Provisioning III: Where does it all go?

Thousands of pounds of food.  One (relatively) small boat.  The mission:  Put the two together in such a way that (a) we can still find things, and (b) we aren’t tripping over stuff as we move about the boat.

First, you get rid of a lot of the packaging.  Next, you get yourself a vacu-sealer.  We just got one at Costco, and I’ve now got competition for my husband.  Yes, I’ve practically lost him to the vacu-sealer.  He’s vacuum-sealed pasta, dried beans, meat, grains, spices, and then he got into boat parts and batteries.  He’s having way too much fun with this thing!  But I must say we’ve been sold on it.  It not only keeps things much fresher for much longer, but also it makes items take up far less space.  Which is what we need: for items not to take up too much space.  Because we don’t have much of that.

After much deliberation and filling up our floor boards and all closets, lockers (another term for an area under a seat that stores stuff) and pantry areas, we have filled our duffel bags with food.  Three large bags are devoted to cans, and three on top of those are for more fragile items (one for crackers, one for snacks and one for cereals).  These we placed on the sea berth, which is a narrow bed located in the port hull for extra sleeping.  Michael then installed some brass eyes so that we can rope the bags in so that they won’t fall while we’re underway. 

Under the floor boards...

How will we find it all?  The trusted Ship’s Provisioning Log, that’s how.  I have a column with abbreviations for where I keep everything.  PFA=Port Floor Aft, PFF=Port Floor Forward, FCB=Forward Cabin Berth, SMF=Starboard Mid-Floor, L1/L2/L3/L4=Salon Lockers 1, 2, 3 and 4 respectively, PBO=Pantry Below Oven, MBOS=Master Bath Open Shelves, and the list goes on.  The truth is, we have good storage area on this boat, which is either a blessing – we have been able to fit it all in – or a curse – the boat is now much lower into the water.  The true test will be when we push this baby off.  Will she move???  SB (=She Better).

So ends the bulk of my provisioning.  I’ve got a couple of odds and ends still to pick up like art projects for the passage.  And then the last of the provisioning will come 2 days before we cut the lines and head out:  Twice a week there is a produce warehouse that sells to all the retail tiendas around town, and they open to the public.  This is where we’ll get the bulk of our fresh produce for the passage.  And then we’ll need a day to prepare it for stowing, and to stow it.

For now I can concentrate on other details. The work’s not yet done.

-Barb in La Cruz