We ran out of water!
Gerald was filling the pool, and the pump lost prime. After trying to re-prime it a few times, we realized that the cistern was empty. Doh!
We switched to our 2nd small cistern, which will last us a month or so without rain for the 2 of us. Too bad we have some guests coming next week, doubling or tripling our water usage. We may have to order some water, which is delivered in a large truck that holds 3,000 gallons or more. Average price is $0.01 to $0.03 per gallon, depending on the quality, last I checked.
So with a 75,000 gallon cistern, how did we run out of water? The problem is the pool. It's got lots of small leaks. We were unable to locate the leaks by dropping food coloring in the pool, but we were losing close to 2" of water per day.
We talked to the former owners of the house, and it turns out our house is located directly over a fault line for the neighborhood. We get lots of minor tremors in the Caribbean all the time, and they eventually lead to cracks in the pool, walls, and anything concrete. (In fact, one day last year, I walked into the guesthouse to find that a dozen tiles had popped up, making a small tent shape! Our best guess is that there was a little tremor that put pressure on the tiles, and they popped.)
So the only real solution is to regularly use this stuff that I think is called Leak Stop or something like that. It's basically a bottle of viscous glue that you dump into the pool. You take out all the filters and run the pump to circulate it, and it gradually gets into the cracks and solidifies. Obviously you can't use the pool for a few days while this is going on!
So we did that 2 days ago, and so far so good. The pool is losing a lot less water than before, so hopefully our water woes will be solved. We still lose a little bit, and hopefully that's mostly due to evaporation. We're at the top of the hill so the wind will evaporate more water than you'd think, especially if the water is warm, which it usually is due to our solar pool heater.
Keep your fingers crossed; let's see if it holds!
Tales and thoughts from the founder of NormSoft (maker of Pocket Tunes), working and living in St. Croix, USVI
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1 comment:
Well now that the pool is fixed and we have had over 2 inches of rain in the last 5 days, two of your guests arrived Saturday and one more today. Good Grief you may still have to buy water!! (hope not) But if you find desal water at .03 a gal let me know from whom. They are getting (almost) a better deal than I do connecting to the plant with piping. Actually the average now is closer to .06 for desal water. 5300 gals for 310.00 or 3000 gal for 200.00 .06666 per gal ( I know) GASP! sticker shock to all that don't live on our heavenly island.
But then again still cheaper than a gallon of bottled water and just as good if not better ;)
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