The start of the week was greeted by another overcast drizzly morning. So I decided to stay indoors and finish writing a couple of articles about the steelband that various agencies and publications in Australia were asking for.

The macerator toilet was still not working reliably (mostly not working, and then sometimes working after being hit with the handle of a big screwdriver), so I decided that there was no option but to dive in and strip it down, to try seeing what might be the problem. It was an interesting experience, to say the least. The inside of the macerator casing was gruesome, with the filter around the macerator blades pretty well clogged up with hair, plastic brush bristles, calcaire deposits and other un-named substances. I took a few pictures, but you might be reading this just before eating, so I’ll spare you most of the grisly details. Just one shot of the non-return valve, after most of the gunk had been scraped off, will give you an idea of what was involved. After it had been thoroughly cleaned, I put it all back together and reconnected the pipes and wires, and it worked perfectly and so much quieter than before.

The trouble was it only worked once!!  Repeated attempts to get it to work again were a miserable failure. Iain’s diagnosis was that the armature in the macerator motor had a dead segment, and if the motor stopped with that segment against the brushes, then it would not start again. It was only a matter of time before it stopped on that segment, so the long-term prognosis was dire. Iain suggested that perhaps I should buy a new domestic (not marine) macerator toilet like they had done on Anneke. He suggested that Weldom might have them in stock. So I checked their catalogue and saw that they had something similar to our current Vetus model (but 220V AC rather than 24V DC) for 250euro (compared to about 1200euro for a replacement Vetus!!). Sounded like a good deal, so we decided to investigate further, with the idea of running it off the 220V AC circuit on the boat, rather than the 24V DC circuit.

While I was over at the Capitainerie, Kaz showed me an email that had arrived from a French TV station, who wanted to come down to produce a 6 minute segment on the Fetes de Plaisanciers and the steelband for broadcast on one of their high-rating lifestyle shows. Sounds like the weekend is starting to gain traction, with about 20 boats already booked in.

While I was in the office, Kaz also took a phone call that was meant to reach me. It was from Terrie Chatfield on Mr. Pip saying that Terry Lalley and Sandra wanted to enquire about playing at the “music festival” at the Fetes. I was caught a bit on the hop, since I wasn't aware we were running a “music festival”, but I told her I would check it out and that she should call back tomorrow.

Having returned to Kanumbra for dinner, I was thinking about macerators and music festivals when the skies opened with a late downpour to end the day.