AirHead mid term update!

So, we are now going on the second week with the newly installed AirHead toilet and I can say that so far SO GOOD! It is far less difficult or finicky than the old marine head and there is no smell at all! It is as if the head were replaced by nothing except that you still can use it and it is if anything a lot easier to deal with.

We have all gotten into the act and are using it for the "full range" of headlike duties.

SO far we have been very pleased. The liquids need emptying about once every two days but it looks like the solids will be ok for a pretty long while. I will let everyone here know how things are going as we go along, but so far the "harvest" seems a long way off.

All in all I am still bullish on this product. I love the simplicity, the green aspect and the fact that there is no smell.

Learning to dock a boat...

Once there was a guy who had boating in his blood. It was like the milk of memory flowing through his viens and it was thick as history. He was destined to be the man who sailed the seas and brought back tales to tell with great deeds and fine adventures aplenty. That was then...

Here I am. I have been out of the game, out of the sea, away from neverland for so long that I have forgotten everything. It all went away. I had to begin again. It was awful. Of course, I still had the old confidence. I still thought I knew how to bring a boat into port. But I did not.

On the date of delivery, I had to have a captain take my boat with me on it from Shilshole to Gasworks Park. A journey of no more than 2 miles, because I had forgotten how to drive and bring a vessel to the dock. It was bad.

Beyond that, I was determined to bring back my old days of mooring boats (mostly small) along side great and small piers. I was determined to recall the ways in which that happened. I tried at times to take the family out on the lake. I tried to get the boat to obey me. It would not. I was frustrated. I was losing confidence. I was losing face with the wife (who holds a captain's license let's not forget!). She was afraid to let me go out in the boat. What could I do?

Two weeks ago I told her I wanted to get out on the water and sail. I told her I wanted to take her. I wanted to ride the wind. it would be a very good day for it and she would love it.

She acquiesced.

I had been thinking. Remembering the ways of boats. Remembering how they move. How they turn. The way they move under power. I was thinking in equations, differential calculus. Creating the image of the perfect exit from the slip. The perfect landing at the dock on the other side of the lake. The triumphant return home. I replayed these thoughts at their appointed times. And so it was.

The outing, a success.

Feeling well, I got the mojo back. A long time had passed between the feel of tiller and the hold of the wheel. The time long ago as a youth, and the now of my older years bringing it all back. The power of a larger vessel in my control. It happened as it had to, and I have the old love of the sea again. With the full acclaim of my wife. The partner of my choosing. The one I could not, with out her will, do this. And it feels like coming home.

New head in and ready to try... Maybe.

Carrie and I have been living on the boat now for the entire time that Obama has been President Elect. We moved aboard on election night and now it is the day after inauguration. The time has come for change. In that vein we decided to have the head changed out for a new AirHead composting toilet. It is now in the boat and ready to go but there is a simple first step that we need to perform before use. We need to hydrate the Coir desiccating agent so it is ready to go. I am hopeful that we will be able to get that done this afternoon before it gets too dark.

The new toilet is much simpler than any other marine head and we are hoping that simpler is better for this type of thing. The head looks similar to other heads but there is literally no plumbing or holding tank other than the composting container and the liquids storage tank. (The liquids tank needs to be emptied about once every two to three days while the solids composter should be good for almost two months or more at the rate that we use it.)

While we were at it we decided to have the Webasto Diesel heater serviced to be sure it would run through the rest of the winter. The yard we are using to do the install and the service has gotten the toilet done but didn't get the heater back to us so we still have to sleep at their dock tonight and use plug-in electric heaters on the boat. It is a mild annoyance but I am hopeful that the heater will be installed and the boat delivered back to the home dock tomorrow. Then we will be ready to enjoy the boat in all of it's complete glory.

It is hard to imagine after many weeks of not using the head "to it's fullest use" to finally be able to do so again. I for one will not miss going up the dock in the middle of the night to do my business. I will be happy to "go at home." Finally.

Great day out!

Finally sailing!

So after a great and slow morning of the more fun Sunday stuff. (The street Market, coffee, a visit to the chocolate factory, more food from the market...) Carrie informed me that, yes, we could take the boat out and go sailing today. I was ecstatic.

When we came home I immediately began stripping off the bimini cover over the cockpit. The walls were taken down. The top was furled. The lines securing us to the dock were simplified to prepare for slipping the moorage. The dock step was removed... I got her ready to go. While I was doing all of the topsides preparation Carrie was busy below getting all of the items that could be tossed around stowed. Both jobs took about the same amount of time.

The next thing that needed to happen was to get the engine going and head out. This first was easy but I was mighty concerned about the exit of the slip. (and the re-entry of the same.) All of that fear was unfounded as the M&M/Clarion slid past the end of the pier and turned majestically in her own length to manage the fairway with plenty of room. After we rounded the corner to the outside fairway we were home free!

The gas dock was crowded, what with the first real sun that boaters in Seattle had seen in months, and we decided to give it a while and go sail first and hit the gas dock on the rebound. We motored away through the cut towards the larger waters of Lake Washington.

In 20 minutes we were there. Not a bad time to get through the cut, I thought. We managed to get both bridges to open as soon as we arrived so there was little standing to and waiting for access. We made great speed.

As soon as we were out of the navigable channel we hoisted sail. There were a few complications. The main has a tendency to hang up on nearly everything. The Lazy Jacks especially, but also the reefing lines as well. After a few attempts, I cleared the hurdles and set sail like a proper sailor and we were off! The stuff aboard this boat is wonderful! I have all self tailing winches and a roller furling genoa. There are many conveniences that I have never had on a sailing vessel before, including having all of the running lines go into the cockpit. It is fantastic. I could easily single hand her if I could manage to leave the dock and return without assistance. Sailing was a breeze and the end came too quickly. Carrie found a Ladybug on my sweater on deck. A harbinger of her mother's spirit on our maiden sail. We took photos and then were joined by our neighbor boat with Greg and Bonnie Riddler aboard. We sailed together for about an hour and then headed for home.

On the way home we stopped for gas "across the street" at the gas dock. I was feeling confident after being under sail and I managed a very slick landing at the dock.

After the gas was aboard we headed in and to the last test of the day: the landing in our slip. Our slip is on the inside of a set of finger piers. The fairway there is slightly wider than my boat is long which makes it tricky, but the real challenge comes from needing to go in stern first due to the need for our shorepower inlet to line up properly, so we have to go "against" the natural propwalk of the boat. This time I had been figuring it for hours in my head and I managed to push the nose up toward the boat forward of our slip and crank her into reverse to get the stern around the finger just right. My next door neighbor Richard said it looked like I knew what I was doing so I felt good about that.

After all was done I settled down to clean up the boat and have a glass of wine while Carrie hung out below and warmed up. we later went out for pizza but that's another story...

Survived the holidays!

This year's holiday season was the first test of having a full compliment of people aboard. During the week between christmas and new years we had 5 full time residents on the boat. It ended up working surprisingly well. The kids were in the aft cabin, we had a guest in the salon and Carrie and I were up in the forward cabin. Accommodations were tight but all in all there was little in the way of banging together.

The resources aboard were strained a bit but it seems to have come through without being too far stretched. We nearly ran out of water as we were making use of a lot more to clean the dishes for five as opposed to two. The head that we were hoping to get set up with the new AirHead didn't happen in time for the new group but the old standard marine head worked, mostly... Having to close the door to keep the fragrance of nature in the head cubicle was a challenge but it worked.

The weather mostly cooperated as well. There was snow and frost this time but not nearly as much as there was in the previous weeks. We had a small power glitch one night during a storm but I fixed the dodgy wire and things seem to have settled down and gotten back to working correctly.

All things considered I feel that the biggest test of the boat to date was a qualified success. I am looking forward to spring and summer aboard and having the ability to get out on the boat away from the dock.

Cheers!