The post Living on a boat is a lot of work! appeared first on Where The Coconuts Grow.
]]>For those of you that don’t follow our Facebook posts, I wanted to share our most recent quote of inspiration spoken from Peter himself.
“You don’t know your strength until you know your limits”
-Peter Pieschel
It took us awhile to get over the initial exhaustion of becoming liveaboards. It takes a LOT of work to live on a boat and for the first month we were just plain exhausted every day. It’s one thing to go boating for a weekend but when you live on a boat it takes some getting used to.
Living on a boat is much different than living on land. There is a lot to get used to, but it has slowly started to feel normal :) We absolutely LOVE our little home and we say it out loud to each other every day!! Its hard work but SO worth it in the end. We are preparing our home to travel across oceans to visit far off lands, beautiful tropical beaches and crystal clear waters. We’re going to go Where The Coconuts Grow and the wind in our sails will take us there!
Its going to be a hell of an education too. As the months go by we will be forced to learn so many new skills and we’ll learn how to live with ‘less’ all around. We need the basics, safety equipment, a few personal effects from home and all the rest is just stuff. Our priorities have already begun to change as we work on the boat every day and prepare to set sail. We appreciate the little things we didn’t even notice before. We take a lot less for granted and our happiness increases by the minute.
We do get frustrated sometimes but I think we’re getting better about understanding that we’re both doing our best. Our patience with ourselves and with each other is growing too. Everything we do, we do it as a team and it seems much easier that way. We’re helping each other figure out how to do things we haven’t done before and it’s actually really fun! It’s hard at first to step outside of your comfort zone, but when you do, that’s where the magic happens :)
After the initial exhaustion wore off a little, Peter and I committed to running again to get ourselves and the dogs the exercise we all need. The last couple of days have been a chilly 38 degrees at night here in Southwest Florida, and this is not exactly what I signed up for, but Peter laid the inspiration down pretty thick. His quote about strength and limits really did get me thinking and even though it’s almost freezing outside I perked up a little and tried to see things in a positive light instead. We should be able to handle a little cold weather and still keep exercise a priority. We’ve done 3 miles each night through the cold winds and by the time we’re done we both smile and feel glad we went :) We really are stronger than we think we are, and as a good friend said to me yesterday, we have to BELIEVE in ourselves!!
Peter and I are about to set sail on an adventure of a lifetime with our two dogs and we both feel so lucky that everything has just fallen into place. It’s one of those moments where we know we’re in the right place at the right time, and now is the time to go for it. We’re young, we are finding strength we didn’t know we had, and we’re throwing our fears and doubts aside in exchange for this amazing opportunity. What better time in our lives than now to travel and see the world? There’s so much beauty and joy out there just waiting to be shared.
We hope our adventures will inspire others to take a leap of faith, step outside your comfort zone and find out where the magic happens. Dreams really do come true, if you believe!!
The post Living on a boat is a lot of work! appeared first on Where The Coconuts Grow.
]]>The post Bilge Deep appeared first on Where The Coconuts Grow.
]]>Our boat was built in 1980 and it unfortunately needs a little more TLC than some of the newer boats out there. Since we have been running the air conditioning quite a bit lately, the condensation created is around three gallons per day and it all travels down into the bilge. We decided to clean the bilge for one of our first maintenance projects to get rid of some of the mildew and old ‘funk’ that has been in there for a while.
Peter wanted to get right down there and get the dirty deed over with, but alas, his muscles are just too big!! He can reach farther than I can but he just couldn’t reach all the way down to the lowest point of our bilge. We tried using gargantuan tweezers (one of those tools we kept for the one time we might really need them!) but just couldn’t get them to grasp the rags and sponges well enough. Kitchen tongs weren’t going to work either.
The best access panel for the lowest part of the bilge is in our aft head. I decided to see if I could somehow reach father than Peter, maybe just by flexibility, and it turns out I could actually fit my head AND shoulders all the way INSIDE! Getting in there was one thing, getting out was another. I discovered arm leg and back muscles that I didn’t know I had. While hanging into the opening in the head, my torso was twisted out into the aft cabin and I hooked my feet up into a cubby on the front of the bed for leverage. Peter was trying to be a good helper but with my whole body in the way he couldn’t shine the flashlight where I needed it to go. I couldn’t use a headlamp either because I could barely fit my head in there. Turns out headlamps can also be worn around your neck and angled upside down so when you are inverted into the abyss of your bilge with no room for a helping hand you can still see what you are doing.
Bilge Deep and upside down is just one of the new ways we are discovering to keep us flexible and burn some calories while living on the boat. It’s hard work, and it’s never done but the trade-off sure is worth the effort!!
The post Bilge Deep appeared first on Where The Coconuts Grow.
]]>