Our to do list is long but we parsed it out by month and we are finishing the assigned tasks for each month and still keeping on top of "normal weekly/monthly maintenance and fixes". So, I try to ignore the total list and trust the monthly lists.
Honestly, it is our long list of little things that take up the most time and are too numerous, and boring, to write about here.
The big items we have finished in the last month are:
the medical kit
my immunizations
the alternator order and install (install was bonus, only ordering was on list)
revarnishing interior completed (bonus but oh so necessary)
HAM license for Livia
Partly finished items are:
Virtual passage (we are currently between Mexico and the Marquesas "virtually")
SSB install
Solar purchase and install
Battery purchase and install
Thinning more stuff
AIS receiver purchase
Spares first wave of purchase
Queen Charlotte planning
We have no major items that aren't started except for the huge 2 week haul-out in May. We will work long hours for those 2 weeks on a lot of different projects (e.g., raising our waterline, changing some thru hull hoses, bottom paint, hull wax, transmission oil, zincs, wallas diesel heater overhaul), plus the entire week before the haul out I will be running around purchasing what we need to do the jobs.
Despite feeling aheada, some of the "partially finished" items will take a lot of time to finish.
We're in a good place. A focused place, but a good place. Our stress levels are way lower than most people about to start cruising because we are going to be in and out of major towns in BC and WA over the next year so if we've forgotten something big, it's not a big deal. All we need to do is to be ready to cruise full time locally and we have enough experience under our belt to know what we want for that. Actually, if all we do is install our batteries and do the haul-out maintenance we are good to go for local cruising. Everything else is for our emotional health (e.g. SSB, HAM) or for long-term (e.g., medical kit and immunizations, SSB, etc).
We're saving some big decisions until next Spring when we will have another long haul out, maybe 4 weeks, before heading South. We'll pull the mast, re-do the rigging and decide on some other big pieces of kit - or put them off longer.
3 months...wowzers.
What do you do for a "virtual passage"?
ReplyDeleteHey Ryan - Basically we pretended we each had a boat in Cabo San Lucas and were heading to the Marqueses. Each day we look at the forecasted weather and make a choice of what direction to point the boat. Then we look at the satellite weather for what is actually happening and pretend that we had that weather for the next 24 hours and calculate, based on what we know about our boat, how fast we would have gone and thus how many miles we covered. Then we move the boat for that day and do the same each day.
ReplyDeleteIt's very unrealistic in a number of ways we know. We aren't taking into account the huge slowing effect of waves and we are only taking into account historical currents above .5 knots in each area.
It has been a great exercise to learn about weather systems though and we both read a lot about that passage which is one of "the big ones".
When we are done I'm going to post a full description of what happened with links etc.
That sounds very cool Livia! I look forward to reading more about it.
ReplyDeleteI also like what you said about not NEEDING to get everything crossed off your list before you leave. If I start to get overwhelmed by the things on our list I just remember that we could virtually leave today without doing any of it (assuming of course that our boat was back in the water and back to the condition she was before we hauled out for the season). Everything on the list thus becomes a "want" instead of a "need."
Mike
I love that your sail day, my due date, and the world cup all coincide. That's your 'random' for the day.
ReplyDelete