Day 9: Fairport

We had been on the canal for 8hrs and decided it was time to stop for fuel & a shower. So far it had been a long trip with little or no sight seeing and I was ready to get off the boat so after much pleading Belle & I convinced Amy we needed a short day so we pulled in early (4pm) to Fairport for the night. Note: Fairport does not sell gas you need to stop at the marina about a mile prior to getting to Fairport. We were all in need of a shower and this was a very nice town to stay at. Once we got in and tied up it started to rain, about this time Amy noticed that the bilge was filling up. Of course neither of our bilge pumps were working at this point so we had to figure out where the water was coming from and how to get it out of the boat. After searching for any water shut off we could find and closing all the sea cocks we felt comfortable little if any additional water was coming in. We later found out that the hot water hose had popped off & it was the water pump sending all our fresh water to the bilge. With the immediate issue solved we headed in to look for a bilge pump & a shower. Unfortunately none of the local shops carried marine parts, Amy was hungry so we headed out for some Mexican food. Dinner was good & I had never seen Mexican food presented as if one would expect in a high end restraint, the meal was expensive but cured my craving for Mexican. On the way back to the boat Amy stopped by the auto shop and asked if they had a loaner car we could rent unfortunately they didn’t but one of the mechanics was nice enough to loan us his car for the night. Amy headed to Wal-Mart to get supplies and to find something that might get the water out of our boat while Belle and I headed to the laundry. Amy found a little hand held electric pump and the next day we found batteries for it and pumped 8-10 gal of water out of the bilge. After playing with the water a bit more we determined that the water was coming from the hot water tank & the other source was from the drain in the ice box going to the bilge. After washing out the bilge a bit we decided to head over to the ice cream shop for a treat and then head out for the day.

Up until now we had spent a lot of time in the wetlands area of the canal and we were now starting to see civilization. It was nice to be reminded of life outside the boat again.