About a Boat

I've pretended to be a lot of things this year:

A camel (slash backpacker):

 This is how I arrived in Indonesia after a whole year in Aus land

A nautical engineer (the boat sank)

A hardcore biker ganger (but we never really created any gang related havoc or got arrested)

 A cross continental cyclist (with  a crappy Chinese bike)-  

A hitch hike extraordinaire

And now I pretend to be a vegetarian sailor

Today marks one month of sailing for me and, if anyone knows me well, that's quite a long term commitment! So much so that I feel the need  to involve you in my life of nauticasity...

Firstly there's the crew: 

Four of us at present, with a fifth joining the ranks in Indonesia.

Captain Kirk, apart from being our skipper, is also our in-boat chef extraordinaire - without him a diet of peanut butter and chilli coated starches would prevail

James is our Engineer, plumber, electrician and resident DJ - he likes to subject us to the wholesome lyrics of murderous gangster rock. And fortunately he also fixes our toilets and fans when they brake.

Teddy is the mandatory slob that lazily lounges about watching other people work - because there always has to be one.

I'm not sure what my actual job description would be now that I no longer provide sea sick amusements by hanging over the port side but "resident licker" slash "rapid consumer of expiring first aid supplies" (I tend to injure myself all too frequently) will suffice for now.  

We'll start with the deck, shall we? It's all good and well having an autopilot on board, but the amount of fishing nets and tankers and freak wooden planks and killer whales (I say this in hope that we may actually see some whales soon) about means that there always needs to be someone on the watch - day and night

It's tough being at the helm (actually, sometimes it really is)

In calm waters it's brilliant and you can see for miles and relax, but in bad weather and strong waves the horizon bends to 45 degrees... I for one had no idea that boats could tilt so much without flipping!

Inside we have the saloon (dinning table) where teddy currently resides (man am i glad I don't have to carry him anymore)

 We have a remarkably open plan kitchen (galley) for a boat - if only I knew how to cook!

My 'stateroom' (bunk) used to be, and I quote "a glorious wardrobe closet" and when the boats not rolling about too crazily, it's the comfiest bed I've probably ever had!

To use the toilet ('head') you need to pump water in and then pump everything out after use - This alone should ensure that some day I will actually own arm muscles.

Everything onboard has bizarre names and bizarrer purposes and whilst I still confuse my mains with my gibbs and often untie the wrong sheets and tangle up the black loopy thing, I've made massive progress and can generally steer without crashing - I also know now that you should always puke leeward.

We've done some mammoth supply shopping sprees

This picture holds 47 blocks of cheese and a very happy amrican

And some mamother fuel missions (lugging almost 3000 litres of fuel in 20 litre jerry cans is no easy feat!) 

I've just feasted on a delicious popcorn and chilli sandwich and we're finally sailing out of Malaysia - next stop, Indonesia.