Last Minute Preparations

We are finishing up our preparations for another trip to the Bahamas and hope to leave tomorrow morning. Earlier this week we loaded a winter’s worth of food into Breeze On. After five years of adjusting the quantities of food to enable us to take just enough and not to too much, I started following a personalized nutrition program this summer which led me to make big changes in my eating habits. That caused me to completely redo our menus and provisioning list for the Bahamas. Because I am guessing how much of everything we will need, we are taking more food than usual. It seems as if every square inch of the boat is packed. Once we return next spring—with lots of leftover food, no doubt—I will be able to adjust the quantities to reflect what we actually need. 

Yesterday I cooked some casseroles, soup, and vegetables. Today we packed up the clothes we will need for the winter—everything from bathing suits to long underwear (for the first part of the trip.) I went through our medical kits to make sure we have what we need and discarded what had expired. This fall I learned about a company, Duration Health, that provides medications—including prescription meds—for people who will be traveling off the grid. I signed up and had an interview with a physician over Zoom. She customized the kit according to my health needs and destination. She even had some recommendations for vaccines so I took her advice and got another tetanus booster. The Duration Health kit arrived about a week after my interview. The whole thing was convenient and reasonably priced. 

George spent a few hours this morning securing the new dinghy to the foredeck. It will be much more secure there than hanging from the arch at the back of the boat if we encounter rough seas while offshore. Once we arrive in the Bahamas we will move it to the arch. By the way, the floating dock I wrote about in my last post has worked out beautifully as a place to store the dinghy while we are home. Although we had to take a few leaps of faith when we bought this dinghy—where will we store it, will it fit on the foredeck for offshore travel—so far it has all worked out, knock on wood. 

We plan to take three days to get to the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. One reason we want to take our time is to monitor the batteries. Early last week George happened to take a look at the readings on the solar battery charger and discovered that the batteries weren’t charging. They weren’t dead, but they weren’t fully charged and should have been charging. Not only would they not charge from solar power but they wouldn’t charge through the engine or shore power. We spent a few days in a semi-panic mode. Our lithium battery system was just six years old and was supposed to last ten years. It was installed by Alex Miller. His company, SeaTek, apparently went out of business three years ago and we had no way to reach him to ask his advice. I did my usual online research while George checked all of the connections. Just as we were thinking we would have to cancel our trip to the Bahamas, George reconnected the system one more time—he had disconnected and reconnected it numerous times already—and they started charging! We don’t know why but they have been charging as they should ever since. Nevertheless, we will be keeping a close eye on them as we slowly make our way down the bay. 

George putting the food away while I record the location on the inventory. 

Frozen soup will be loaded onto the boat just before we leave. Our freezer can accommodate just two ice trays so we will eat these meals as they thaw. My friend, Laura, told me about these dissolvable labels. Much easier to remove once you are done with them. 

George’s clothes for the Bahamas. 

We put the clothing bags on shelves in the v berth to make them easily accessible. 

Medical kits. 

“Boat blanket” fabric that will keep the dinghy from chafing on the rough deck. 

Dinghy on the floating dock. 

Dinghy tied down on the foredeck. 



Lithium batteries. 

George disassembling the battery management system. Fingers crossed the battery system will continue to work.