สล็อตเว็บตรง

สล็อตเว็บตรง

สล็อตเว็บตรง

สล็อตเว็บตรง

The Joys and Sorrows Of a Life At Sea

Recycling continues

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When I was a small kid back in the communist Czech and Slovak Socialistic Republic, a friend of mine introduced me to this marvelous new gadget – a digital watch. The Vietnamese throw them into the garbage when the battery is dead, said my friend. Yes, that marvel was battery operated. I’ve never seen battery operated watch. Why wouldn’t the Vietnamese replace the battery instead of tossing the whole watch I didn’t understand. My friend just shook his head and pointed out to me again that the fact that these can be found in garbage cans is what I should be concentrating on.

Surely I did peek to garbage cans for a while then before emptying the content of our household bin. Yes, there were no plastic bags used then. All went to the bin, we would fold an old newspaper on the bottom, and the bin would have to be cleaned from time to time, because it would start to smell quite badly. I guess we were quite ecological back then, regardless of the fact that people didn’t know much about being ecological.

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| 24/03/2013 | Category: Logbook | One comment

Boom-gallows

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We have a new, large roach mainsail, which significantly overlaps the topping lift and little bit the backstay too. After few trials, playing around with topping lift and pondering our options, we decided that we will make ourselves a boom-gallows. We wanted it for a long time anyway.

We were about to make a dodger, but the gallows idea got in the way and the dodger project was postponed. It didn’t take too long to convince ourselves that we are a tough bunch and that like the many other cruisers before us, also we will cross the oceans without the unsightly roof above the companionway.

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| 22/03/2013 | Category: By the way | 2 comments

Non-skid

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Not much has happened in the last few days, i.e. nothing worth telling a story about. We were concentrated on one thing only (not to mention translating of course): creating a new non-skid deck.

We were little reluctant to get into it, because we knew it will be slow and nasty work. The first phase for sure, because first we had to sand the old non-skid, which on our boat is a molded gelcoat. It’s 39 years old and especially the front deck was almost flat and was turning into a dangerous skating rink when wet.

We are planning to paint the whole boat, step by step, but it was imperative that we do the non-skid before our crossing to the Philippines, because most likely we are up for a bit of wave action. The north of South China Sea is well known for it.

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| 17/03/2013 | Category: By the way | Leave a comment

Vegetable Soup with Green Lentils

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Today we were supposed to apply the first of the two last coats of our new nonskid, which included not only painting but also dusting with Intergrip. Of course, when we least needed it, contrary to the calm that prevailed the last couple of days, we’ve been harassed by quite a breeze since the previous evening. Nevertheless, the spirits were still high and we hoped that by noon the wind might calm down and we would be able to finish the job after all. So we needed something to satisfy our hungry stomachs but at the same time something light, in case the weather really started to cooperate. Apart from that, we were left with an oddly shaped, slightly stale piece of bread, so it was decided that for today’s lunch we would have a quick soup with bread croutons. The following recipe was adapted from the previously praised The Bean Book.

PS: The nonskid post will follow up soon!

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| 11/03/2013 | Category: Recipes | Leave a comment

Banana Bread

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I guess, for most our English speaking friends, there’s nothing so revolutionary about the good old banana bread. However, since it’s so popular with our Taiwanese friends and so very useful if you are suddenly left with too many overripe bananas, here is a very easy variation that works every single time:

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| 04/03/2013 | Category: Recipes | Leave a comment

Tomatoes Stuffed with Chick Peas

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Back in 2008 when we were preparing to set out on our very first voyage from Singapore to Langkawi, we decided to follow the example of our role models Lin and Larry Pardey as well as Annie Hill, who claims in her Voyaging on a Small Income, that since they eat well not only while in the port but also while at sea, unlike other cruisers who are fed up by constant diet of canned goods, they are not tempted to stop in every port on the way, in order to just enjoy some nice meal. Therefore when we left Singapore, I decided that as our first proper meal underway, I would prepare a recipe from our “bean bible” aka The Bean Book by English vegetarian cook Rose Elliot, a cookbook masterpiece, that we actually picked up after reading Annie Hill’s book. Not accidentally, this very book later became our favorite present to fellow cruisers. Of course, we didn’t forget to add a useful dedication:  Lentils and beans give you fair winds!

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| 03/03/2013 | Category: Recipes | Leave a comment

Anti-gravitation equipment

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I’ve spent yesterday fighting the power of gravity, the adverse consequences of the centrifugal force and the malignant inertia.

Few years ago – yes, we are already counting our life with Janna in years, this was autumn 2009 – when we converted the original small wardrobe and wet locker into much more specious wardrobe shelves, we knew right away that we will need something to prevent our precious garments to fall out. It was obvious that they will fall out and they did. Not too often, though. Actually they stood put in many hairy conditions, so we didn’t feel too bad about postponing what should’ve been done much earlier.

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| 03/03/2013 | Category: Logbook | Leave a comment

Visitors

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Once again we’ve left our sanctuary at Xingda fishing harbour and returned to Kaohsiung. Main reason being that Jana was asked to share few of her delicious “instant meals” with few friends.

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At the beginning of last week, still in our oasis of quiet, we finished the last version of the translation of Li Ang’s novel “Magic Garden”, put it aside for a week to read it one last time before we send it to the publisher and submit it to a scrutiny of a proof-reader. Have you ever noticed that every time you read what you wrote, there’s always an error to be found? We’ll soon know how many we’ve left behind.

Anyway, we felt good about the work done, and the rest of the week just flew by. We cleaned the boat and became hosts to couple of groups of visitors.

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| 02/03/2013 | Category: Logbook, Taiwan | Leave a comment

Back in the Oasis of Quiet

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We casted off as planned. This time we were resolved that nothing can stopped us.

The last three days were a real ordeal. From peace of a quiet bay we stepped right in the midst of a full-blown house-party. The Chinese New Year that’s nine days of national holidays, desperate traffic jams, every hotel in the favorite destinations is hopelessly over-booked, even small shrines and temples offer their meditation cells to tourists.

Why would we go back to Kaohsiung at the peak of the busiest tourist period of the whole year? Why?

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| 15/02/2013 | Category: Logbook, Taiwan | One comment

We Had Enough of Life in Public

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We’ve left Kaohsiung, at least for few days. We couldn’t stand the place anymore. We had enough of our life in public. It was on our minds for quite some time now, but there was always an excuse or two, which stopped us from leaving. True, our berth in Kaohsiung is really convenient. Everything is within the reach of a hand. Food, tools, material for the never ending repairs. In fact, we don’t have that much to do anymore and for what we still want to do, we have everything we need. Janna’s waterline had risen a bit already. After all we have loaded 30l of paint and epoxy, rest of wood that we still could use in the future, 20l of backup diesel.

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Most important reason for getting out of Kaohsiung is that we are starting to forget what silence sounds like. We do live in the Chinese society, so there it shouldn’t be surprising that there’s a bit more noise. The Chinese are by nature playfully noisy, which is cute and most people are just unbelievably friendly, but we grew up on the Bohemian meadows, groves and peripheries of small Czech towns, we simply need a good helping of silence and quiet.

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| 13/02/2013 | Category: Logbook, Taiwan | 2 comments
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