Saturday, July 14, 2012


July 14

WE HAVE--OR ARE GOING TO HAVE--A BOAT!!

I am attaching pictures of our new home. Admittedly, you can’t see a whole lot, but I’ve been thinking that boat photography is really pretty awful.  All the pictures are basically the same and they don’t tell you what you really want to know, which is what it would be like to LIVE on it, whether for a weekend or vacation or as an actual residence.  I’ve been thinking that I might be able to do something about that, so will keep you posted on that idea.
The boat that we are buying is a Hanse 400, a German boat, about 40 feet long with three cabins and two heads.  The second head is unnecessary, but that’s the way it comes and it will be fine.  It appears to have quite a lot of storage space, although I think I will probably have to do some sort of purge either before or after we move in in order to survive.  Frank and I will have the berth in the bow and Max will have the larger of the two in the stern.  When we’ve looked at similar boats he has always wanted the one on the left, but I think once he realizes that the one on the right is larger he will see the logic in his having that one, considering that he’s got quite a lot of stuff that he’ll need to find homes for.  If nothing else, living on a boat will make him keep his room picked up or he’ll have nowhere to sleep.  Of course, that goes both ways and I guess I’ll have to hang up my clothes rather than letting them accumulate until I just can’t stand it any more.
Since the boat has never been launched and will need some outfitting, transportation comes as part of the deal, so it is being driven here to Empuriabrava (about 100km from Barcelona and worth a separate post of its own) and will be put in the water here.  Also included is someone to help us sail the boat to Portugal, since we’ve never done this sort of thing before and need to learn the boat.  I think we’ve been pretty thorough about the equipment that the boat will need, so now I am thinking about other stuff--for example, how does one grocery shop to sail to Portugal?  Mom? Susan?  Ken?  Can you help?  I’m not even good at keeping a kitchen stocked, so having to do this sort of thinking ahead is difficult.  Frank laughed at me yesterday because I’ve started a grocery list and we aren’t even leaving for another two weeks.
Here are some photos and of course I’ll post more when we actually get the boat!













5 comments:

  1. Zut! This is fantastic! How long is your transit to portugal? We are so excited for you guys.
    Food wise its safe to say that cokking will be the last thing from anyones mind unless your delivery crew person is up for it, or maybe ifits calm and you are motoring alot. Not to say that you can't cook. With time to develope a system and get passed any queasiness of the first days you guys will be making bread, omletes, pizza and really about anything you like. The trick is really in preparing food while you are heeled. I used a wooden cutting board on the stove. Any liquids have to be wedge in the sink or on/in the stove. For a quick offshore leg I would plan on no cooking beyond tea and coffee or warming premade pizza. We would always start with a big volume of pizza, brownies and canned drinks in the fridge. As things progress the pressure cooker becomes the solution for every meal. One pot, fast and minimal clean up (you won't want to do dishes either!). We have a million thoughts on provisioning and a comprehensive blog post on svbintalkhamseen.org. I'll find it for you.
    Ken

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    2. Appologies for the horrible phone typing!

      Delete
  2. Hi Helen! Ken's the cook on our boat, so he's the go-to guy for that, but I wanted to add that I found that crackers, peanut butter, nuts, cookies, and hardboiled eggs really came in handy on a passage. And a bottle of water. And Altoids (the mint kind). I get seasick and don't like to spend a lot of time below when we first set off, so those are something I could always zip down and grab and zip back up to the cockpit if I had to. Also, small-ish baggies were handy for storing pre-made stashes. We kept a small bin in a cupboard for storing on-watch snacks.
    Looking forward to hearing about your adventures! Congratulations on the gorgeous boat! xo, Susan

    ReplyDelete
  3. Everything we know about food on passages:

    http://www.svbintalkhamseen.org/blog/2010/04/how-this-all-works-part-iii-food-for-the-ages.html

    ReplyDelete