The rains have stopped and we have had some good dry days.  We eventually realised that our procrastination time was coming to an end when the water was slowly going down in the tanks and the frogs had laid enough spawn in our buckets to start a frog farm.

It was time to pull up the well-pump and face reality and deal with it. So, yesterday Gnome cleared the well-pump area which was overgrown with lots of green climbing stuff.

He pulled the 50 feet of pipe to bring the submersible pump up.  Hoping that the pump was just full of gunk, we ran the pump inside the water tank.  It groaned and creaked with each electricity jolt but refused to start up.

On closer inspection of the one-way valve, Gnome noticed that there was a “biological black rotting that slimed out past the valve.”  Those were his technical terms and he thought that it was most likely a frog, snake or bunch of slugs which had got caught and mashed up in the intake.

The next thing that we need to do is to open up the pump and clean it out and to see if there is damage to the pump mechanism.  We are not sure if this can be done if the parts are all glued together.  Anyway, it isn’t looking good for the pump and we are already looking for a replacement.  Since we have a variable-draw pump because we have a very shallow (slow) well, the pump is extra expensive…with duty and shipping it will probably cost close to $5000 all up.  Needless to say, we are now considering other less traditional types of pumps; Gnome is favouring the “air-lift” pump which will double-up as a compressed air source for the farm.  Also, he is trying to save me money!!

Anyway, enough of the technical stuff.  This reminds me of our good, old pioneer days when we first came to Belize….

Back in the early days, we befriended the manager at Cotton Tree Lodge who was, at that time, in the early phase of construction of the establishment.  He had mentioned to us that he had bought a second-hand well-digger ( a small one which could only dig a maximum of fifty feet) but the only problem was that he could not figure out how to use it from the operating manual.  Gnome was able to decipher the manual and so the manager made a proposal to us; if Gnome could dig a well for Cotton Tree Lodge then he would allow us to dig a well on our own property.  We readily agreed to the exchange of services and Gnome set about digging a well at the lodge.  We loved the idea of being “well-diggers”…it sounded sooo cool and appealed to our sense of adventure.

Anyway, during a short morning break, we happened to meet a visiting medical doctor from New York who was on holiday.  When he found out that we were Doctors and that we were enlisted well-diggers, he was absolutely horrified.  He guffawed and stammered and finally said,”Doctors, huh?  Do you think this is a smart career move?”  We just laughed because we were having so much fun in Belize.  But all he could do was scratch his head and give us a befuddled look of dismay.

Yes, I definitely have to say that it was a smart career move.  Ten years down the line, we have become independent-minded and self-sufficient.  We can usually figure how to achieve a job on the farm without paying for an expert or professional.  It is all about thinking out of the box and as one very well-seasoned Belizean ex-pat (a Hawaiian Gnome) once advised us,” to make it in Belize, you need to have the smarts to get ahead.”

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