1st Year As Liveaboards!

Nirvana at her new slip, 2017

It's no lie .. the older we get, the faster the year goes by! I can't believe that this past Sunday was not only Mother's Day, but one year since we moved onto Nirvana. Can you believe it?! We've been liveaboards for one year already!

I remember turning in the keys of our 1-bedroom, furnished condo last year. It seems like yesterday. I remember giving the condo one last glance before shutting the door .. and I wondered what the year ahead would have in store for us. Closing the door to the condo felt so symbolic .. another door was opening! After more than 7 years of working on Nirvana, we were finally moving on her. The dream was getting closer to becoming a reality!

So how was our first year? Was it all we thought it would be? I'd say our expectations were realistic, and therefore our first year of living on a small sailboat was as we'd imagined. This past year has been full of ups n downs .. adjustments, sacrifices and some amazing experiences too. The first couple of weeks were great ... like a camping vacation! Those sunsets the first few weeks were amazing (one of the first in photo below), and it felt so good to finally be living on the water again after selling our waterfront house 2.5 years earlier.

We were so excited to be living on Nirvana that we brushed aside any discomfort. As with anything, the "newness" died and the reality of living on a sailboat started to creep in. Like the first year of living together ... we learned to live with Nirvana. We learned to compromise, adapt, and take the good with the bad. Things like ... climbing in & out of the v-berth in the middle of the night, dealing with the head (and its odors), walking a really long distance to our vehicles in all types of weather (below freezing temps, high temps & humidity, and rain!), sweating our butts off last summer (even with a window a/c), packing up our toiletries & walking to the marina shower to get clean, going to the laundromat, washing dishes in a really tiny space, living with a tiny refrigerator (we love our 12v Engel fridge!) & without a freezer, and probably our most challenging .. cooking on a boat! I hate to cook, and it didn't help when we decided we hated our alcohol stove & removed it. For most of the last year, I cooked on one electric burner. With tiny counters, tiny sinks and one burner .. let's just say we spent a lot of money eating out the first six months! Oh, and another challenge .. storage. We're still working on that one. We just got rid of our winter clothes, which helps.

We eased the transition to living aboard by traveling quite a bit. We flew to Mexico, camped in Georgia with our "kids", took a 3-month insurance adjusting gig that sent us from Florida to California, and we even sailed to Mexico with our friend, Charlie, on his boat!

Many cruisers mention that they have days they want to sell the boat, but then they have days that are so amazing that they can't imagine every getting rid of their boat. I'd say our first year of living aboard at a dock was similar. We never wanted to sell our boat & give up, but to tell the truth .. we wouldn't want to live on Nirvana if we never planned on leaving our Louisiana dock! Perhaps we'd be happy living at a Florida dock somewhere that had a pool, outdoor kitchen, and weekly pot-lucks. Heck, we visited a couple of marinas in Isla Mujeres recently that we could definitely live at .. they even had there own beach! We love Louisiana, but we've given up a lot of comforts & conveniences, so we wanna get out there. We anticipate some awesome experiences in the near future once we start traveling after this year's hurricane season!

Our daily walk to the bathroom/parking at the marina ...

Let me back up and say that we've met some fantastic people & have made some great friends since living aboard. Our dock has been full of great folks, and one of them was our friend, Charlie, that we sailed to Mexico with! We've met a liveaboard couple that sails to the Bahamas every winter, another couple that's living on a really nice power boat while building their house, a few married guys that come to escape (we've never seen their wives .. they don't like boats?!), another liveaboard couple that recently moved onto their Catalina 30 (we need to tour each other's boats soon & get ideas), a cute lil 84 year young man that's been living on his small sailboat for over 15 years, and an 83 year young widowed woman that visits her power boat for a few days every month. She drives about 3 hours from her house, stays on the boat a few nights, and works her butt off maintaining it while she's here! We took a ride on her boat recently .. she makes herself take the boat out on a regular basis so she can practice docking it. She did much better than I could ever do. She's such an inspiration .. and tough as nails. As a retired trauma surgeon, I guess she's seen a lot! Oh, and we even met a couple while walking past their condo every day. The guy is from Egypt, has a dreamy accent, and loves to cook .. we've had some great dinners at their place! Here's a pic of Ken & our friend, Charlie ..

Okay, so living here on Nirvana has been pretty good. Downsizing, reducing our bills, and reducing our living space this past year has brought us opportunities that we'd have never had. If we hadn't already streamlined our businesses, we wouldn't have been able to leave on short notice for a 3-month insurance gig, we wouldn't have been able to fly to Mexico .. then sail to Mexico with Charlie, and we wouldn't have been able to go camping with our "kids" in Georgia to see the solar eclipse! We wouldn't have met all of our new dock friends and enjoyed "docktails" with them at sunset ... good times! Yeah, we're ready for more adventure but it's been a pretty good year. We're already getting a taste of what's out there, and we're so glad we hung in there. I think our dream, while not cruising yet, has already become a reality! Life is about new people, new experiences .. and change. In my opinion, change & challenges are what makes us grow .. and live life to its fullest!

As the year passed by, we learned to deal with the inconveniences mentioned above. I finally got into cooking one-pot meals, and we started spending less money at restaurants .. and more on boat stuff! Ken recently finished our propane project, so now we're livin' large with TWO burners! I'm looking forward to using our Omnia oven in the future .. I can finally bake again! We also found a few things to make living aboard more efficient & comfortable, including making curtains. Nirvana is feeling more & more like our home! I'll be sharing some of our ideas in future posts, and hope to learn more from you all as well. As I mentioned earlier, storage is always a battle so feel free to give suggestions! Here's a photo of our new curtains .. blocking the sun!

We love our occasional "lounging" area .. just lower the salon table, add a few cushions & viola!

It's really nice in the evenings .. yes, we have a tv and we watch it! We are at a dock.

While we didn't officially celebrate our first year as liveaboards, it was "Mother's Day" so it kinda felt like we did. The day started with a visit from this momma & her babies ...

We went to New Orleans to visit the zoo with our daughter, son-in-law, his family and .. our 3 month old grandson! It was a great day walking around the zoo under the oak trees and watching our daughter on her first "Mother's Day". I can't describe how it warms our hearts!

Here's the new lil family ...

and me with our baby girl ..all grown up!

How many can we cram into this Indian rickshaw?!

Once we got home, Ken installed a bigger window a/c in Nirvana's hatch. We had a 5000 btu last year .. hopefully this 8000 btu will make things more comfortable inside. It's gotten hot fast! Time with family and a new a/c unit to beat the heat .. can't think of a better way to start our 2nd year as liveaboards!

We're excited about the coming year, and in the meantime we're working on more boat projects, enjoying evenings in the cockpit listening to music, and we're still enjoying those sunsets!

Hasta luego .. until then. Mid-Life Cruising!

The Propane Project!

Since our sail to Mexico we've been busy working on boat projects to get Nirvana ready for cruising, including one project that we started last year. After giving our old alcohol stove an honest effort, we decided that we didn't like having to go into the cockpit & pump it every time we wanted to cook. So last summer we removed the alcohol stove/oven & purchased an RV drop-in cooktop from Camping World. No, it's not "marine" and it isn't gimbaled, but at only $108 we went for it!

For the last year, our new cooktop was covered with a cutting board and we'd been using an electric burner to cook. We knew we wanted a composite propane tank, but we weren't sure of how we wanted to attach the tank to Nirvana's stern. We also wanted to be sure that we ordered the correct parts for this project, which was a bit stressful. We don't wanna blow up!

With our flight to Mexico last summer followed by camping in Georgia to see the solar eclipse & then a 3-month road trip from Florida to California .. it was easy to put this project (and many others) off. However, the time had come to tackle this project if we want to start cruising the end of this hurricane season. We don't wanna spend another winter here in Louisiana .. it was freezing!

Adding propane to a boat sounds like a piece of cake, but like everything on our boat .. it's always much more difficult than it sounds! Ken did a lot of research .. high-pressure vs low-pressure regulator, choosing a solenoid, a control valve, providing chafe protection for the supply hose, attaching the stovetop to the hose, drilling holes in Nirvana's transom for the hose & the solenoid wire, making sure wires don't touch the supply hose, keeping water out of the holes in the transom .. all sorts of stuff to keep him awake at night!

After a lot of thought & measuring from cooktop to stern, Ken was finally ready to place an order. We ordered a 17 lb.Viking composite propane tank, the Breeze Make-A-Clamp to attach the tank to Nirvana's stern, and several items made by Trident Marine .. a solenoid & control panel kit, 15' of supply hose, a propane straight thru fitting (to run hose through transom), and a low pressure regulator.

Once our order arrived, Ken mounted the propane tank to Nirvana's stern with the clamps. This is a temporary solution, as a friend is going to weld a bracket for the tank to rest on. In the meantime, the clamps seem to hold well. We were worried about the 17 lb. tank being too big, but since it's the same diameter size as the 11 lb. and only a few inches taller we figured we'd go with the 17 lb. tank. We think we made the right choice! The only regret .. I didn't realize we could have ordered the tank in green or orange, which are Nirvana's colors. Oh well, not a big deal.

We chose a composite tank for several reasons .. the tank won't rust or corrode, won't explode in a fire, is lightweight, and is translucent which makes it possible to see how much propane remains in the tank. I've heard that some places won't fill these type of tanks, but we had no problem. I think that it used to be hard to find a location to fill these tanks, but not anymore. I know from a friend that we'll have no problems in the Bahamas!

It was time to start drilling holes .. ugh! We always hate the thought of putting any kinda hole in Nirvana, but it had to be done. Without going through every detail, I'll sum it up by saying that Ken pulled out the galley cabinets and was able to run the hose from the cooktop & under the galley bulkhead, through the port lazarette into rear lazarette, then through the transom. Holes had to be drilled in the galley bulkhead (for the control panel), the port lazarette & the transom.

First hole in lazarette next to galley bulkhead ... see that thin black hose? He also added that grey box, which holds the wires for the control panel that runs to the solenoid & to the batteries/nav station.

Hose and wire then ran over the port lazarette bulkead into the rear lazarette. I crawled into the port & rear lazarettes to tie-wrap the hose and wires to make sure the hose wasn't touching any wires. We don't want the hose to touch wires in case there's a short .. don't want to burn a hole in the hose! Ken leaned over the stern & was able to drill the holes in the transom. 

We had ordered (above) a fitting for the hose to go through the transom, but we also needed something to prevent water coming into the other hole that the solenoid wire ran through. We ran to West Marine & luckily found a 2-hole wire cap. Ken installed the fitting/cap in the holes, then I again crawled in the rear lazarette and guided the hose and wire through the holes/fittings. Below is a photo of the hose & fitting going through the transom hole. We are going to add some material soon for chafe protection. In other areas, we wrapped some tape around the hose for chafe protection.

Once all the hose & wires were run, Ken connected them to the solenoid, which is connected to the regulator and tank.

Here's a pic of the stovetop ...

and the control system mounted in our galley bulkhead.

After everything was hooked up, Ken sprayed all connections with soapy water to make sure there were no leaks. It all looked good,so then Ken ran a pressure test ... can't be too cautious. To run a pressure test, the tank was turned on, the solenoid control panel was turned on, then the propane burner turned on. We then turned the stove burner off, then the tank .. leaving the solenoid control panel on (solenoid open). We then looked at the pressure gauge & made sure there was no drop in pressure for at least 3 minutes. All was good .. whew!

We now have propane, and two burners too! It's been almost two weeks since this project, and we've cooked a few meals since then. It's been so much easier with two burners. I'm looking forward to trying out my Omnia oven soon! Ken plans on making it possible to connect our Magma grill to the propane tank too .. no more little green bottles!

As a safety measure, when we're done cooking we keep the stove burner on, then turn the solenoid control panel off until the flame goes out. We then turn off the propane tank and the burner. We don't have one of those expensive sniffers, but I'd like to get something to test areas of the boat every now & then. I'm thinking of something like this leak detector. Any thoughts or suggestions?

I'm not gonna lie .. propane on Nirvana makes us a bit nervous! But, we've taken precautions when installing the propane system and we plan on doing a pressure test on a regular basis. This will be easy to do after cooking a meal.

Here are photos of the before & after of our galley stove ...

With no oven, Ken added a shelf and we now have a lot more storage area. While at dock, we're using the area for a microwave, Foreman grill and Omnia oven. The Omnia oven will be great at anchor too!

Since this project, Ken has run 12v wire throughout Nirvana, added some 12v outlets, and some Caframo fans too! He's also replaced all of our interior lights with LED lights .. we're making progress! Look for posts about these projects (and many more) soon. Oh, and something we're really looking forward to ... we're waiting on some new batteries to arrive. They're not your ordinary batteries, so we're really excited that the company has agreed to give us a great deal on them & allow us to try them out. Stay tuned!

Hasta luego .. until then. Mid-Life Cruising!