Loading Lady

This is getting real, folks.

Lady has been cleaned, the cabins made up, the clutter put away, and we just loaded all the non-perishable food items and paper goods onto her, along with a lot of stuff we bought for our floating “house.” The fridge and freezer are at temperature and early this week we will be moving the freezer items aboard, and eventually the refrigerator items the day before we actually set out. I continue to be amazed, every time we load her, at how much storage space she has!

We’re doing a bunch of last minute shopping both locally and online (thank goodness for Amazon Prime!). We’re eating down our own refrigerator and pantry, and starting to prepare the house for its temporary vacancy.

I’m finishing up those sunshades. Dave is finishing up several boat projects. He got the WiFi booster working, but the single sideband is still being problematic. Through ongoing online consultation with an expert, the current hypothesis is that there is too much “noise” in the marina, so we have to put solving the SSB issue on hold until we are in open water away from said “noise.” We will replace our leaking galley sink faucet once the new one arrives. Normally Dave would  just fix the leak, but replacements for the failed rubber seals are no longer available. Besides, our new faucet has a sprayer option that will be handy.

Believe it or not, my biggest challenge has been packing clothes. Despite Lady’s generous storage space, precious little of that is for clothing, and we sort of need two very different wardrobes, one of which we’ll only need until we get to Virginia waters. I think we’ve settled on bringing what we are sure will keep us warm, plus our Caribbean attire, and we will store whatever we don’t immediately need in vacuum storage bags. Ultimately, the cold-weather clothing will come back with us to New England (to stay). Once we’re actually in the Caribbean, we will mostly need only summer clothes with one or two “warmer” pieces for the occasional cool night (mostly north of the Caribbean in FL and Bahamas).

Dave tells me we’re at 13 cart loads of stuff being shuttled onto Lady (those wheeled carts marina’s provide). I wonder what the final tally will be. 

Author: Indigo Lady

I am a retired educator married to a retired chemist/engineer/educator. We will be living aboard our solar electric catamaran for as long as possible. View all posts by Indigo Lady