This is a placeholder for interesting ideas on provisioning - and the care and feeding of sailing crew.
http://theboatgalley.com/
While cruising in remote areas of Baja Mexico - I was able to provision several times while anchored off a few fishing villages. When I left the U.S., I had stocked-up initially with plenty of canned good - but as time went by - I found it often difficult to find replacements for canned goods that contained a good variety of different meats. After a few months, I deemed it a rare treasure-find if I located a can of spam in an out-of-the-way village :)
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Cockpit Cushions
Although you can easily sew a set of cockpit cushions with time and a bit of practices - if you are looking for ready-made cushions, this company might be worth a look:
http://www.bottomsiders.com/
tip'o the hat to http://www.windtraveler.net
Friday, August 2, 2013
First Year Review - 1963 35 ft Pearson Alberg
Last month was the first year anniversary of owning my 2nd boat - a 1963 35 ft. Pearson Alberg.
After one year living aboard her, here are a few of my thoughts and reflections on the choice of this particular boat.
My current idea of the ideal boat continues to be a Hans Christian 43 - however, my more modest budget warranted tempering my desire with a modicum of reasonableness.
The 35 ft. Pearson Alberg is a good boat - and a reasonable compromise. A few words that come to mind when I think of my boat: Salty, Seaworthy, Blue-water Capable, Hardy, Robust, Resilient, Strong, Safe, Workable.
Living aboard again, after a hiatus of almost 5 years without a boat has been an easy readjustment - given that I do not have a need for much space or material things.
For my professional client work, I have leased a small office (two suites, ~650 sq ft for $750/month) in the marina complex - which allows me to keep all of my books and clothes in a storage area within the office. When I am in-between client engagements, I plan on putting everything into a storage facility to further reduce my monthly overhead - and to allow me to spend weeks or months cruising along the coast.
During the winter I purchased a small personal space heater at Target (about $9) - and it kept the v-berth toasty warm most nights.
During June, a few nights were quite muggy - and so I purchased a small personal/desktop style oscillating fan at Target (about $16) - which provided welcome air flow to cool down during a few particularly hot and muggy nights
The Good:
Needs Work / Needs Fixing:
[I'll get to these over the next few months]
After one year living aboard her, here are a few of my thoughts and reflections on the choice of this particular boat.
My current idea of the ideal boat continues to be a Hans Christian 43 - however, my more modest budget warranted tempering my desire with a modicum of reasonableness.
The 35 ft. Pearson Alberg is a good boat - and a reasonable compromise. A few words that come to mind when I think of my boat: Salty, Seaworthy, Blue-water Capable, Hardy, Robust, Resilient, Strong, Safe, Workable.
Living aboard again, after a hiatus of almost 5 years without a boat has been an easy readjustment - given that I do not have a need for much space or material things.
For my professional client work, I have leased a small office (two suites, ~650 sq ft for $750/month) in the marina complex - which allows me to keep all of my books and clothes in a storage area within the office. When I am in-between client engagements, I plan on putting everything into a storage facility to further reduce my monthly overhead - and to allow me to spend weeks or months cruising along the coast.
During the winter I purchased a small personal space heater at Target (about $9) - and it kept the v-berth toasty warm most nights.
During June, a few nights were quite muggy - and so I purchased a small personal/desktop style oscillating fan at Target (about $16) - which provided welcome air flow to cool down during a few particularly hot and muggy nights
The Good:
- Comfortable for live-aboard
- Seaworthy
- Good value for the price I paid
- Very pleased with my current marina's facilities and location (paying about $724/month: For example, last month's marina bill: $449 for 35' slip, $240 live-aboard fees for 2, $24 storage locker, $12.48 electric)
- Very pleased with the electronics that came with the boat (integrated chart plotter with depth/sonar, radar,and gps)
[I'll get to these over the next few months]
- The auto-pilot grips the wheel too tight, even when disengaged
- External brightwork needs to be re-varnished
- Port navigation light is out [not urgent, since the tri-light at the mast head meets requirement]
- Sail Repair: Tear at bottom of main sail [from my voyage last year down the coast]
- Stern coaming has a split in the board at the stern end [likely damaged when I was thrown across the cockpit by the strike to the head by the boom during my voyage last year down the coast]
- Stop-guards for the port-side of the traveler and port-side jib track line were somehow sheared off during last year's voyage.
- A better Digital TV antennae would be nice
Things I Would Change:
- Better (easier) access to where the batteries are kept
- Some way to put a zinc on the prop shaft (there i no room to do so externally)
- The boom is carried too low - and can be dangerous in a confused seaway, as it can swing wildly
Future Boat Projects:
- New running rigging
- Secure the hard dinghy to the deck (possibly on wooden chocks?)
- Run a line at the outer edges of the mast-steps (from top-to-bottom) so that the halyards cannot become snared/caught in the mast steps
- High-Gain WiFi antennea
- Add Solar Panels
- Add Wind Generator
- Add Wind Vane (for backup to Autopilot)
- Add Water-Maker
- Replace mixed chain-and-line rode with all chain
New AGM Batteries
My first boat was a a 1971 32 ft. Islander sloop, that I owned from 2002-2007. Soon after I bought her, I replaced the automobile-quality starting batteries with rugged marine-grade AGM 105ah Group (31) batteries. In my experience, that was a good decision. I never regretted the extra expense for the AGM batteries, because it gave me peace-of-mind - and eliminated a lot of potential maintenance headaches.
Given my client workload, I haven't had much time to do any sailing in the last year. So, it was just two weeks ago that I finally decided to get around to replacing the old wet-cell Group 31 batteries that came with my current boat (a 1963 35 ft. Pearson Alberg, that I purchased last year).
Another deciding factor on choosing AGM batteries: Due to the very limited and exceedingly tight and difficult access to the batteries, it would be exceedingly difficult to maintain wet-cell batteries.
Since I had not kept up with topping the old wet-cells with distilled water - there was also the small matter of their untimely demise. As in, dead, like a parrot.
So, off to West Marine I went.
Three AGM 105ah Group (31) batteries ending up costing me $779.97 ($259.99 each).
Extracting the three wet-cell batteries turned into an all-afternoon (and painful) endeavor - and it was only after I began trying to wrangle an AGM into the most difficult of spots - that I realized; "damn, the new AGM battery is 3/4 of an inch longer than the old wet-cell".
After 6 hours, and pulling the muscles in my back - I accepted that it wasn't going to happen that day -and decided to give it a rest for a few days or so.
Now, two weeks later, my back has recovered, and I'm ready to try and tackle the job again this weekend.
Necessary tools...
Worst-case scenario, if I cannot find a way to squeeze that one battery into the tight spot [it happens to be wired as the starting battery] - I may have to consider relocating it to somewhere else on the boat and rewiring to a new location.
Oh, and the battery terminals on the AGM batteries are slightly smaller than the previous wet-cells apparently - so there is another issue to be sorted with not being able to tighten the battery terminals completely, for at least one set of battery cables.
Given my client workload, I haven't had much time to do any sailing in the last year. So, it was just two weeks ago that I finally decided to get around to replacing the old wet-cell Group 31 batteries that came with my current boat (a 1963 35 ft. Pearson Alberg, that I purchased last year).
Another deciding factor on choosing AGM batteries: Due to the very limited and exceedingly tight and difficult access to the batteries, it would be exceedingly difficult to maintain wet-cell batteries.
Since I had not kept up with topping the old wet-cells with distilled water - there was also the small matter of their untimely demise. As in, dead, like a parrot.
So, off to West Marine I went.
Three AGM 105ah Group (31) batteries ending up costing me $779.97 ($259.99 each).
Extracting the three wet-cell batteries turned into an all-afternoon (and painful) endeavor - and it was only after I began trying to wrangle an AGM into the most difficult of spots - that I realized; "damn, the new AGM battery is 3/4 of an inch longer than the old wet-cell".
After 6 hours, and pulling the muscles in my back - I accepted that it wasn't going to happen that day -and decided to give it a rest for a few days or so.
Now, two weeks later, my back has recovered, and I'm ready to try and tackle the job again this weekend.
Necessary tools...
Worst-case scenario, if I cannot find a way to squeeze that one battery into the tight spot [it happens to be wired as the starting battery] - I may have to consider relocating it to somewhere else on the boat and rewiring to a new location.
Oh, and the battery terminals on the AGM batteries are slightly smaller than the previous wet-cells apparently - so there is another issue to be sorted with not being able to tighten the battery terminals completely, for at least one set of battery cables.
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
Google Earth KLM file of Joshua Slocum's Voyage
Tonight I'm doing some research on KLM files (to prepare a file of my 2004 voyage, displaying the voyage track on Google Earth or Google Maps).
Keyhole Markup Language (KLM) Documentation
https://developers.google.com/kml/
I happened to come across a very cool Google Earth KLZ file (a zipped version of the KLM) put together by Jonathan M. Ahlbrand of Joshua Slocum's late 1800s voyage around the world.
View Larger Map
If the embedded image above doesn't display, try this link [note: it may take awhile to load]
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