We anchored right off the mouth of the Suriname River last night, then celebrated the 4th of July with Steve and Marianne enjoying rum and cokes, and I had Baileys in my coffee. We all had a good, long night’s rest at anchor.<\/p>\n
This morning about 7am we started up the river going about 10 miles to the Shell station. It was a fascinating ride, as we passed an old Dutch fort, some more modern homes and buildings, dikes with below-river-level homes behind them, and lots of jungle. The main city of Paramaribo seems to be a decent city, and even has one 10-story high-rise- a bank.\u00a0 <\/span>We had hoped the Shell station would be near town, and maybe we could sneak around a little (we weren’t doing customs or immigration, just buying fuel and not getting off the boat), but it was a backwater place with nothing near it but the tank farm.<\/p>\n They delivered as promised, giving us three pretty red drums with yellow lids (courtesy of Royal Dutch Shell), and filled everything with a ton of diesel. Literally, we now have a ton of diesel aboard.<\/p>\n I didn’t have time to explore the jungle, nor see any toucans, macaws, jaguars, tapirs or anteaters which the area is famous for, but I was able to grab an armload of mangoes from a nearby tree. All too soon we had to leave to allow another ship to dock, so it was back down the river and out to sea.<\/p>\n We decided to name our 3 new crew members Larry, Mo and Curly, so as to avoid any confusion, and duly labeled them with a Sharpie. In the process I made a wonderful discovery- these fuel drums play like timpani drums, and each with a different pitch!\u00a0 <\/span>It wasn\u2019t long before I was singing the dramatic theme from 2001- A Space Odyssey, with me covering all the parts except the key timpani drum solos, which I played to perfection. The performance was very well received, albeit by a limited audience.<\/p>\n We are back at sea now, finally on our way again, and expect to cross into French Guiana around midnight tonight.<\/p>\n 06.06N\u00a0 <\/span>54.57W\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>1172nm gone, 3754nm to go.\u00a0 <\/span>3pm\u00a0 <\/span>7\/5<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We anchored right off the mouth of the Suriname River last night, then celebrated the 4th of July with Steve and Marianne enjoying rum and cokes, and I had Baileys in my coffee. We all had a good, long night’s … Continue reading