Day 4
Leona continues to fly. We covered 200 miles from noon yesterday to noon today. As David said, “she was born for this: a sea dragon shouldn’t be cooped up in a marina, but spreading her wings and soaring across the waves.” Yes, he was waxing rhapsodic. Do you see why I called Leona his mistress?
If you have to eat your vegetables before you get any pudding, we have been chomping through a big plate of broccoli. I know we will emerge stronger, fitter, and better sailors (except Jeff, how could he get any better?) once the grey skies and steely waves relax. But for now, the moderate seas and 20+knots of wind are keeping us on our toes. Or our asses, when we try to move too quickly. More importantly it is keeping us in front of the strong winds to the north-east.
Zaca Coffee: powering sailors across the Pacific.
Speaking of vegetables, I know I left some of you dear readers on tenterhooks, dying to know about fresh food provisioning. Surely we weren’t going to subsist on tins of chopped tomatoes and bay-leaf scented flour? Worry not, as the day before we left we loaded and stored the fresh food: onions, garlic, jicama….and of course, the aforementioned cabbages. Net bags and produce hammocks (oh yes, the little darlings get to swing happily in their own little string beds) waited to be filled, while the Jenga puzzle that is the cold storage situation had to be conquered. We have a tiny vertical fridge set into the counter that can be accessed from the top or the bottom. This means one has to be thoughtful about how one stacks: it is colder at the bottom, so its a good place for dairy (do NOT ask me to go a month without cheese). However, the twist is the teeny, tiny freezer compartment at the very top that tends to frost up, so you don’t want anything too delicate next to that. Finally, you need to make sure you know when you will want to access each item, so you are not pulling everything out to get the one packet of deli meat located at the very center.
The fresh produce gets their own hammocks, happily swinging and occasionally head-butting an unsuspecting passer-by.
And now, let’s talk freezer space. I am sure you have heard of the expression a fish story? Well, the first time David described the freezer, it was the size of the one we have at home. I was surprised, but “OK,” I thought, “I definitely can work with that.” The next time David mentioned it, his hands came quite a bit closer. “All right,” I thought, “sounds more likely.” And then I saw the thing: about the size of a six-pack of DBA. My dreams of pulling out a frozen pre-cooked lasagna for dinner melted like the ice cream we weren’t going to be able to bring. But hallelujah, we found one that fit in the space that has a truly workable capacity.
Lasagna is back on the menu.
Ice cream, however, is not.