17 April 2017, Monday

by

Today was a public holiday, Easter Monday, so the alarm was not set.  I finally woke at 8:30 am.

After a breakfast of raisin bran and toast, Virginia and I headed to the transmitter site.  I ended up installing about 45 of the 60 (20 per box) small concrete anchors that Jim Hull brought to me yesterday.  I think all of the anchors are done now.

I had been invited to an exclusive tour of the engine room of the Logos Hope at 1 pm today, so we headed back to the duplex about noon for a light lunch (sandwiches–PB&J  for me and ham/lettuce/mayo for Virginia, plus Sun chips) and a quick shower, then off to town.

We learned from my sister Lois that if we had been at the webcam on the hour on Saturday that our picture would remain available for 24 hours– to be selected by the hour buttons at the bottom of the webcam page. In case you missed it, here it is!

Meanwhile, I was given a tour of Logos Hope’s engine.  There were only three of us on the tour.  The ship is air conditioned, but not the engine room!

We learned that each of the four propulsion engines are 3000 horsepower (about 2200kw).  Only two are used while cruising.  There are also two main engines to generate electric power.  The label on each of these engine read just over 1,500 kw.  [Just one of these engines generates almost triple the amount of power needed to run TWR’s new 400,000-watt transmitter!].  The power panel showed that just under 1,000,000 watts were being used to provide the electrical needs of the docked ship.

The tour also showed us where sea water was converted to drinking water, while on the sea.  Also the black water storage system — some necessary things one does not usually think about!

After the tour, I joined Virginia and Donna in the theatre at 2 pm for a presentation of “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”.  It was very well done.  I did notice that the only characters that had microphones were Peter, Susan, Edward, Lucy and the White Witch.  Although the rest were recordings, I never noticed any glitches in the performance.  It had a great message and opportunity was given at the conclusion for members of the audience to interact with the characters and crew.  No photos were allowed for copyright reasons.

On the way back to the duplex, we stopped by the Bonaire Warehouse supermarket to pick up some bread and milk to hopefully last the rest of our week here.

For supper, we had leftover nasi goreng–the third meal from our Chinese carryout.  There is still enough left for at least one more meal.  We also had lettuce with grated carrots and bacon, plus the rest of the watermelon that Virginia saved from yesterday.

Virginia made some brownies with walnuts for tomorrow.  Some of the crew from Logos Hope will be helping at the site, so there will be at least pizza and brownies for lunch.

This evening we had ice cream.  My sister Debby commented on one of our posts, “Hope Virginia’s rash is getting better. I think I remember that ice cream is really good for eradicating rashes.”  Guess what–Virginia’s rash is gradually improving!!

The long four day holiday weekend is over, so we’ll be back to regular work hours tomorrow.

 

16 April 2017, Easter Sunday

by

“HE is Risen!!!”  When we sent each of our children this message today, many replied, “HE is Risen, Indeed!!!”

Our alarm was set for 4:30 am this morning to get up in time to attend the Resurrection Day sunrise service at 6 am being held at Seru Largu.  At 5:30 am as we drove to the church, we noticed the mass of cars still parked along the beaches, where so many were camping.  Virginia commented, “Do you think we should honk our horn as we pass?”  [There is always plenty of honking as drivers pass our duplex, but I resisted the temptation!]

We drove to the church and rode the bus.  Amado Felix drove one of his Achie Tours buses.  I decided it was too dark to find and drive the shorter back road to Seru Largo.

The sunrise service included a lot of inspirational songs with pastor Doug Searle accompanying with his guitar.  He also gave a short devotional.  The sky was cloudy so there was not a good view of the sun coming up.  It sprinkled lightly for a couple of minutes, but not enough to get us wet.

Following the service, we rode the bus back to the International Bible Church (http://bonaireibc.org) for a potluck breakfast.  There were lots of breads, cheese, coffee cakes and fruit salads.  Virginia made some blueberry bread and cut up the watermelon, we bought a few days ago, into slices and took them.  Yes, the watermelon had seeds, but it was sweet with good flavor.

The 9 am worship service was well attended.  Many of the well-known Resurrection hymns were sung.  The message, as expected, was on the Resurrection and its implications for us.  I came away with these points to ponder:

“The Law is designed to defeat you, so that you will seek a Savior”

“Jesus was fully man, the only perfect human.  Our humanity is broken by sin.”

After the service, snacks and drinks are usually available.  Today the leftover breakfast items were left out.  Most everything was eaten up, including Virginia’s bread and watermelon.  We also took this opportunity to chatfor a while with Amado and Sue Felix, mainly about old times and mutual acquaintances over the years.  They specifically asked about Rich West, who works with us in Elkhart.  Felix and Sue are in their 70s and still working hard with their businesses, which include Achie Tours (for tourists and the cruise ships that come to Bonaire) and transportation services.

We came back to the duplex for a light lunch.  When the visitor staying in the other duplex came back from his lunch, we spent some time visiting.  John Hull works at a Christian radio station in the Houston area and is here to assist TWR with some programming ideas.  He also brought 60 small concrete anchor bolts that we needed to finish fastening components to the floor of the phasor room.

In late afternoon, we had a meal of leftover nasi goreng.  We did go for a quick cool-down swim at Bachelor Beach.

Later we had popcorn, which is our Sunday evening staple at home.  I also called my mother in Colorado, which is my Sunday evening ‘ritual’ at home.  But from overseas, we use Skype to call her phone directly.  Cost is only about $0.02 per minute.

Tomorrow is also a public holiday in Bonaire (for that matter, much of the rest of the world) so the alarm will not be set again.

15 April 2017, Saturday

by

No alarm clock set for this morning!  Not sure when Virginia got up, but I rolled over and went back to sleep.  Next thing I knew it was 8:30am.  Must have needed the extra sleep!

Forgot to mention that there was a rainstorm early yesterday morning.  Rain came down fairly heavy for only a few minutes, but there were puddles of water everywhere.  There is still a mud puddle at our vehicle gate this morning.

It was nice to have a little slower pace to start the day.  After breakfast, I trimmed a little more on the tree by the front doors of the duplex.  Virginia had done some earlier, but with that being one of the possible causes of her rash, we thought it best that she not be involved this time.  By the way, her rash seems to be improving, for which we are thankful.

TWR staff is getting a special tour at 2pm of the Logos Hope, which is docked at the south pier of Kralendijk.  We Facebook messaged our children, and others, that we would plan to be in view of the coffee shop webcam http://www.breathebonaire.com at 1:30pm, just before the tour.  So after a light lunch, we went to town and picked up ice cream cones and sat on a bench in front of the webcam right at 1:30pm.  My sister, Lois, took  a screen shot of our passing the webcam about 5 minutes early to get the ice cream.  Elizabeth and Lois took other screen shots as we sat on the bench and enjoyed our cones.  Others made comments on Facebook as well, but none made any comment about our PDA moment!  [Spoke too soon!!  Joyce caught us in the act!  [See here!]

At 1:45 we headed to the south pier to board the Logos Hope for a tour.  There are around 400 crew on the ship from all over the world.  They all raise support from churches or individuals and the usual term of service is two years.  Our tour guide showed us their dining hall, a typical cabin (very basic), dining hall, bridge, meeting room for devotions each day and worship services, theature and a huge book store.  There are over 5,000 different book titles for sale with over 800,000 books in their inventory.  After the tour, they served us cake and drinks.  The crew is involved in a large variety of Christian ministries, both on ship and at the ports.  Logos Hope usually stays for several days at each port it visits.

One of the tour guides for our TWR group was from Durban, South Africa and she was well acquainted with TWR’s ministry in Africa.  We had quite a long chat with her after the tour.  She lost her husband 3 years ago and her children are now all grown and away from home.  Most of the crew are in their 20s or early 30s, but she is in her late 40s.  She commented that it is good, at times, to have some more ‘mature’ crew members available to mentor the younger ones.

After the tour, we decided to stop by China Nobo restaurant and pick up some nasi goreng for our supper.  The cost was $10.50, but it looks like there is enough for two or three more meals of leftovers!

After supper, we went for a cool-down swim at Bachelor Beach.  Unlike last night, and unlike the airport beaches which are still very crowded this evening, Bachelor Beach was not crowded at all.  Just after we got in the water, a bride and groom plus two photographers arrived to take some wedding photos.   We may be in some of those photos, as two heads bobbing in the water offshore!!

Our alarm will be set quite early in the morning as International Bible Church is holding their 6am sunrise service at Seru Largu on the hill top a few miles north of Kralendijk.  After the sunrise service there will be a pot-luck breakfast at the church building followed by their 9am worship service.  We had better go to bed earlier tonight!

14 April 2017, Friday

by

Slept in this Good Friday morning until about 8am!!

After a leisurely breakfast, Virginia accompanied me to the transmitter site.  While I continued installing capacitors, Virginia spent most of her time in the air conditioned transmitter hall.  Another diagnosis of her rash is that it is a result of the heat, so we will see if this will help.

Shortly after starting on the installation of the capacitors, Dave Pederson came and began helping.  This really sped things up as he would take the capacitors out of their special padded boxes [vacuum capacitors are fragile and very expensive!], and remove the bolts from the bottom plates.  While he did this, I would quickly consult the Kintronic photos to verify the capacitor orientation, then properly orient the capacitor and bolt it to its mounting plate.  By 1pm, all the remaining capacitors were installed and we headed home for lunch.

Well, I had my usual PB&J sandwich for lunch — I like them, always have!!  My nap ended up being 30 minutes today — again with my feet elevated to help reduce the swelling, especially of my left foot and ankle.  Virginia got word from our family doctor to try hydrocortisone cream and/or prednisone to see if that helps her rash.

We headed back to the site about 2:30pm where I began doing the short connections within each capacitor bank.  These connections consist of copper tubing, normally about 1.5 inches in diameter.  Kintronic has made a nifty connector that slides inside the tubing and expands using just one set screw to join two pieces of tubing.   I’ll try to remember to take a photo of this connector next week.

Some of the Kintronic connectors had some light corrosion on them, so Dave used sandpaper to clean the corrosion off and Brasso to polish them.  Again, it was necessary to consult the photos to connect the interconnecting tubing to the right connections of the capacitors.  By the time one was connected, Dave would have the next two Kintronic connectors cleaned and ready for the next connection.  By 4:30, all the possible short connections were done.  For now, we decided not to do any of the longer connections between capacitor and inductors (coils).  There is still some solder-brazing of copper straps to be done and installing the longer connections will restrict access routes too much for doing the solder-brazing that still needs done.

On the way back to the duplex, we decided to check out the nearby beaches.    Every beach was crowded and there were lots of tents and temporary kitchens made from old pallets.  Since Bonaire is a small island, many use their long weekend for a vacation camping on the beach.  It costs too much to fly anywhere else!  We decided not to go for a cool-down swim with all this crowd!

We also noticed that the ship Logos Hope ( https://www.gbaships.org/en/meet-logos-hope ) was at the dock in Kralendijk.  We had seen it coming in last night.  The Logos crew has organized a special tour of the ship for TWR staff tomorrow at 2pm.  We also have tickets for a theatrical presentation of “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” on board the ship on Monday at 2pm.  On Tuesday, several of the Logos staff plan to assist with various projects at the TWR facilities.  TWR’s Jonas used to work with Logos ships and helped outfit this ship when it was first obtained by GBA Ships.

For supper, Virginia prepared macaroni and cheese with bacon and lettuce with grated carrots, then iced tea in two variations — with lemon and with peach flavor.  We are still using up some of the food supplies that our team shipped in the container from Niles.  Later we had brownies with walnuts for dessert.  This proved to be a yummy ‘practice run’ for the desserts that she will be preparing next week.

Virginia’s rash seems to be looking a little better this evening.  Your prayers for her would be appreciated.

We do not plan on turning the alarm on again for tomorrow morning.  Everyone sleep well!

13 April 2017, Thursday

by

Jonas and I were the only ones at the transmitter site for morning devotions.    Lionel took a day off to watch his 3 year old daughter while his wife had to take care of some business.  Later in the day, Dave Pederson was there for a while and Ivan was painting.  Ivan has been painting the WEB power building to match the transmitter building.  Now he is repainting some of the transmitter building because it looks so faded.  That’s one thing we have noticed here–all the bright Caribbean colors fade to more pastel colors over time.

After checking emails, we ordered five relays and sockets to be included in the shipment that will be sent from Niles in a month or so.  We also attempted to order two contactors, but somehow the order did not appear to go through.  Rather than risking making a double order, we decided to wait a while in case an email confirmation for the order might have been delayed.

Jonas and I began installing more vacuum capacitors in the phasor room.  The total number of these capacitors that will be in the phasor room is about 50, not the 40 that I estimated earlier this week.  Six bolts hold each capacitor to their base plates and each one’s orientation must be verified using photos that Kintronic took at the factory.   Often it is necessary to sort through 40 or more photos to find the one that most clearly shows the right orientation that will allow the prefabricated connections to fit right.

Sometime during the morning, the special truck came and loaded the ‘rented’ container that brought the dummy load, back onto its trailer.  The shipping company should be taking the container and its trailer away shortly.

Had lunch at the duplex, as usual.  Rather than a PB&J sandwich (which is my standard request), Virginia made a toasted cheese sandwich.  Also had a small bag of cheddar Sun chips.  I then lay on the couch with my feet up for a 15 minute snooze before heading back to the site.  It is less than 1.5 miles from our duplex to the transmitter site.

On the way, I noticed that the salt ‘harvesting’ machine was close to the road, so decided to get some clearer photos.

Back at the site, I continued to install vacuum capacitors and by the end of the day 32 of about 50 were in place.  Tomorrow, Good Friday and Easter Monday are public holidays, so everyone has a four day weekend.  Since we only have a week left on Bonaire, I might try to continue doing some work tomorrow.

We made a quick trip to Van Der Tweel supermarket this evening to get more ingredients for making desserts for next week–two days now instead of just one.  Traffic was really heavy in town, probably due to the long weekend ahead.  No swim tonight because the beaches are also crowded because of the long weekend.

Supper tonight consisted of leftover spaghetti topped with grated cheese, lettuce with bacon and grated carrots.  Do you notice that the list of supper items is a lot shorter with the rest of the team gone?  For dessert later in the evening was a repeat of last night vanilla ice cream with chocolate topping on a sugar waffle.

Virginia has developed a rash of unknown origin on her upper arms.  It is amazing the variety of diagnoses from A to Z that she has received — allergy to the sun, or sun screen lotion, to zika virus.  [The zika virus has been on Bonaire] The rash seems to be spreading to her forearms.  This evening she is trying to contact our family doctor via Facebook for his diagnosis and advice.  What amazing times we live in!!

Since tomorrow is Good Friday, we decided not to turn on the alarm clock.