. And waited. And waited. Yes, I know how island life goes so I was not surprised or unhappy. It was a nice cool, sunny morning with a light breeze down by the dock. Just before 7 we heard the drone of an outboard and in a few minutes our boat pulled in. We hopped aboard and lit out for the territory ahead. Whether it was the tide or the wind we made unusually good time and were at Maderas dock by 7:30. We walked over to the main building and were pleased to see that the store opened at 8 am. This was excellent as it meant we could move quickly and hopefully be back on Isla Popa by 11 am. Things seemed to be going our way.

While we waited the opening of the store Elizabeth and I wandered around Isla Colon. It really is a neat little town, kind of like a dingy version of Key West with a definite "edge of the world" feel to it. There must be great surfing off the  coast as the streets are full of young people with accents from all over the world heading to the docks with boards and wet suits and all sorts of equipment. In the center of town is a beautiful little park that sits adjacent to the colonial administration building. In the center of the park is a pretty old-fashioned bandstand, like something from the play "The Music Man" and some phenomenally big old Banyan-type trees. Elizabeth and I explored the park for a while and came across a bust of my cigar hero, Simon Bolivar. We mugged for a few photos then headed back to open Richards.

We walked back up the street and caught Richards just as was opening. We went item by item on the list determined not to miss anything. Some items were simply not available, such as UV resistant PVC or plastic tubing and we would simply have to use plain stuff, but overall we were successful and out of Richards well before 9 o'clock. The "zinc" would be waiting down by the docks for us, but not at the one we had arrived at as that dock was now occupied by other workers. We would depart from a different spot on the waterfront and the zinc would be there. Elizabeth and I left Richards and headed back to do our grocery shopping. Since Isla Colon is our access point into Isla Popa we pass through it both coming and going so I have had a chance to get sort of familiar with it and I know where the markets are. One place is good for fruits and vegetables, another has the better butcher shop. Off we went.

Elizabeth and I found everything we needed as well as a bag of oranges for the gang and an extra bottle of Bocas Hot Sauce - we were going through it really fast. We beelined back to the dock, found our boat, hopped in and took off. The harbor in Bocas is a patchwork of waterways connecting a bunch of smaller islands and is a madhouse on Saturday mornings. Business moves on the water there just as much, if not more so, than on land. Our boat operator shouted at a few other boats to get out of the way, but eventually picked his way through the congestion and made his way out to clear water. It was 9:30 and we were looking great for time.

Our trip back flew by just as smoothly as the inbound one and we were back on Isla Popa a little after 10 and after dropping off the various food packages at their various destinations (a delicate task that needs to be conducted discretely in such a way that one recipient does not see a package going somewhere else lest there be any jealousies or charges of favoritism) we got back to el rancho by 10:30 AM. Excellent.

Mike opened the bags and started going through the inventory. "Paul, where are the elbows?" he asked. Elbows, I thought. Elbows. Now, I got everything on that damn list. I had crossed each item off as it came up. Front of page and back. Elbows, elbows. No, they were not anywhere on the list. Sorry Mike, no elbows.

Houston, we have a problem.