From the Captain: Supplies and other details

From the Captain

Supplies and Other Details

Be here now….Baba Ram Das

The Tao that is unnameable is the Source of the Heaven and the Earth.

The name, once introduced, becomes the Mother of the Ten Thousand Things.  Lao Tzu, Tao te Ching   

Preparations are going forward. There are lists and lists. Boat projects are ongoing, and there is food to think about. Hundreds of details and loose ends to tie up before we go. Thinking ahead, the lists seem unmanageable, the projects unlikely ever to be completed. New items are added regularly as they pop into consciousness—usually very early in the morning well before the dawn.

Yet, to begin the work, to attack items on the list, is to realize they are finite, and they will get done. Thinking ahead is painful. Living in the present is the best way to get through. This is a hard lesson to keep in mind.

Luna up in the slings of the travel lift at Point Bay Marina

This week, Luna was dismasted and lifted out of the water. Currently, she is up on stands in a shed as the boatwrights at George Darling Boatworks carefully repaint her bottom. When they are not working, I go in and continue plumbing the new water tank and construct supports to hold the mast on deck as we travel the first leg of the trip next week.

Meanwhile, Carol works through the rest of the ten thousand things. She goes on line to set up electronic billing, contacts the motor vehicle department to make sure our cars and boats will stay registered, figures out how to estimate taxes so we can defer filing in April,  and sets up mail forwarding with the post office. The house must be put in order for the family who will live here while we’re gone. Carol is the keeper of the lists, the organized one, and she’s good at it.

And there’s the social scene: A retirement party for me in Charlotte brought out past staff members of the Charlotte Family Health Center as well as current patients. We get together with our friends who want to say good-bye before we leave.

And, finally, we are starting to think of what food and supplies we will bring for the trip. From Costco, we have cans of wild salmon, chicken and tuna, tomatoes, chicken broth, black beans.  We have lentil dishes in pouches. We have Ziploc bags, plastic wrap, watertight containers, paper towels and toilet paper.  There is dish soap and laundry soap and quarters for the laundromats. We think about how much spring water to bring for drinking

My feeling is that we can re-supply fairly easily on the way down the east coast, and so can plan meals for a week or so at a time. Once we grasp the pattern that forms our days and see what we’re eating, then we will supply for two months before heading over to the Bahamas.

And we’re starting to consider where we will pack it all. The time is coming when we will find out for sure. Departure date is in one week.