I’ve been on the lookout for another blog hop to join. It’s not always easy. The nature of our lifestyle
and limiting theme of our site add to the difficultly (believe it or not, not
everyone likes sailboats . . . go figure!). I’ve taken part in three in the
past: the Alphabet Photography Project, the Blogging from A to Z Challenge and
Jo’s Monday Walk (I have another post for that one coming soon). And I just
found my fourth: the Word of the Week sponsored by The Reading Residence. It’s
a simple task. Writers look back on the previous week and choose one word to
sum it up in a blog post every Wednesday Friday. It’s a quick and easy way to let
people know what’s been happening around here. And the word that describes this
past week the best is none other than (though, had I not written this post before the US election, my word would be something more akin to "depression"):
BOAT
Break out
another thousand
Boat
owners world-wide know that BOAT stands for “break out another thousand” and we’ve
been living up to the name lately . . . in spades. For the most part, we find
living-aboard and cruising to be an inexpensive (by comparison) way to live: No
property taxes. No mortgage. No home insurance. No work clothes. No cable bill.
No electric bill. And so on. Basically, our needs are simple and we meet them
simply. Cambria is an entirely different story. She’s the biggest mouth to feed around
here and, lately, she’s been hungry.
To
start, we finished the cruising season a little more than a week ago and there
have been a lot of costs attached to reconnecting with “civilization”. Tying up
can be expensive, even in the off-season, and we had to fork over two months of
moorage to start (first and last months). And while Kingston is quite reasonably priced, that’s still about a
$650 hit to the budget. When compared to anchoring, which is free, it feels more
like a beating.
What’s
the point of being back in “civilization” without stocking up on food? If you
ask me, there is no point (except power – power in the winter is good). After
six months away from it all, the cupboards were looking a little bare . . . not
to mention the veggie bin (we had to get rid of all our produce before checking
into the US). First there was the trip to Costco to fill the
freezer with meat, restock David’s Baileys supply (for his coffee) and whatever
else would fit in the cart. And then the obligatory stop at Walmart on my way
home where I suddenly remembered every recipe I love and bought the ingredients
to cook meals we haven’t been able to have for a donkey’s age (when we were on
the hardstand in Nanaimo, we ate simply – things like pizza, hamburgers and
meat pies – to the point that I could puke). I understand none of these things
are boat-related and I can’t really blame them on Cambria but after six months where we spent very little
money, it’s a big change.
To
get to the store, I had to get our truck out of storage which was actually a
money saver (and sort of boat-related). But then I increased that part of our
budget by doing something we’ve never done before – renting an actual storage
unit. Despite the fact that we plop ourselves down in one area of the world for
years at a time, I’ve always been reluctant to plant roots. And, to me, keeping
your things in one place for an extended period of time constitutes gardening.
But in order to get the boat ready to sell, we need to offload everything we
can (there’s a bit of not being able to see the forest for the trees going on
here). After that, items need to be sorted into things we want to store
long-term, things we want to take to England, things we want to sell and things that stay with
the boat. There’s no way to organize an operation like that here, so we bit the
bullet and rented a 10 x 8 stall which I’m slowly filling up.
But
the real expense that reared its ugly head last week came from the credit card
bill that just landed in our inbox – charges for the month-long emergency haul-out
in Nanaimo, including parts. I don’t want to go into details
(I’m still suffering from shock); but the yard didn’t start charging its
monthly rates until the first of November, so we had to pay the daily rate (can
you say ouch?). The parts weren’t cheap, either. In fact, they made up half the
bill. The only saving grace is that David and I did all the work ourselves – at
CA$100+ an hour, I can only imagine how much that would have cost. On the
bright side (there always has to be one of those!), David and I are happy with
the work we did and think it was money well spent. We’ll be happier still when
the bill stop pouring in.
What about you? What word sums up your week? Join the
conversation below in the comments section or on our Facebook page. We’d love
to hear from you!
12 comments
This is a fun blog hop :-) I think you should have some of David's Baileys to help with the sticker shock. There's nothing worse than opening up large bills, even when you know that they're coming.
ReplyDeleteIt is but I totally messed up. I was searching through Linky for Wednesday blog hops and when this one came up in the results, I liked it so much that I didn't notice it's actually a Friday blog hop. Bugger!
DeleteI know the feeling. With civilization comes comfort, but also bigger expenses. Getting hauled out is the most expensive part of cruising, we have found. But man, does the boat look nice and ready and happy afterwards. Enjoy the sorting and dedicating. We just left everything on Irie when we left, except for what fit in four bags. Word of the week (if you don't count the events of Tuesday): sunshine! Nice blog hop. Wish I had time for another one, but I'm "committed" to Wordless Wednesday for now. :-)
ReplyDeleteI wish we could just leave everything aboard Cambria as well but after 13 years of living-aboard, we've piled up so many personal possessions that it's ridiculous. And I love your word of the week!
DeleteThat's terrible about the yard rates. I was just thinking about how expensive boats are - but, you are right, the home owning lifestyle is expensive too, and at least our expenses are usually low. My word of the week is cold - for the feeling, and the cold fronts that are moving through every other day and making progress difficult. Who knew a sailboat owner would be afraid of a little wind!
ReplyDeleteYeah, we were disappointed when we got the bill considering how long we had to wait around for parts to arrive. But it is what it is and (hopefully) what it is is our last and final haul-out with this boat! Stay warm!
DeleteOuch, this does sounds like an expensive week, sounds like you've got hit for a lot all in one go, especially when you've been used to living relatively inexpensively. Glad you still managed to find a bright side! Thanks very much for joining in with #WotW, lovely to have you.
ReplyDeleteThanks for having me! I'm enjoying reading your blog and discovering new ones in the process.
DeleteWhat an intriguing insight into your boat world. Albeit an expensive one. #wotw
ReplyDeleteThanks, Carol. Hopefully things will be a lot kinder to the budget in the coming months!
DeleteWow, what a fun life it must be to be living it on the seas for the majority of the year. I'd never heard of the acronym BOAT before, but reading your post I can now understand why! What an expensive week!
ReplyDelete#WoTW
Thanks for stopping by, Tracey. After 15 years, we should be used to it but, thankfully, they're few and far between!
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