Thursday Sept 13: New Alternator in New Bedford

It rained all night and most of the morning on Thursday.  I've been to New Bedford/Fairhaven three times now, twice by boat and once by car and this was the only kind of weather I've experienced here.  I guess we'll have to come back sometime when it's sunny.

Dan took an Uber ride to the alternator place, lugging along the starter too, in case they could also fix that.  Leo Boulanger & Son (Jerrod) are the real deal when it comes to rebuilding engine parts.  They couldn't help us with the starter, but during the course of the day they took apart the alternator and declared it "toast", had the replacement parts to fix it, and had it ready for us to pick up at 3:30 this afternoon.  Dan returned to the boat to re-install the starter (it works, and it will get us home) while I worked on office stuff and other things (finished the laundry, cleaned the heads) and just after noon we set off on foot to walk back to town and find a place to eat. 

New alternator!

New Bedford is a diverse area of blacks, hispanics, and Portuguese.  Catholicism is the predominant religion and there are very large churches everywhere. We also noticed carports consisting of grape arbors.  Very cool to see the bunches of grapes hanging down and the cars tucked under a ceiling of leaves.  Shady in the summer - wonder how it does in the winter?  And would such a thing be possible in Maine?  We found a great little hispanic restaurant with "authentic Guatemalan sauce" and had a late lunch.  Dan had shrimp and fried fish with his beans and rice and I had chicken taquitos.  That authentic sauce was very spicy and very good.

We collected his newly re-built alternator and headed for home.  Just outside the marina we came across a statue of St. Henry the Navigator, donated by Portugal and the St. Henry Society.  The inscription reads: "God wills, Man dreams, the work is born.  God willed that all the Earth be one.  That seas unite and never separate."  Fernando Pessoa in "Mensagem"

St Henry the Navigator