Category Archives: boats
The Difference Between a House and a Boat
According to Arthur Ransome (British author)
Houses are but badly built boats so firmly aground that you can not think of moving them. They are definitely inferior things, belonging to the vegetable, not the animal world, rooted and stationary, incapable of gay transition…The desire to build a house is the tired wish of a man content thenceforward with a single anchorage. The desire to build a boat is the desire of youth, unwilling yet to accept the idea of a final resting place.
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Sail Pricing Guide
As readers of this blog know I intend on building a houseboat/shantyboat when I move to Panama and want to equip it with a sail for auxiliary power. Of course I’m going to need to have a dinghy and will probably go with some form of “instant boat” design. I want it to have the option of oar, small outboard and sail for powering. But how much are those sails going to cost? I recently found this site while surfing. It’s: http://www.sailritesails.com/
There is a list of about a gazillion different boats to choose from. They even have my old Kaiser26 (though they call it a Kaiser 25) which amazed me since John Kaiser only built 26 of them. I had hull #24.
Click on the boat you own, or want to, and the site will tell you how much each sail for that boat will cost…main, genoa, jib, spinnaker, etc., and all the options available for each sail: fabric choices, reefing choices, etc. Sailrite has two locations: Indiana and Annapolis.
Their main home site, accessable by a tab at the top of their page offers a huge range of other sailing gear.
What to Bring to Panama
“At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much.” – Robin Lee Graham – Dove
I am currently in the process of culling down my possessions before I make my permanent move to Panama. Though Panamanian law says I may import up to $10,000.00 worth of household goods the biggest problem is I don’t have $10,000.00 worth of household goods. I probably don’t even have one third that amount and the question arises as to whether I want to bring them along with me, anyway.
Besides the opening quote there are two two others I’ve kept for years that address this dilemma.
“‘I’ve always wanted to sail to the South Seas, but I can’t afford it.’ What these men can’t afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous discipline of ‘security.’ And in the worship of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine–and before we know it our lives are gone.
“What does a man need–really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in–and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That’s all–in the material sense. And we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention from the sheer idiocy of the charade.
“The years thunder by. The dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves of patience. Before we know it the tomb is sealed.” – Sterling Hayden – Wanderer
“If we’re really going to start a new life, we have to kill the old one. That’s why most people never really start anything new. They’re claimed by old lamps and bureaus left to them by their grandmothers.” – Betty Wilson–Away from it All
So, what do I do with those old lamps and bureaus?
My full name is Richard Staigg Philbrick. The original Richard Staigg was a fairly well-known painter, primarily or portraits and miniatures. I have a pencil sketch of his of a young girl with flowers. It’s not worth a whole lot of money. According to the web site Live Auctioneers the original oil painting of the sketch sold at auction for $425.00. While the pencil sketch has little intrinsic value it does have value as a family heirloom. But it certainly isn’t something I want to take with me. So, I will be sending it to one of my nieces. She is the last one in the family to carry the Staigg name. A few years ago when I asked her what she thought of her middle name she just shrugged. Now that she’s in college perhaps she’s better disposed of carrying on a long family tradition.
When my dad sold the family home in Orleans, on Cape Cod, built before the Revolution, he gave each of us boys a few things from the home. I received one of the few chairs that had been built in the 1800s by my mother’s relatives. Since I was working on living on boats at that time I had no use for it and gave it to my brother Gary and his family. One thing I have kept, primarily in storage for the last twenty years or so is a beautiful Reed & Barton tea pot. But what do I need it for? I rarely drink tea and when I do it’s simply made with a bag. I have decided to give it to another niece. One who has a home and children.
There are other items like those that I’m not going to take with me and I really don’t know of anyone who want or need them. What does one do with their high school year book in a situation like mine? I’ve been an avid reader all my life but in the past year or so I’ve been buying my books on-line through Audible.com and listening to them on my Ipod. I’m certainly not going to pack up the stack of books I’ve accumulated over the past few years and lug them to Panama. They’ll end up somewhere.
I love my large screen t.v. but it’s not coming with me, either. The woolen suits that I haven’t worn for years will probably end up at Goodwill, and some of them are quite expensive, too. But they were all given to me in the first place so they’re going.My bed, chest of drawers, computer desk, etc., though only a couple of years old, are staying, too.
My computer(s) of course are going but the five year old printer and scanner don’t make the cut. My small stereo/CD player is probably coming along and I definitely can’t leave my Krups espresso maker behind.
The hardest thing I’ll be leaving behind is my dog, Penny. 
I got her out of a shelter 16 years ago. She’s been a good and faithful friend all these years. She’s old now and has trouble getting around. She loves her afternoon walk but she’s consigned to one speed which is very slow. When I first got her she was able to leap from the ground into the seat of my Toyota van. Now I have to lift her into the seat of my Hyundai Elantra. But she soldiers on. I don’t think she’d make the transition well at all. Fortunately my roommate loves her and has agreed to care for her in her last years.
In the last couple of days I’ve donated a ton of clothing to several charitable organizations. Eight very expensive suits that were all given to me. Some I never wore and the others I haven’t worn for at least five years. They were simply taking up space in the closet. Today I got rid of more than a dozen dress shirts, slacks and sweat suits.There’s absolutely no reason to bring them with me. After all, if I need to replace something I might have given away they sell clothes in Panama, too.
The last thing I need to get rid of is my Boston Whaler. The money I get from selling it will build my houseboat in Panama.
It’s a Revenge model. Very rare and a scary fast boat. My friend, Stephen, got stopped in the Intracoastal one day and clocked doing 44 mph. If anyone reading this is interested, I’m asking $10,850. Fully titled and including trailer.
Filed under boats, panama, Retirement, Uncategorized
Long Trip in a Small Boat
I am a big fan of people who make long trips in small boats. I am also a big fan of classic working watercraft. I stumbled across this series of videos by Englishman Dylan Winter the other night and will share them over the next weeks.
In this series Dylan takes his 19 foot sailboat on a circumnavigation of his home island and along the way he encounters and films a wide variety of sailing vessels. In this first video there are some great shots of the Thames sailing barges.
These boats of the 19th century were used in the Thames Estuary. They were in the 80′ to 90′ range with a beam of around 20′, flat bottomed with a shallow draft of about 3′ and sported huge sprit sails on two masts. They normally were worked with only a two-man crew. They were fitted with lee board to work in the shallow waters. There are some excellent views of these barges in Dillon’s first video.
Boats I’ve Bought Plans For
Over the years I’ve bought plans for three different boats I was thinking of building. None, so far, have been built.
The first set I bought came from Glen-L, one of the biggest outlet for boat plans around: http://www.boatdesigns.com/
I shelled out the money for the 32′ Mark Twain pontoon boat. The plans had full-sized patterns for building the frames and detailed plans for construction of the house and interior.
The project was abandoned when I bought my shantyboat. I kept the plans for years, but they disappeared somewhere in the two decade saga that followed which included a three year stint living on the French Riviera.
When I decided to retire to Panama and was interested in the possibility of settling in the Bocas del Toro archepeligo on a boat I bought another set. This came from: http://www.bateau.com/ I opted for something a bit smaller at 27 feet and a mono-hull rather than a pontoon model. I chose the GT Cruiser 27 which looks like a pram on steroids. It is 27-1/2 feet long with an 8’9″ beam. Only slightly bigger than my Nancy Dawson. The GT Cruiser 27 has a six inch draft which means it can tuck into really skinny water. You could easily beach her and step ashore with dry feet. Nancy, on the other hand needed at least an additional 4 feet of water.
Not only do I like the looks of this boat, it is built with stitch-and-glue methods. Having done a lot of expoy work in my years of repairing boats I feel confident that I could easily put this together.
While this boat is still a possibility, I am strongly drawn to the barge-hulled shantyboat. I also purchased the plans for the Brandy Bar
This is probably be the direction I take in the end. The reasons are rather simple. Building the barge is essentially nothing more than building a big box. Simple as that. The house, though, probably won’t look anything like that above. My windows probably won’t be glazed. More likely they will be something like this:
On Nancy Dawson I had screens that could be rolled up and were attached to the open frames of the hatches with Velcro. Screens will be essential down in Panama.
No matter what gets build it will be One More Good Adventure.
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Filed under boats, Houseboat, Shanty boat
Native Watercraft Around Bocas
Being an island archipelago, boats are a way of life here in Bocas del Toro. Not the cruising sailboats in the marina and at anchor, but the way people travel here. They are the cars, buses, taxis and trucks of the area. If you don’t fly here the only other way to arrive is on a boat.
A water taxi
An Indian SUV (How many life jackets do you think they have on board?)
An Indian truck
The boat above went just a few buildings down, side-tied to a steel work barge and headed back to Almirante
These native craft almost always seem to be paddled or pushed along by an outboard. Yesterday while having lunch at a restaurant in town I saw, in the distance, a canoe with a sprit sail rig. I didn’t have my camera and it was too far away anyway. But this morning sitting out on the porch reading the newspaper on line I glanced up and caught this going past. Almost missed it. Had to run down to my room and grab my camera.
Just down the street, in a little shed, someone is building a dugout canoe.
In all the times I’ve passed it I’ve never seen anyone working on it and wasn’t ever able to speak to the builder.
Note how the transom is filled in and the log is carved to shape a skeg to provide some tracking ability when the boat is underway. The area above the green paint has been built up by strip planking with epoxy glue. A traditional Indian building technique?
Across the street, sitting out over the water is another dugout build by the same man I was told. In the first picture above you can see thwarts inserted either to give the hull some extra rigidity or to be used as seats. This dugout has ribs inserted.
Well, I’m packed and ready to head to David. I’m flying back. Coming over there were sections of the road high up in the mountains that had been washed away in the heavy rains back in November. In several places the road was barely one lane wide. With the torrential rains of the last two days I’m sure that the conditions haven’t improved. Although I’m very leary of third world puddle-jumpers I think it’s probably the safest way to get out of here. With my Pensionado discount the flight only cost me $30.10 for the 40 minute ride. Hopefully this won’t be my last post.
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Water, Water, Everywhere and Not a Drop to Drink
Water, as everyone knows, is absolutely essential to life. Articles say that anywhere from between 50 to 70 percent of the human body is made up of water (I guess the variable is how fat one is). And a person can go anywhere from between eight to fourteen days without any before they die, and fat people can actually go longer without it than can someone who is skinny and out of shape.
People on land, at least in developed countries, take clean, potable, accessable water for granted. And we’re lucky, millions of people don’t have the water we take for granted and tens of thousands worldwide die each year because they don’t have it. More children, worldwide, die from the lack of clean water than those who die from AIDS and malaria COMBINED. But this is about access to water aboard a boat.
When you’re tied up at a dock in a marina water is similar to what it was when you were living ashore. Turn a knob and the water flows. You just have to hook up a hose from the dock to your boat.
What happens after you’ve cast off? At first you will depend on the water stored in your boat’s tanks and what you have brought aboard in containers. After that you can either make your own water with a reverse osmosis watermaker which is 1)expensive to purchase 2) a hassle to maintian 3) probably going to break down at some point which brings us to the most accurate definition of “cruising” ever: “Cruising is repairing equipment with inadequate tools and access to parts in exotic locations.”
OR, you can do what people have been doing since the dawn of time: collect and store rain water.
Watermakers
Don’t get me wrong. Watermakers certainly have their niche, and there are valid reasons someone might want to invest in one.
- As an emergency water supply. What happens in the unlikely event that your tanks spring a leak or get contaminated? Neither ever happened to me in all my years of professional and pleasure boating. BUT, I did have one incident when an inexperienced deck hand topped off the fuel tanks with the water hose, not paying attention to which deck fill he was opening. It’s also possible that a water tank could be contaminated with undrinkable water and you aren’t able to purify it. A hand operated model may also be a good thousand dollar investment for a ditch bag for long-distance cruisers in case they have to take to their last-chance of survival raft and could well save their lives. But that group of boater is a tiny minority of people who own and use boats.
- Reduce weight. A gallon of fresh water weighs 8.34 lbs, so, with a topped-off 50 gallon water tank that means you’re lugging around an additional 417 pounds.
- Extended range of travel. You don’t have to plan your cruise around stops to replenish your water supply.
- Save money in foreign ports. Available potable water in many foreign ports is limited even to their own inhabitants and if you want to fill your tanks from their precious water reserves you’re going to have to pay for it just like you have to pay for filling your fuel tanks.
- Provide a safe water supply on board. In many parts of the world safe, potable water is unavailable. If you’re able to make your own you won’t ruin your adventure with parasite-related illness.
But all this comes with a hefty price tag. Checking the West Marine on-line catalog the watermakers they offer range from $1,999.00 to $6,887.00.
An alternative, if you’re handy, is to build your own. You need a high-pressure pump capable of at least 1,000 psi, 3,000 psi is better. Then you have to buy the membrane that filters the water, the wiring and tubing, etc., etc. A Google search of “build your own watermaker came up with 8,170 hits, so there’s a lot of information out there if you’re so inclined.
If you have a watermaker you also have to have a power supply to run it, either 12 or 24 volt dc power or 120 or 240 volt ac power. All this presents another problem. There is one site I saw that is supposed to be able to make up to 72 gallons of water by dragging a special unit with a propeller behind your boat while underway and can be adapted to hand operation if you have to ditch the sinking mother ship. I offer this URL because I think the concept is interesting:http://www.watermakers.ws/
Collecting Rainwater
Harvesting rainwater has been going on since man lived in caves and a time-honored method of filling the water tanks at sea. People living a shore-based life have had cisterns for the containment of rainwater worldwide and is currently enjoying a reviva ldue to the inherent quality of rainwater and an interest in reducing consumption of treated water.
Rainwater is valued for its purity and softness. It has a nearly neutral pH, and is free from disinfection by-products, salts, minerals, and other natural and man-made contaminants. Plants thrive under irrigation with stored rainwater.
Appliances last longer when free from the corrosive or scale effects of hard water. Users with potable systems prefer
the superior taste and cleansing properties of rainwater.
There is archeological evidence that the concept of harvesting rainwater in China may date back 6,000 years. Ruins of cisterns built as early as 2,000 BC for storing runoff from hillsides for agriculture and domestic purposes are still standing in Israel today.
One of the best things about rainwater is that it’s FREE, and a collection system can be very inexpensive to install on your boat. When I was cruising on Nancy Dawson I only brought water from shore on two occasions in my nine-month trip. The rest came from the sky.
The first time I collected water on board was in Belize heading north from Belize City to Ambergris Caye. The wind stopped and the water came down so hard and heavy that it cut visibility to less than a hundred yards. I’ve been in fog banks were I could see farther. After it had rained for about five minutes in a deluge that Noah never had to deal with I felt that whatever salt and dirt might be on the sails had been washed off I raised the topping lift a bit and the water ran off the goose neck. I put a cup down to collect a bit of water and tasted it and it was sweet and clean. It was raining so hard and fast that I filled five of the gallon jugs I had aboard in about 15 minutes.
A couple of weeks later I stopped for a day at Caye Chapel where I filled my main tank with their water and headed south towards Guatemala. I had been thinking about how I would capture more rain water since that first experience. Standing in the rain to get the water off the goose neck didn’t seem like a practical exercise and I needed some system that wouldn’t require me to either get soaking wet or to put on my foul weather gear.
The deck fill for my water tank was on the port side just forward of the cockpit. I built a small dam from the cabin towards the toe rail and from the toe rail inboard leaving about a three inch gap so water could run the whole length of the deck and out the scuppers aft. I fashioned the dam out with epoxy stick, something no boat should ever leave the dock without having several on board. They are a two part putty, one part wrapped around the other. They’re about six inches long and an inch thick. You simply break off the amount you need and knead the two different colored parts together until it’s a single color and them mold it around whatever you want to build or repair. Besides building the dam I used it to stop a persist ant leak in a through-hull fitting and to repair a broken part on my windvane self-steering. If I hadn’t had the putty I would have had to hand steer for about a thousand miles. After the stuff hardens it can be tapped to accept machine screws and the stuff hardens under water, too.
Anyway, I built the dam so that each section had a small groove where I could insert a small piece of wood when I wanted to utilize the dam for water collection but would otherwise remain open. From then on when it would start raining I would wait for a while for the rain to wash off the deck, open the deck fill and insert the piece of wood to close the dam and the rain water would drain into my tank. It worked like a charm.
Here are several other solutions that can be used for collecting this nectar from the Gods:
http://www.atomvoyages.com/projects/RainWater.htm
http://setsail.com/catching-water/
http://www.sailing-starting-over.com/sailboat-rainwater-harvesting.html
http://www.sailnet.com/forums/living-aboard/45397-rain-catcher-anyone.html
All this, of course, is grist for the mill for when I build my shanty boat, and since I’ll be living on the hook most of the time it will be a requirement. How feasible is it in Bocas del Toro? Well, I did some research on rainfall in the area and this is what I found:
| Rainfall in Bocas del Toro, Panama | |||||
| Month | Mean Total Rainfall | Mean Total Rainfall | Mean Number of | ||
| (mm) | (Inches) | Rain Days | |||
| January | 123.9 | 4.88 | 16.6 | ||
| February | 266.1 | 10.48 | 14.6 | ||
| March | 83.8 | 3.30 | 14.8 | ||
| April | 369.1 | 14.53 | 15.2 | ||
| May | 178.3 | 7.02 | 16.7 | ||
| June | 259 | 10.2 | 17.9 | ||
| July | 420.1 | 16.54 | 20.9 | ||
| August | 440.7 | 17.35 | 18.4 | ||
| September | 311.2 | 12.25 | 15.8 | ||
| October | 150.5 | 5.93 | 16.4 | ||
| November | 291.7 | 11.48 | 17 | ||
| December | 563.6 | 22.19 | 20 | ||
| Total | 3,458 | 136.15 | |||
| That’s 11.35 FEET of water a year | |||||
| This information came from the World Weather Information Service | |||||
| Climatological information is based on monthly averages for the 30-year period 1971-2000. | |||||
| Mean number of rain days = Mean number of days with at least 0.1 mm of rain. | |||||
With almost eleven and a half feet or rain falling in the area every year I think keeping dry will be more of a problem than keeping the water tanks full.
“All the water that ever was, still is today. All the water that evaporates today the same amount also falls. The tears we cry could be the same ones Jesus wept”..Unattributed
POST SCRIPT: Ken, a regular reader of my blog and who contributes welcomed comments left a comment on this post and referenced the discharge of gray and black water from boats. You can read my reply, but I couldn’t upload a photo in the comments section so here goes.
Ken, this is common in the Bocas del Toro area as well as in the San Blas archipelago, and it’s NOT a phone booth built out over the water.
Filed under boats, Floating Homes, Houseboat, Living off the grid, Shanty boat
Live Aboard Simulator
This is FUNNY… Thanks to Larry at Google rec.boats.cruising
The Liveaboard Simulator”
Just for fun, park your cars in the lot of the convenience store
at least 2 blocks from your house. (Make believe the sidewalk is a
floating dock between your car and the house.
Move yourself and your family (If applicable) into 2 bedrooms and 1
bathroom. Measure the DECK space INSIDE your boat. Make sure the
occupied house has no more space, or closet space, or drawer space.
Boats don’t have room for “beds”, as such. Fold your Sealy
Posturepedic up against a wall, it won’t fit on a boat. Go to a hobby
fabric store and buy a foam pad 5′ 10″ long and 4′ wide AND NO MORE
THAN 3″ THICK. Cut it into a triangle so the little end is only 12″
wide. This simulates the foam pad in the V-berth up in the pointy bow
of the sailboat. Bring in the kitchen table from the kitchen you’re
not allowed to use. Put the pad UNDER the table, on the floor, so you
can simulate the 3′ of headroom over the pad.
Block off both long sides of the pad, and the pointy end so you have
to climb aboard the V-berth from the wide end where your pillows will
be. The hull blocks off the sides of a V-berth and you have to climb
up over the end of it through a narrow opening (hatch to main cabin)
on a boat. You’ll climb over your mate’s head to go to the potty in
the night. No fun for either party. Test her mettle and resolve by
getting up this way right after you go to bed at night. There are lots
of things to do on a boat and you’ll forget at least one of them,
thinking about it laying in bed, like “Did I remember to tie off the
dingy better?” or “Is that spring line (at the dock) or anchor line
(anchored out) as tight as it should be?” Boaters who don’t worry
about things like this laying in bed are soon aground or on
fire or the laughing stock of an anchorage…. You need to find out
how much climbing over her she will tolerate BEFORE you’re stuck with
a big boat and big marina bills and she refuses to sleep aboard it any
more…..
Bring a coleman stove into the bathroom and set it next to the
bathroom sink. Your boat’s sink is smaller, but we’ll let you use the
bathroom sink, anyways. Do all your cooking in the bathroom, WITHOUT
using the bathroom power vent. If you have a boat vent, it’ll be a
useless 12v one that doesn’t draw near the air your bathroom power
vent draws to take away cooking odors. Leave the hall door open to
simulate the open hatch. Take all the screens off your 2 bedroom’s
windows. Leave the windows open to let in the bugs that will invade
your boat at dusk, and the flies attracted to the cooking.
Borrow a 25 gallon drum mounted on a trailer. Flush your
toilets into the drums. Trailer the drums to the convenience store to
dump them when they get full. Turn off your sewer, you won’t have
one. This will simulate going to the “pump out station” every time the
tiny drum is full. 25 gallons is actually LARGER than most holding
tanks.They’re more like 15 gallons on small sailboats under 40′ because they
were added to the boat after the law changed requiring them and there
was no place to put it or a bigger one. They fill up really fast if
you liveaboard!
Unless your boat is large enough to have a big “head” with full bath,
make believe your showers/bathtubs don’t work. Make a deal with
someone next door to the convenience store to use THEIR bathroom for
bathing at the OTHER end of the DOCK. (Marina rest room) If you use
this rest room to potty, while you’re there, make believe it has no
paper towels or toilet paper. Bring your own. Bring your own soap
and anything else you’d like to use there, too.
If your boat HAS a shower in its little head, we’ll let you use the
shower end of the bathtub, but only as much tub as the boat has FREE
shower space for standing to shower. As the boat’s shower drains into a little pan
in the bilge, be sure to leave the soapy shower water in the bottom of
the tub for a few days before draining it. Boat shower sumps always
smell like spent soap growing exotic living organisms science hasn’t
actually discovered or named, yet. Make sure your simulated V-berth is
less than 3′ from this soapy water for sleeping. The shower sump is
under the passageway to the V-berth next to your pillows.
Run you whole house through a 20 amp breaker to simulate available
dock power at the marina. If you’re thinking of anchoring out, turn
off the main breaker and “make do” with a boat battery and
flashlights. Don’t forget you have to heat your house on this 20A
supply and try to keep the water from freezing in winter.
Turn off the water main valve in front of your house. Run a hose from
your neighbor’s lawn spigot over to your lawn spigot and get all your
water from there. Try to keep the hose from freezing all winter.
As your boat won’t have a laundry, disconnect yours. Go to a boat
supply place, like West Marine, and buy you a dock cart. Haul ALL
your supplies, laundry, garbage, etc. between the car at the
convenience store and house in this cart. Once a week, haul your
outboard motor to the car, leave it a day then haul it back to the
house, in the cart, to simulate “boat problems” that require “boat
parts” to be removed/replaced on your “dock”. If ANYTHING ever comes
out of that cart between the convenience store and the house, put it
in your garage and forget about it. (Simulates losing it over the
side of the dock, where it sank in 23′ of water and was dragged off by
the current.)
Each morning, about 5AM, have someone you don’t know run a weedeater
back and forth under your bedroom windows to simulate the fishermen
leaving the marina to go fishing. Have him slam trunk lids, doors,
blow car horns and bang some heavy pans together from 4AM to 5AM
before lighting off the weedeater. (Simulates loading boats
with booze and fishing gear and gas cans.) Once a week, have him bang
the running weedeater into your bedroom wall to simulate the idiot who
drove his boat into the one you’re sleeping in because he was half
asleep leaving the dock. Put a rope over a big hook in the ceiling
over your coffee table “bed”. Hook one end of the rope to the coffee
table siderail and the other end out where he can pull on it. As soon
as he shuts off the weedeater, have him pull hard 9 times on the rope
to tilt your bed at least 30 degrees. (Simulates the wakes of the
fishermen blasting off trying to beat each other to the fishing.)
Anytime there is a storm in your area, have someone constantly pull on
the rope. It’s rough riding storms in the marina! If your boat is a
sailboat, install a big wire from the top of the tallest tree to your
electrical ground in the house to simulate mast lightning strikes in
the marina, or to give you the thought of potential lightning strikes.
Each time you “go out”, or think of going boating away from your
marina, disconnect the neighbor’s water hose, your electric wires, all
the umbilicals your new boat will use to make life more bearable in the marina.
Use bottled drinking water for 2 days for everything. Get one of those
5 gallon jugs with the airpump on top from a bottled water company.
This is your boat’s “at sea” water system simulator. You’ll learn to
conserve water this way. Of course, not having the marina’s AC power
supply, you’ll be lighting and all from a car battery, your only
source of power. If you own or can borrow a generator, feel free to
leave it running to provide AC power up to the limit of the generator.
If you’re thinking about a 30′ sailboat, you won’t have room for a
generator so don’t use it.
Any extra family members must be sleeping on the settees in the main
cabin or in the quarter berth under the cockpit….unless you intend
to get a boat over 40-something feet with an aft cabin. Smaller boats
have quarter berths. Cut a pad out of the same pad material that is no
more than 2′ wide by 6′ long. Get a cardboard box from an appliance
store that a SMALL refridgerator came in. Put the pad in the box, cut
to fit, and make sure only one end of the box is open. The box can be
no more than 2 feet above the pad. Quarter berths are really tight.
Make them sleep in there, with little or no air circulation. That’s
what sleeping in a quarterberth is all about.
Of course, to simulate sleeping anchored out for the weekend, no heat
or air conditioning will be used and all windows will be open without
screens so the bugs can get in.
In the mornings, everybody gets up and goes out on the patio to enjoy
the sunrise. Then, one person at a time goes back inside to dress,
shave, clean themselves in the tiny cabin unless you’re a family of
nudists who don’t mind looking at each other in the buff. You can’t
get dressed in the stinky little head with the door closed on a
sailboat. Hell, there’s barely room to bend over so you can sit on the
commode. So, everyone will dress in the main cabin….one at a time.
Boat tables are 2′ x 4′ and mounted next to the settee. There’s no
room for chairs in a boat. So, eat off a 2X4′ space on that kitchen
table you slept under while sitting on a couch (settee simulator). You
can also go out with breakfast and sit on the patio (cockpit), if you
like.
Ok, breakfast is over. Crank up the lawnmower under the window for 2
hours. It’s time to recharge the batteries from last night’s usage and
to freeze the coldplate in the boat’s icebox which runs off a
compressor on the engine. Get everybody to clean up your little hovel.
Don’t forget to make the beds from ONE END ONLY. You can’t get to the
other 3 sides of a boat bed pad.
All hands go outside and washdown the first fiberglass UPS truck that
passes by. That’s about how big the deck is on your 35′ sailboat that
needs to have the ocean cleaned off it daily or it’ll turn the white
fiberglass all brown like the UPS truck. Now, doesn’t the UPS truck
look nice like your main deck?
Ok, we’re going to need some food, do the laundry, buy some boat parts
that failed because the manufacturer’s bean counters got cheap and
used plastics and the wife wants to “eat out, I’m fed up with cooking
on the Coleman stove” today. Let’s make believe we’re not at home, but
in some exotic port like Ft Lauderdale, today….on our cruise to Key
West……Before “going ashore”, plan on buying all the food you’ll
want to eat that will:
A – Fit into the Coleman Cooler on the floor
B – You can cook on the Coleman stove without an oven or all those
fancy kitchen tools you don’t have on the boat
C – And will last you for 10 days, in case the wind drops and it takes
more time than we planned at sea.
Plan meals carefully in a boat. We can’t buy more than we can STORE,
either!
You haven’t washed clothes since you left home and everything is
dirty. Even if it’s not, pretend it is for the boater-away-from-home
simulator. Put all the clothes in your simulated boat in a huge
dufflebag so we can take it to the LAUNDRY! Manny’s Marina HAS a
laundromat, but the hot water heater is busted (for the last 8 months)
and Manny has “parts on order” for it…..saving Manny $$$$ on the
electric bill! Don’t forget to carry the big dufflebag with us on our
“excursion”. God that bag stinks, doesn’t it?….PU!
Of course, we came here by BOAT, so we don’t have a car. Some nice
marinas have a shuttle bus, but they’re not a taxi. The shuttle bus
will only go to West Marine or the tourist traps, so we’ll be either
taking the city bus, if there is one or taxi cabs or shopping at the
marina store which has almost nothing to buy at enormous prices.
Walk to the 7-11 store, where you have your car stored, but ignore the
car. Make believe it isn’t there. No one drove it to Ft Lauderdale for you.
Use the payphone at the 7-11 and call a cab. Don’t give the cab driver
ANY instructions because in Ft Lauderdale you haven’t the foggiest
idea where West Marine is located or how to get there, unlike at home.
We’ll go to West Marine, first, because if we don’t the “head” back on
the boat won’t be working for a week because little Suzy broke a valve
in it trying to flush some paper towels. This is your MOST important
project, today….that valve in the toilet!! After the cab drivers
drives around for an hour looking for West Marine and asking his
dispatcher how to get there. Don’t forget to UNLOAD your stuff from
the cab, including the dirty clothes in the dufflebag then go into
West Marine and give the clerk a $100 bill, simulating the cost of
toilet parts. Lexus parts are cheaper than toilet parts at West
Marine. See for yourself! The valve she broke, the
seals that will have to be replaced on the way into the valve will
come to $100 easy. Tell the clerk you’re using my liveaboard simulator
and to take his girlfriend out to dinner on your $100 greenback. If
you DO buy the boat, this’ll come in handy when you DO need boat parts
because he’ll remember you for the great time his girlfriend gave him
on your $100 tip. Hard-to-find boat parts will arrive in DAYS, not months like the rest
of us. It’s just a good political move while in simulation mode.
Call another cab from West Marine’s phone, saving 50c on payphone
charges. Load the cab with all your stuff, toilet parts, DIRTY CLOTHES then
tell the cabbie to take you to the laundromat so we can wash the
stinky clothes in the trunk. The luxury marina’s laundry in Ft
Lauderdale has a broken hot water heater. They’re working on it, the
girl at the store counter, said, yesterday. Mentioning the $12/ft you
paid to park the boat at their dock won’t get the laundry working
before we leave for Key West. Do your laundry in the laundromat the
cabbie found for you. Just because noone speaks English in this
neighborhood, don’t worry. You’ll be fine this time of day near noon.
Call another cab to take us out of here to a supermarket. When you get
there, resist the temptation to “load up” because your boat has
limited storage and very limited refridgeration space (remember?
Coleman Cooler).
Buy from the list we made early this morning. Another package of
cookies is OK. Leave one of the kids guarding the pile of clean
laundry just inside the supermarket’s front door….We learned our
lesson and DIDN’T forget and leave it in the cab, again!
Call another cab to take us back to the marina, loaded up with clean
clothes and food and all-important boat parts. Isn’t Ft Lauderdale
beautiful from a cab? It’s too late to go exploring, today. Maybe
tomorrow…. Don’t forget to tell the cab to go to the 7-11 (marina
parking lot)….not your front door….cabs don’t float well.
Ok, haul all the stuff in the dock cart from the 7-11 store the two
blocks to the “boat” bedroom. Wait 20 minutes before starting out for
the house. This simulates waiting for someone to bring back a marina-owned dock
cart from down the docks…..They always leave them outside their
boats, until the marina “crew” get fed up with newbies like us asking
why there aren’t any carts and go down the docks to retrieve them.
Put all the stuff away, food and clothes, in the tiny drawer space
provided. Have a beer on the patio (cockpit) and watch the sunset.
THIS is living!
Now, disassemble the toilet in your bathroom, take out the wax ring
under it and put it back. Reassemble the toilet. This completes the
simulation of putting the new valve in the “head” on the boat. Uh, uh,
NO POWERVENT!
GET YOUR HAND OFF THAT SWITCH! The whole “boat” smells like the inside
of the holding tank for hours after fixing the toilet in a real boat,
too! Spray some Lysol if you got it….
After getting up, tomorrow morning, from your “V-Berth”, take the
whole family out to breakfast by WALKING to the nearest restaurant,
then take a cab to any local park or attraction you like. We’re off
today to see the sights of Ft Lauderdale…..before heading out to
sea, again, to Key West. Take a cab back home after dinner out and go to bed, exhausted, on
your little foam pad under the table…..
Get up this morning and disconnect all hoses, electrical wires, etc.
Get ready for “sea”. Crank up the lawn mower under the open bedroom
window for 4 hours while we motor out to find some wind. ONE
responsible adult MUST be sitting on the hot patio all day, in shifts,
“on watch” looking out for other boats, ships, etc. If you have a
riding lawn mower, let the person “on watch” drive it around the yard
all day to simulate driving the boat down the ICW in heavy traffic.
About 2PM, turn off the engine and just have them sit on the mower
“steering” it on the patio. We’re under sail, now. Every hour or so,
take everyone out in the yard with a big rope and have a tug-of-war to
simulate the work involved with setting sail, changing sail, trimming
sail. Make sure everyone gets all sweaty in the heat.
Sailors working on sailboats are always all sweaty or we’re not going
anywhere fast! Do this all day, today, all night, tonight, all day,
tomorrow, all night tomorrow night and all day the following day until
5PM when you “arrive” at the next port you’re going to. Make sure
no one in the family leaves the confines of the little bedroom or the
patio during our “trip”. Make sure everyone conserves water, battery
power, etc., things you’ll want to conserve while being at sea on a
trip somewhere. Everyone can go up to the 7-11 for an icecream as soon
as we get the “boat” docked on day 3, the first time anyone has left
the confines of the bedroom/patio in 3 days.
Question – Was anyone suicidal during our simulated voyage? Keep an
eye out for anyone with a problem being cooped up with other family
members. If anyone is attacked, any major fights break out, any
threats to throw the captain to the fish…..forget all about boats
and buy a motorhome, instead.
One More Good Adventure 