Living by the words of the W.O.K.

Sunset in the salon

Kirstin and I are often times visually offended by the boats (and even yachts) of others. In short, many of them are a hot mess; holes drilled haphazardly in mahogany, wires running loose everywhere.....switches, breakers, and lights scattered randomly around the boat.......kind of like a bomb went off in a Radio Shack.

Not so on L'ORIENT. We have no art, pictures, exposed electronics.............in short, our boat is everything we need and nothing we don't. OK, we need our clothes washer, dishwasher, 3 A/C units, etc. but the point here is we haven't cluttered things up with flourishes of our own twisted design.

But there is one exception...........a small half hidden grab bar in the galley has taped to it various fortunes from cookies we've gotten in Chinese restaurants across our travels. This area is known as the W.O.K (the wall of knowledge). Like pilgrims climbing to the top of a buddhist temple in search of knowledge, occasionally we seek inspiration here. The most important fortune in the W.O.K is the one stating "when one must, one can".

Kirstin's transition to yachtie illustrates this ethic perfectly, as her days might not seem "normal" to land-bound women. For example, Kirstin in the L'ORIENT salon (below and above)...if you look carefully, she's coloring her hair in the dinghy (so as not to get hair dye on the mahogany floor of her bathroom). The next step in her process in the use of a hand pump and a fresh water bucket to complete her process. Not most women's idea of a salon day, but this is how it works in our world.

Where is my bucket?

Earlier this same day, she finished Crabby's (our dinghy) chaps. A dinghy costs about $5,000 and it's made of hypalon......a type of high tech canvas that is UV-resistant (but not UV-proof). Unprotected dinghies begin to deteriorate after only a few years so cruisers invent a variety of "chaps" to cover their dinghy and protect their investment. This becomes a bit of an arms race as sailors buy (which is considered lame) or sew these chaps themselves. Kirstin's new creation for Crabby is awesome.......kind of an Armani suit of the dinghy chaps world.........note the two-tone treatment of the pontoons and rear suspenders..........certainly a red-carpet worthy creation........this is what the well dressed dinghy is wearing these days.

Multi-tasking... podcasts and sewing

The finished product

Next, we worked on a small electrical project in the navigation area to facilitate charging our technology. I love when I get the chance to be foreman and Kirstin volunteers to do the work. The only drawback is that she sees how easy most of my projects actually are, and diminished the "my husband can fix anything" aura...........whatever.

Just me and my voltmeter

My favorite frontier-woman feature of my wife is her predatory shopping instinct. Yesterday, through sleuthing and asking around, Kirstin located a fish market here in Grenada and figured out when the tuna arrives. We pounced and purchased 15 lbs of amazing tuna at a bit less than $3 per pound. Visions of 10-12 meals of seared tuna danced in our minds as we hurried home and reorganized the freezer. This tuna was swimming in the Caribbean this morning and it looks absolutely yummy.

Grenada Fish Market - Ahi Tuna $3 a pound

Tuna Tartare and more

So to our male followers using Match.com to find the perfect cruising partner..........I'd offer the advice that certain frontier skills that might seem unimportant on land can be quite desirable at sea. And start saving those fortunes for your boat's W.O.K.........you just never know.