Passion

I love Passion Tea Lemonade from Starbucks. Unfortunately, it's just not in our budget for daily consumption, so I was really excited when my dear friend gave me a box of Passion tea from Tazo, along with a handwritten recipe card, as a going-away present. It was not only a great gift because I love the tea so much, but because Tazo's headquarters in Portland, Oregon - where we'd been living the past five years.

Incidentally, here in Mexico it's called Hibiscus Tea Lemonade since that is actually the main ingredient in the tea. The first time I tried to order it I got blank stares until I realized my mistake.

Making Passion Tea Lemonade is easy. Simply brew up the tea using the teabags, let it cool and mix with lemonade to your liking. I like to brew the tea sun-tea style by leaving it outside to steep all day. By not boiling water you keep the boat cool and save gas. You can also add extra sugar but it's great as is.

If you don't have lemonade on hand, one of our GalleySwap members submitted this great recipe, for making lemonade from scratch.

Fire Safety

On a boat you can't simply step outside and call the fire department if something catches on fire - unless of course you happen to be in a marina. We're planning on spending a lot of time at anchor, so being ready for a potential fire is important. While working aboard ships, we both attended several days of shipboard fire-fighting classes, both in classrooms and fighting "fake" fires aboard old ships. Even with the fake fires my adrenalin got pumping pretty good so I can only imagine how scary a real fire would be.

The standard fire extinguishers that most people carry on their boats really don't last very long and barely put a dent in a good sized fire. Not to mention they make a huge mess. So we've beefed up the standard two fire extinguishers required by the US Coast Guard by adding more ABC extinguishers as well as two fire blankets. Our fire-fighting arsenal has been placed strategically all over the boat including the cockpit.

Yachting Monthly Magazine has made an excellent video on the different options you have in fighting onboard fires by setting fire to their crash test boat.

Space Saving Ideas

Storage on a boat is at a premium. Since we first started talking about preparing to move onto a boat we have been getting rid of bulky stuff and buying tiny versions of everything we wanted or needed. But being tiny isn't the only requirement to make it aboard. Serving double-duty is another. Hardly anything on our boat serves just one function. Tables make into beds, couches and beds cover electronics and tanks, refrigerator doors serve as counter space.

Extra linens are huge space-hogs, so to be sure we have spare sheets for our guests, I stuff decorative pillowcases with towels and blankets rather than actual pillows. This way they can still be used as pillows but serve double-duty as storage.

My favorite "pillow" cover (pictured above) I made from a mola my parents and I picked up on our trip from Germany to California.  I used sunbrella fabric for the back and sewed in a heavy-duty plastic zipper. This pillowcase alone has five extra towels and one small quilt hidden inside. 

Shopping... again

Friday morning we drove to San Diego for another mega shopping-spree at West Marine and to pick up our new watermaker... but not before getting one more taco near the local fish market.

We're back on the boat now putting away and installing our new acquisitions.

Going aloft

Mike took a quick trip up the mast to figure out what types of bulbs need to be replaced with LED.

Introducing Camille | The Head

We love Camille's huge head - that's the bathroom for you landlubbers. It has two separate areas, a shower/toilet area and the vanity/sink area. It can be entered either from the master stateroom (aft cabin) and from the saloon (and yes, that is saloon with two Os). Excellent ventilation with four opening ports and two large drains in the floor make for easy maintenance and cleaning. Last but not least we have a fresh-water VacuFlush head (toilet) which is the only head that I know of that doesn't smell, aside from the composting head we had on our previous boat. Read more about Camille...

/

Water

We've already been in Mexico for over a week and our water tank was starting to near the empty mark. It was time to get it filled so we could continue doing the dishes, flushing the toilet, brushing our teeth, etc. In Mexico that is a bit tricky as the water here is not of very high quality and can make you pretty sick. We would like to keep our tanks clean until we install our watermaker so we had to get drinking water delivered in 5 gallon jugs.


In the afternoon we went to the opening of a new orphanage near Ensenada. It's an orphanage for special needs children and the first orphan arrived today.






It was an amazing full moon tonight rising over Ensenada.

Shopping

We rode our bikes into town today to do a little grocery shopping. After looking over the receipt I realized that avocados cost us a tenth of the price of what we pay in the US. We also bought fresh eggs that were unrefrigerated, which means they won't have to use up precious fridge space on the boat. For other great galley tips and onboard recipes check out our free sister-site GalleySwap.

Mike installed our 27" computer monitor at the nav station. It fits perfectly and we plan on using it to do some serious route planning. Also tested out an anchor our dock neighbor is trying to sell. Looks like it will fit. We just need to get some better shackles and finally pick up our 200' of chain.

Introducing Camille | The Saloon

The saloon is the main living area on a boat. On our little boat this includes the living room, dining room, galley, and navigation station. Under all the built in furniture are water tanks, fuel tanks, batteries, an inverter, a battery charger, food, gear, water and head pumps, a refrigerator compressor and countless other things to keep a boat as self-sufficient as possible. Today we took measurements to squeeze in a watermaker which will allow us make freshwater from seawater making us even more self-sufficient. For a list of gear we have added or plan to add see our Finances page.  Read more about Camille...

Border Crossings

We are getting settled in Ensenada. Our goal for the next month is to outfit the boat so that we will be able to make fresh water and have enough battery power to run all the systems that are onboard Camille. This weekend we took the bus back to the border to pick up our van from the US. We don't want to stray too far from the boating supply center of SoCal just yet. See the Finances page for our list of gear complete with prices.

Today we drove the dinghy around the bay to test out our new outboard and visit with the sea lions at the cruise ship dock.