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Observations of Land People

3/24/2014

7 Comments

 
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Dearest land people,
   We have been observing you. We too have lived on land, for most of our lives actually, but after just three short years living full-time aboard our 32 ft sailboat, land living seems different...land people seem a little different too. We notice and think about these little (and big) differences because we're also, like many liveaboards, the go-to house-sitters among our land living friends. Living in someone's house a week or two every couple of months is refreshing - a moment to spread out, cook intricate stuff, shower, & do endless laundry - but it also highlights a few land/boat differences. 

1. The weather.
Do land people notice the weather? When we're on land we quickly forget about what's going on outside. Wind storm? What wind storm? It's sprinkling? Who knew? On the boat we feel it. Our entire house moves with the wind and water like a giant hammock. We hear every rain drop, every sprinkle...especially on the long walk down the dock to our car.

2. Forks.
Land people have a lot of forks...and way too many pens/writing utensils of all types. To be honest, they have way too many duplicates of a lot of things.

3. Ice cream.
Ahhhh, ice cream. It's tricky to keep ice cream frozen in our small boat fridge, it even has a freezer! It's cold enough to make ice, but ice cream turns to ooze. Enjoy your ice cream land people!

4. "Howdy!"
We've never felt so welcome and gotten so many friendly "hellos" then when we moved aboard. Over the last few years we've given sailors we barely know rides back to the marina from town, attended our next door neighbor's wedding, and we always make eye contact and say hello when passing fellow sailors on the docks - that's what you do. We've lived in multiple land neighborhoods across Seattle that weren't like this. Do they exist? We hope so!

5. Spiders. 
I kinda forgot about the giant brown spiders that scurry across the basement floors of Northwest land houses. While house-sitting last month, I was working on a project in the basement...in my bare feet...and then I was reminded of these little (giant) guys as one ran across the floor. We don't seem to have spiders on the (inside) of the boat. The family is pretty happy about this.

6. Quiet…or, rather, not quiet. 
We have grown accustomed to the ambient noises of the marina and our boat. The creak of the lines that tie us to the dock, the birds (sometimes even swimming under our boat!), the water hitting the stern. Land dwellings have their own sounds but a lot of them are super quiet...too quiet.

7. Where do the drains go?
When you live aboard you quickly realize where the kitchen sink drains. It drains into the Puget Sound. The storm drains in the parking lot? The Puget Sound. Wash your car? Wash your boat? Puget Sound. It makes you think...and watch what you let roll of the boat or run down the drain. I wonder who else is dumping things into the Puget Sound...

8. Power.
No contest. Land power rocks. Make toast while leaving the heater on - no problem. Charge every electronic device all at once - easy. Long, hot showers - easy. Problems with land power? Oh yeah, when it goes out. When Kingsley's shore power goes out we can still run quite a bit off of the batteries. Like the lights…lights are good.

   Observations complete…for now. It's maybe not so much that there's land people and boat people, it's more about how we tend to live on land vs. living on the sailboat. Even with the back and forth between land and sea, I know one thing: ice cream never tasted so good:)
   ~Paul, Amber, Kali (the cat…who prefers boat living for sure)

P.S. Surely we missed something? Let us know in the comment section!


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7 Comments
Gavin
3/27/2014 04:28:41 am

fresh air? seems to me that living on the boat makes you closer to the outside world. its all to easy on the land to go from office to car to car park to house without ever really taking a stroll outside.

simpler pleasures on board. Drinking a cup of tea in the cockpit on a early sunny morning.

Reply
Kristin Stewart link
3/27/2014 06:01:25 am

Great summary. I've lived aboard and even though that was decades ago, I never take a hot shower for granted!

Reply
Al Felker
3/28/2014 07:29:57 am

Toilets: Where does that go? In our case, into a tank which we have pumped out by our local pump out service. In other overseas places, it just goes overboard.

Water: Where does that come from? Must pump water aboard from land or desalinator. Or must haul it from shore with the dinghy.

Reply
Jak
5/26/2014 01:39:00 am

We have foot pumps onboard in our galley. I'm always amazed how the water runs in a house.

Reply
Tod Flak link
5/26/2014 11:01:58 am

Very nice observations! The ice cream thing is exactly right for us too (although my wife likes the semi-solid goop that results from our boat freezer).
We are house-sitting at the moment, and one of the things I am always amazed at is the excess space! All the rooms really seems unnecessarily large, and too many of them!

Tod

Reply
Paul S Schernitzki
6/1/2014 03:44:29 am

For sure - so much space!!! I imagine there is a boat-freezer ice cream container made for the job, but we haven't found it yet...we have these fancy metal ice cube trays that make ice just fine...if our little freezer can make ice surely it can keep ice cream normal!!!

Reply
Paul S Schernitzki
6/1/2014 03:45:14 am

I know, right? We have water pressure aboard - that helps!

Reply



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