Clean and Provision
Nov 22, 2023
We arrived about a week before putting the Altitude Adjustment into the water in order to clean and provision. The boat has been sitting in a yard in St. Marys, Georgia largely exposed to the elements for about seven months so the exterior had developed quite a crust. The four of us went to work determined to make her seaworthy as quickly as possible. The boat was partially stocked from the year before, so first the existing inventory needed to be taken and organized which, trust me, was no small task.
A snapshot of Julia’s inventory spreadsheet
Then my dad and I removed and reinstalled three massive 6-volt batteries that weighed 120 lbs each which was a heck of an effort. We also installed StarLink wifi for the first time. It will be awesome to stay connected while out in the ocean, but believe me when I say it was a struggle. We decided to fish the wire through the walls of the boat from the roof down to the pilot house. When looking at the boat it really isn’t much distance from A to B, but it took two people, power tools, more cussing than I would like to admit, blood, some claustrophobic squeezes, and two days, but we finally have wifi.
Fishing the StarLink cable through the walls
Next, we had to scrub essentially every surface on the boat: every cabinet and shelf, the interior and exterior of every window, the floors, walls, and ceilings. For the exterior, we borrowed a pressure washer from my Uncle Michael and put it to work. The green mold had taken over during the moisture-heavy summer and was all too happy to coat any surface it could land on. I ran through two tanks of gas before I decided to call it quits, and there is still more work to do…always more to do.
Tired after a day of hard work
The interior had nearly the same level of mold growth as the exterior due to the humidity in southern Georgia. Unfortunately, all we had for help cleaning the inside was elbow grease so we scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed. The boat is finally clean enough to inhabit and now we need to stock it for our voyage. The first step was finding places to store the twenty cases of beer my parents brought from Colorado.
I think we’re gonna need a bigger boat
Nov 25, 2023
The next day we woke up and went to Costco as soon as they opened, the shopping list was extensive! Most groceries in the Bahamas are more expensive than they are in the United States, so we ended up spending about $1000 at Costco in hopes of saving us money down the line. We also bought some of our liquor there, however they didn’t have everything we needed.
This was before we got liquor
After completely filling the back of the truck with our grocery run we went back to St. Marys, GA and unloaded it into the boat. Sounds easy enough right? Well everything has to go from the back of the truck, to the swim deck on the back of the boat, up stairs from there to the back deck, then back down a small set of stairs inside to the living room, and from there distributed into storage. By the time we finished putting away the refrigerated and frozen items, the doors would hardly stay closed. Next, we had to get creative using hundreds of nooks and crannies in the state rooms (bedrooms), living room, and kitchen to store our - hopefully - four months’ supply of food; trust me, it’s packed in tight.
Finally, everything was put away, boxes broken down, and trash thrown away, but there is more shopping to do. Sam’s Club was our next target, mainly for booze, and a few items we couldn’t get at Costco. This trip was much shorter but no less-expensive than the last, five cases of tequila is not cheap!! We also had to go to Walmart, Target, a nursery, and a fishing store to find everything on our list. Before yesterday, I had never been to a Costco and Sam’s Club in the same day, much less the numerous other stores. It was a long and expensive day that gives a new meaning to “shop till you drop”.
Nov 26, 2023
This morning, we woke up to rain and the news claimed it would last all day; unfortunately for us they were right. We still had a car full of groceries and alcohol from Sam’s to unload after stopping there on our way home yesterday. Initially, there was a light drizzle hitting the windshield, but as we drove further north the rain became stronger.
Once we made it to the boat yard, we donned our rain jackets and went to work. The four of us formed a bucket brigade from the truck to the swim deck to the covered back deck of the boat. Amazingly we managed to shove even more groceries into the fridge and freezers, add two more cases of beer to the stash, using our new ottoman from Target to store anything that was left out.
After we were done it was back into the car for one of the last drive to Jacksonville. Going back in the rain was almost as much fun as the drive there, hydroplaning and fighting to see the whole way, but we made it just fine.
Nov 27, 2023
Our final day before launching we divided and conquered. My parents went back to the boat as it was being picked up in the sling at the yard. There was a small amount of cleaning to tackle and some chargers to swap from one battery to another. Julia and I ran some early morning errands grabbing some plant stuff, and we took advantage of our final day on dry land with a nice walk on the beach in the afternoon.
A sign of good times to come