Shifting Gears

It is a strange phenomenon amongst sailors to ask about “your plans.” Constrained by the idea that your home is mobile, people expect you to have some sort of timeline, for the coming weeks, months or even years. They think there should be a new destination always on the horizon. As if making a plan…

Reading Round Up; Recently Published Articles

Steve is home, and as always has brought me a few treats. This time he presented me with a stack of out-of-date magazines! To you that might not seem so exciting, out-of-date and all, but when magazines are like unicorns, you don’t really care if they are a few months old. Yes, I do keep…

DIY: Low-Impact Liquid Hand Soap

Living a low-impact life is important to me. It is also something that I practiced long before we moved onboard. However, living on a boat is living a little closer to the natural world than most, and I mean literally. For instance, our sinks drain directly overboard, which means everything that goes down the drain…

Pseudo-Single Handing & Cooking for One

Steve is away earning beer coupons, so we can keep doing this sailing thing. If you’ve been here for a while you know this is a kind-of-regular occurrence. By that I mean he spends 8-12 weeks of the year away working, just not necessarily on any regular or predictable schedule. This time however, it was…

Scenes from the Philippines Rice Fields, a Photo Essay

Almost every year for the past decade I have put together a calendar of photos that reflects our life on board over the last 12 months. Usually I have more than enough images of bucolic anchorages, dramatic landscapes, exotic local scenes and a few usable pictures of us. This year when I looked back over…

Looking Forward: Looking Back

It might seem like I am a little late to the party with this one, I mean aren’t you supposed to reflect about the previous year as soon as the new year dawns? The thing is I have never been very good at following trends. I don’t necessarily think that I march to the beat…

9 Nifty Gift Ideas for a Greener Galley

The holiday season is upon us – actually it has been upon us in the stores in the Philippines since September, no joke. Last night watched Holiday Inn, the first in our annual Christmas movie line up. We’ve been looking for “the perfect anchorage” to spend the holidays; away from towns but still within mobile….

Galley Notes: Chicken Stock in the Pressure Cooker

Making chicken stock in my pressure cooker isn’t some sort of revelation, but it is a process I recently started using to reduce food waste. I had experimented with the idea back in the beginning, 2008, when I first bought the PC, or perhaps I should say when I bought my first PC. Back then…