We purchased our first digital camera, a Canon PowerShot Pro90 IS, in 2002. Many of our pictures are taken from a boat, with the subject often at a distance. So we wanted a long lens to successfully get those distant shots. Since light conditions in the Pacific Northwest can be poor, and we'd often be using a long lens, image stabilization could make the difference between an interesting picture and a missed shot. We decided against an SLR for a couple of reasons: a good image-stabilized SLR lens was expensive back then, on the order of $2,500, and the complete camera packages were heavy and bulky. For our use, we wanted a reasonably compact, lightweight package that was easy to use, carry and stow. A minimal SLR setup, with a body and two lenses, is a fair bit of equipment to carry around. Also, since many interesting shots happen quickly, we might lose them because we didn't have the right lens on for the shot. The early SLRs had an additional disadvantage of not being able to shoot movies. The PowerShot cost about $1,000, was image-stabilized, could record movies, and had a wide zoom range from 37 to 370mm. With an inexpensive camera, we could afford to upgrade it every few years as technology improved, or if we damaged it. Although the PowerShot picture quality wouldn't be as good as an SLR, this seemed like the right way to go for our usage pattern.

Another problem with an expensive SLR camera is that losing or damaging one is a pretty significant financial loss. We frequently take pictures in extreme conditions, in pouring rain or in rough water while taking waves, and have damaged at least two cameras this way. For example, the wave pictured above was taken in a 9-foot dinghy in 40-knot winds off the northwest coast of Vancouver Island, and the one below was taken in the Broughton Archipelago during a winter snowstorm. And here is a video we shot of breaking ice into Princess Louisa Inlet during a winter visit. For the wave picture in particular, we would not have been comfortable taking camera equipment costing more than $4,000 out in those conditions (you might argue that we should not have been comfortable taking ourselves out there either). Ironically, we got a great picture almost because we didn't have good equipment.

 Over the years, capabilities have improved dramatically and prices have fallen. Here's the digital cameras we've owned:

• 2002: Canon PowerShot Pro90 IS, $975, 37-370mm, 2.6 MP
• 2004: Panasonic DMC-FZ10, $800, 35-420mm, 4 MP
• 2005: Panasonic DMC-FZ30, $650, 35-420mm, 8 MP
• 2009: Canon PowerShot SX20 IS, $400, 28-560mm, 12.1 MP
• 2012: Canon PowerShot SX40 HS, $400, 24-840mm, 12.1MP

In addition to lens and image stabilization, big improvements also have been made in quality and speed of electronic focus systems. Our current camera, a Canon PowerShot SX40 HS, is respectively fast, produces good pictures, and has an incredibly wide zoom range from 24-840mm. And at $400, if the camera is damaged by operating in extreme conditions, it’s not the end of the world.

One thing we’ve found valuable is a lens hood. This helps protect the lens, keeping rain and snow off when taking pictures, and, without putting the lens cap on, we can quickly stuff the camera inside a coat for protection from weather or bumping.

We revisited the SLR decision with the second camera, but since then haven't bothered, and have generally just upgraded every few years. You can see the improvements in picture sharpness, color quality and white balance in this collection of our best and favorite pictures taken over the past decade.

We keep our boat ready to sail at all times, with drawers all latched and loose items stowed. When we're heading out for the weekend, we just need to start the engines and go. Before we lived aboard at Bell Harbor Marina, we could arrive at our Elliott Bay Marina slip on a Friday night after work and cast off the lines in under five minutes. This included the time spent unloading and returning two dock carts. Our next-door slip neighbors, Paul and Pam Lewis on Nordhavn 46 Gryphon, would pretend to time us and jokingly let us know if we were slowing down.

We've kept the same practice since moving aboard. We'll do more preparation, however, when we're heading out on a run where we might see bigger seas, such as the offshore run to SE Alaska or Prince William Sound.

To prevent a window blow-out should we take a large wave or a knockdown, we cover the five large salon windows with lexan storm plates. The plates screw into welded sockets on the window corners and are easy to install--we can put all five on in less than ten minutes. When not in use, we stow the plates beside the stack on the boat deck, under a canvas cover. On the offshore run to SE Alaska, we didn't feel the storm plates were necessary. But on the Prince William Sound trip, when waves were breaking against the side of the boat above the level of the pilothouse, we were glad the storm plates were in place.

We also have deadlights, metal covers that screw into the interior of the porthole, for the eight along the sides of the boat (one in the galley, two in the master stateroom, one in the master head, and four in the guest stateroom). Deadlights for the master stateroom are particularly important because the portholes there are large and close to the waterline. A nice side-effect is that the deadlights darken the room, making it easier to sleep there during daylight on a multi-day passage. The deadlights are a little more troublesome to install than the storm plates. The master stateroom deadlights fit right over the top of the porthole, but we have to remove the window hinges to install the rest. We keep them all stowed low in a bilge when not in use.

Our bow roller has a captive pin to secure the anchor underway. Matching the anchor and bow roller holes is a little fussy however, so we use a carabiner and short length of line to secure the anchor most of the time. But when preparing for heavy weather, we use the pin.

We've installed D-rings in the cockpit and boat deck and use ratchet straps to secure everything on deck. We generally keep them that way, including the heavy outdoor teak tables, although this isn't really necessary for local conditions. About the only thing we'll keep loose on a regular basis when underway locally is our teak chairs. But even for a short run across say, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, we secure the chairs as well.

We also use ratchet straps and bungee to secure fluids and large bins in the engine room and lazarette, and these always are kept in place.

Other heavy weather preparation items include locking down the davit, and plugging the furnace exhaust so water can't be forced down. And after the caprail flipped open during the Prince William Sound trip, we now secure it with bungie when preparing for rough seas.

When it comes to managing interior lockers, particularly the galley, one school of thought is to keep the lockers packed as tightly as possible, with no glass containers, so that nothing can shift or break in rough weather. We'd find that a little onerous--we want the galley to be workable in normal conditions. We generally don't have a problem with items shifting inside galley lockers anyway, even in pretty rough conditions. But when preparing for more extreme weather, we use bubble wrap, nerf balls, and foam scraps to keep thing secure and quiet underway. And we keep a bag of foam scraps handy to stuff into any place that develops a noise--it's surprising what will move or squeak in big seas. Even with no risk of items falling, keeping noise levels down reduces anxiety--you don't wonder what is loose and what might happen. Offshore sailors reported that loose items shifting and falling reduces a crew’s confidence in their vessel’s safety.

We put big sheets of bubble wrap above and around our glasses and plates, and wrap any items, such as glass olive oil bottles. And we stuff small pieces of bubble wrap in the fridge and pantry shelves to keep items there from moving. 

To keep vertically-stored items such as cookie sheets and baking pans from rattling and shifting, we stuff a nerf ball between them and the locker wall.  

We always keep one refrigerator bar in the back half of the fridge--the large heavy bottles there slide too easily. The bars do make taking things in and out a pain, though, so we only put the front bar in place as part of heavy weather preparation.

We have lever latches on anything in the galley that could swing open underway--the fridge, dishwasher and oven doors, the garbage compactor, the freezer drawers, the two large drawers beside the dishwasher, and the heavy sliding pantries. We often use the levers underway locally, and are careful to keep them latched when underway in any rough water. The levers are much easier to use than the standard barrel bolts--we're glad to have upgraded.

To keep any loose items on flat surfaces from shifting, we distribute silicone backing mats throughout the boat. Rick Lamb of Nordhavn 47 Sojourn Mariner recommended them. The mats look better than the non-skid liner we use in our lockers, and are thin, so items can rest partway on the mat.

Our Ekornes chairs have swing tables that we stow, but we leave the chairs loose. We've never had a problem with them even shifting until the Prince William Sound return trip--one of the chairs actually flipped over when we took a particularly large wave on the side. If it happens again we might devise a way to secure them, but haven't felt the need so far.

One of the reasons we made the offshore run from Seattle to Prince William Sound was to gain experience. A gale in the Gulf of Alaska wasn't exactly the sort of experience we were hoping for. But we did learn that the boat, and our rough-water preparations, could take the conditions. The full log of both offshore runs is at Cruising Prince William Sound.

Three days out from Prince William Sound, on our way north, the forecast called for 30-knot SE winds and 10-foot seas. Two days out, the forecast had worsened to 40 knots from the SE with 13-foot seas. As we neared, the surface analysis charts showed the low deepening from 998 to 991. Within a day, the barometer fell from 1014 to 1003 and the seas built from calm to 10-12' on the stern quarter. Even with the stabilizers and autopilot working well, the boat motion still was substantial. We had to be careful to have good handholds when moving about--crawling often was easier.

We ended up not using the off-watch berth at all on this trip. Partly because the pitching motion the first few days was enough to make sleeping there difficult, and also because it was easier on the person on watch to not worry about making noise and waking the person who was off-watch.

In the past when we've been in rough water and had difficulty sleeping in the pilothouse berth, the master was comfortable. In this storm, James slept fine in the master berth, but I was having trouble falling asleep because I was sliding around on the bed with the sideways motion. I eventually wedged myself between the bed and the floor, and slept well.

At some point during the storm, the starboard caprail flipped open. It's a big, heavy piece of solid fiberglass--that must have taken some force. Nobody felt inclined to go out and close it though. One more item for the heavy weather preparation list--on the return trip, we ran a bungee from the inside to the outside handle to hold it down.

We hit much worse weather on the return trip. We'd left Prince William Sound as conditions were settling down from a gale the night before. At the Cape Cleare Data Buoy, the wave height had fallen steadily from 20' at 10pm to 11' by 11:50am, and the forecast indicated continued improvement. Another storm was predicted in a few days, and we wanted to get well south before it hit.

Conditions, however, worsened rather than improved. The winds picked up to 30 knots, with gusts to 41 and then to increased to 40 knots with gusts to 59. The seas were 13', about 5 seconds apart, and were breaking above the pilot house roof. Several slammed into the side of the boat at that height--we were glad to have the lexan storm shields on those big salon windows.

This time we were taking the waves on the bow and the pitching motion was severe.  We both got seasick, James for the first time ever. Although it wasn't debilitating, we both put on a scopolamine patch so we could keep food/water down. I'd had no problems with seasickness on the way up--severe pitching generally is what does me in. Spitfire seemed to be nervous, but otherwise did well. He ate lots, slept lots, and occasionally headed down below to use the cat box.

We were through the storm in 36 hours, although it felt a lot longer. We were pretty tired, but the boat handled remarkably well throughout. The furnace plug was torn off during the storm, the wind pressure against the dinghy cover wore a hole through it, and our US flag was slightly shredded, but otherwise we had no issues. The rest of the trip home was amazingly calm--we could run for days or weeks in those conditions.

Seasickness really makes taking video unappealing, but we did shoot some on the trip north as the storm was building. Waves never seems to look as big in pictures as in person, but notice in a few frames the horizon disappears off the top of the screen and then almost under the bow. Those waves are a good 8-10'. You can see the stabilizers working to counteract the rolling motion of the waves. And notice the caprail flipped open in some of the starboard shots.

We were surprised at how quiet the pilothouse is. The salon isn't particularly loud, but the engine noise is more apparent there. We'd never noticed that until put the video together. We have things pinned down pretty well everywhere, so boat is pretty quiet even in some of those big sideways swings.

This year at the Miami Boat Show, Northern Lights announced their new Wavenet generator digital monitoring system. Wavenet was installed on Dirona a couple of months prior to the announcement in Miami to test out the gear on a busy NMEA 2000 network in real boating conditions. I was pretty impressed with Wavenet from the beginning, but sometimes that excitement fades with time or the new gear ends up being a service problem. After a half year in service, we’re still as hooked as we were on the first day.

Our main engine is a full electronic John Deere 6068AFM75 and this engine makes available on the SAE J1939 bus a huge variety of information including engine RPM, coolant temperature, percent load, fuel pressure, fuel consumption rate, oil pressure, boost pressure, torque, alternator voltage, and number of hours. We use a Maretron J2k100 J1939 to NMEA 2000 gateway to get all this data delivered to boats central NMEA 2000 backbone.

We really like having all this data available and we use it constantly when underway. But we had no data available from our Lugger L844D wing engine and Northern Lights M843NW3.3 generator. Wavenet solved this problem without any adapters or other electronics, and makes available on the NMEA 2000 bus: generator output, AC voltage, line frequency, tachometer, water temp, oil pressure, alternator voltage, and engine hours.

I would have happily paid the price of Wavenet just for the generator telemetry data to NMEA 2000, but the system also includes optional remote panels that display all the data available and, in addition, support remote one-touch start/stop. Each panel is a simple, 1 wire installation. Put a tee in the NMEA 2000 cable, attach the drop cable to the Wavenet remote panel and its operational. We ended up installing three remote panels: at the electrical panel to replace the original generator control panel, another above helm, and a third in the salon. I love being able to just reach over from my seat in the salon, without getting up, and turn off the generator, or see the current output or how long it has been running.

Technically Wavenet only supports Northern Lights generators but, if you have a Lugger wing engine as many of us with Nordhavns do and you ask the folks at Northern Lights really nicely, I suspect they would be willing to offer Wavenet for your Lugger as well. Since we have hydraulic bow and stern thrusters with the wing engine providing primary hydraulic pressure, we start and stop the wing engine quite frequently. It’s great to be able to reach up from the helm and press start as we approach a marina. I don’t have to hold down pre-heat and then start. Just touch start on the Wavenet remote panel, it signals the on-engine control unit which takes the engine through the proper preheat and start cycle. When we are done with the wing, we just touch stop on the remote panel. It’s a very nice setup for those that use the wing frequently as we do.

For safety reasons, we chose to keep the standard analog wing engine controls to ensure the engine is available even if the NMEA 2000 or Wavenet systems fail.

A side benefit of having both the wing engine and the generator controlled by Wavenet is any remote can control either engine. It turns out that I frequently turn the generator off and on with the panel that I originally installed to control the wing engine.

The three main venet wins from my perspective: 1) all engine and generator data available on NMEA 2000 bus, 2) supports remote monitoring, and 3) supports one touch remote start/stop. More on Wavenet at: http://www.northern-lights.com/PDFs/news/L575M_wavenet.pdf.

Although we hadn't run overnight before the Alaska trip, we frequently ran at night in the previous boat. And we did make a couple of night runs in the 52. The learning from those two runs proved invaluable in our 24x7 trip. We found that 1) the navigation screens were too bright, even turned down all the way with the software in night mode and 2) the steaming light illuminated the foredeck. Both impacted our night vision.

For the navigation screens, we built night-running monitor covers. These were highly effective for the trip to Alaska. Before leaving, we hadn't yet added attachments to secure the covers, and the screens did occasionally come off that first night in the Strait of Juan de Fuca when boat motion was severe. We secured them temporarily with blue masking tape that night and the following day added small velcro buttons on each side of the top edge of the monitor. The velcro has kept the covers in place even in the roughest conditions.

In dimming the monitors, we tended to go through stages as night fell. First we might put the navigation software in dusk mode and later night mode. When night mode became too bright, we'd put the covers on and switch back up to dusk or day mode. Then we'd continue dimming the modes until we had everything back into night mode. And we'd reverse those steps at dusk.

With the monitors dimmed properly, other light in the pilot house became more intrusive. This was less noticeable on the Puget Sound night runs in the 52, partly because there was more ambient light. But in the Alaska trip we also needed to dim the VHF radios, the autopilot, and the stabilizers, FLIR, hydraulics control panels. We even put a piece of blue tape over the small red light on the Mathers control.

The other night vision issue was that steaming light illuminated the foredeck. Emerald Harbor built a marineboard shield which solved the problem. They also built one for our forward-facing floodlight. Our experience with fishing boats is that the floodlight can be seen from much greater distances in the fog than the navigation lights. It's not particularly helpful, however, for spotting debris in the water.

We had red lights installed in the pilot house, galley, and day head when the boat was built. When running at night with significant ambient light, we'll put the red lights on everywhere. But on the run to and from Alaska, we found even the red lights in the pilot house too bright, and kept them off underway, turning them on only briefly during a watch change. We even disabled the two forward-most pilot house red lights, finding them too bright period. Having red lights always on in the galley and day head was convenient though, for quick runs down below. We also found a red flashlight handy to study something inside without ruining our night vision, or for the person off-watch berth to read by and not illuminate the pilot house.

For collision-avoidance at night, particularly in the fog, we relied heavily on radar and AIS: Furuno DRS25A 25kw 6.5' and DRS6A 6kw 4' open-array antennas and an FA150 Class A transponder. We passed perhaps thirty boats at night on the trip up. All came through clearly on radar and about five were fishing vessels that did not transmit on AIS. All the rest, mainly cruise ships, showed up on AIS typically about ten miles away. Night traffic was similar on the return trip, except off Barkley Sound, where we passed through during a fishing opening. None of the fleet were transmitting AIS, and we had to be vigilant to keep a safe distance.

We do have a FLIR Navigator thermal imager, and find it effective at picking things out where the temperatures differ. For example, it clearly resolved near-submerged glacial ice chunks that were difficult to see with the naked eye. But on the offshore run, there just wasn't much out there for it to pick up. We encountered almost no floating debris, logs or otherwise, and our rule at night was to not get within two miles of another boat, which is well beyond our FLIR's range of about a half mile.

The picture below is the north-up radar image off the west coast of Vancouver Island. Our boat is at the center of the screen, the large green circles are 4 nautical miles apart, the blue triangles are AIS targets, the white circle with a line is an ARPA target, and the white diamonds are lost ARPA targets. Approaching us are the cruise ships Sapphire Princess (12 miles away to our northwest), Oosterdam (11 miles north), Norwegian Pearl (8 miles northeast) and Celebrity Infinity (12 miles south). The fishing vessel Island Joy is about 7 miles south. And 8 miles southeast, in the clump of one ARPA target and several lost ARPA targets, the Canadian I is heading south.

We've been ordering a seemingly endless number of supplies and spare parts for the boat, ranging from fuel filters to zincs to alternators to pumps, and even a spare inverter. Stowing it all has been a big job. The boat has a large amount of storage space in various lockers, bilges and other spaces, but most are irregularly-shaped. To maximize the storage space in an accessible way, and keep the spares safe from damage, we use Really Useful Boxes. The boxes are straight-sided, so don't waste space; are see-through, so we easily can see the contents; and are strong, so can handle heavier parts without shattering. And they come in about 50 sizes, ranging from 0.7L to 145L, so we usually can find a box, or combination of boxes, to make the most efficient use of any space.

In the flybridge brow, we use 5 64L boxes, and other sizes, to store lighter spares such as fuel and watermaker filters:

We've used a variety of sizes in the irregular area under the stairs down to the stateroom:

In the lazarette, we've got two stacks of 64L boxes, with a 33L on top. The two 64L boxes have a particularly handy feature in that the front folds down, so we can access the contents without destacking them. We've them held in place with bungee cord, but we easily can unhook the bungee to slide the whole stack out of the way:

The open-front 14L boxes are ideal for storing shoes:

In all, we've probably got 100 of the boxes in various sizes stashed around the boat, and we keep ordering more. We buy them from Office Depot, which carries a limited selection, and online at http://www.reallyusefulproducts.co.uk/usa/.

One of the things we learned from our trip to Alaska is that 24x7 operation with a double-handed crew is achievable for us, and with reasonable comfort. We arrived at the end of the run feeling alert and well-rested. In planning for the trip, we researched aspects of running a boat 24x7, ranging from watchkeeping to food preparation. Most of the literature is written by and for sailboaters who were crossing oceans. Although much did apply in our case we, found that some of the concerns, such as watch comfort, were less of a concern for us because our helm is inside at the pilothouse where conditions are comfortable, warm and dry.

For watchkeeping, we wanted a system that would allow someone awake and at the helm at all times. Although the ocean is lightly-enough populated that some cruisers, notably single-handers, sleep for short periods and leave the boat to run on its own, we don't view that as sufficiently safe. Our decision is to have someone at the helm all the time.

In The Voyager's Handbook, Beth Leonard interviewed 13 cruising couples on their watchkeeping practices. Many started off with a 2-hour shift schedule for the entire 24-hour period, but as they gained experience, most evolved to scheduled watches of 4 or more hours overnight and no strict schedule during the day, so long as someone always was on watch. The Dashews use a three-hour system, while the Flanders use a four-hour schedule. Both have informal watches during daylight. The sleeping habits of the crew also can influence the schedule. For example, some people can get sufficient sleep in 2-hour chunks over a 24-hour period, where others need to sleep for longer periods at a stretch to feel sufficiently rested.

We initially planned to do 3 4-hour night watches and informal day watches, using the Flanders' model, with James taking the first watch at 8pm. In practice, we ended up doing the opposite. It turned out that I could sleep pretty much anytime, day or night, whereas James had difficulty sleeping during the day. After a couple of days, we evolved to a schedule where we'd run a formal night watch schedule of 3 4-hour shifts between 8pm and 8am. I took the first and last shifts, and James took the helm from midnight to 4am. After I came off-shift at 8am we'd have breakfast together, then I slept for 2-3 hours, we'd have lunch together, I'd sleep for another 2-3 hours, and we'd have dinner together before starting formal night watch shifts. We kept this same schedule on the way back down, and likely will adopt it on future trips.

We also were concerned about someone drifting off when on watch. To avoid this, we used our autopilot watch alarm set on a 5-minute interval. It sounds a beep whenever the control panel isn't touch for 5 minutes. We also purchased a backup alarm, but in practice didn't need it.

James found the graveyard shift, from midnight to 4am, a little tiring. Spitfire, however, loved it. In foggy conditions, we turned on a large floodlight mounted high on the stack. Our experience with fishing boats is that the spotlight is visible from much greater distances in the fog than the navigation lights. Particularly when the floodlight was on, seabirds buzzed the boat and Spitfire charged back and forth along the dash top chasing them. Both James and Spitfire were ready to sleep by the time 4am rolled around. Pictured below is the graveyard shift crew, sleeping off watch.

Dirona has plenty of storage space—we’ve not yet come close to filling all the lockers despite living aboard. But it is a boat, and storage space is at a premium. So we’re always looking for ways to make the most efficient use of the space we have. When we visited the yard during construction, one of the items on our checklist was to add lockers in any inaccessible void spaces, or to modify standard lockers to make best use of the space available.  

As we organized the galley, one product we’ve found useful is Seville Classics iron expandable kitchen shelf. We’ve purchased five so far, and keep finding new uses for them. We initially got one for the locker above the washer/dryer that we use as a pantry:    

Then one for the dry-goods locker above the port counter:    

And another for the shelf below the port counter:    

And one for for our mugs and glasses cupboard above the main counter:    

Recently, we realized one would fit in the appliance garage behind the stove:

Seville Classics also has an iron two-tier shelf. By some fluke of luck, two fit exactly into our center overhead cupboard and really maximize our use of that space:

The shelves have little friction, so we’ve glued on non-skid material to keep things from shifting.

For dishes and coffee mugs, we are using Aspen from Crate and Barrel. We had Aspen coffee cups in storage from our house and brought them aboard the new boat. Before we put non-skid in the cupboards, the mugs had survived sliding and banging into each other so well that we decided to buy the plates and bowls too. So far they’re working out well. The bowls are a little on the large side, but are multi-purpose.

We purchased the shelves from our local Bed, Bath and Beyond store, but they also are available from Amazon.com.

We’ve cruised with two different cats: Gremlin was 10 years old before we introduced him to boating and Spitfire was a kitten when brought him aboard several years later. Both have enjoyed being on the boat and have seemed as content afloat as on land.

In our experience, cats need time to adapt to a new environment. They’ll want to inspect a new area and understand its limits. We’ve read of people who brought their cat aboard for the first time, stuck the animal below, then immediately started the engines and set off. This is not the ideal way to introduce any pet to boating. The animals will likely be frightened and resist further attempts to bring them aboard.

For both our cats, we brought them on board and spent the night at the marina first. We wanted to ensure they were comfortable with the new surroundings before doing anything else. For cats, cleaning or using the litter box is a good sign that they feel secure. Once they seemed relaxed, we started the engines a couple of times to accustom them to the sound. But we didn’t move the boat. Spitfire finds new sounds terrifying—he bolted from the room when we turned a blender on once. But he eventually got used the engine sound (and the blender.)

We monitor our cat’s location frequently, either underway, at anchor, or at a dock, and keep him inside if we are sleeping or away from the boat. We'll keep a hatch open overnight only if it has a screen. A collar bell helps in tracking his movements. This is particularly important for kittens. Like people, young cats take more chance, are less careful near the water, and can fall in. They do get smarter and more careful as they mature--Spitfire is a testament to both ends of that spectrum. The collar has a breakaway safety buckle that releases if the cat becomes entangled, reducing the chance of choking. For the most part, neither cat has exercised this safety feature, but we recently found Spitfire's collar dangling on a window latch above an open stairwell. We're not sure what happened, but were glad he was wearing that kind of collar. In case he does escape our monitoring and become lost ashore, he wears a tag with his name, our cell phone number, and our boat name. And we never sail until we know he is onboard. We've never had a problem, but have heard stories of people losing their pets this way.

On the previous boat and in our house, we used a standard-sized covered litter box and regular clay litter. A major disadvantage of clay litter is that the cats tracked it everywhere, along with very dusty paw prints. On the 52 we went with a new system, Tidy Cats Breeze. A special litter box holds non-absorbing pellets and solid waste, while liquid waste drains through to a diaper-like liner in a tray underneath. The liner lasts a week with no odor at all. And the pellets, because they aren't designed to absorb moisture, last at least 4 weeks (we've got them to last up to 6 weeks). The Breeze system has a number of advantages over standard litter systems, particularly on a boat. Cleaning the box is almost trivial--once a week we simply pull out the tray and replace the old liner with a new one. We clean solid waste out daily (we did that before anyway) and change the pellets as needed. Spitfire took to the box right away as soon as we'd set it up--we didn't need to follow the instructions for acclimatizing him. He occasionally kicks a couple of pellets out, but they don't track and are almost dust-free. Perhaps the best part, however, is how little storage space the refills consume compared to regular litter. In the picture above right, the large bag at the bottom is a 2-3 week supply of standard clay litter. Above it is a 6-9-month supply of pellets and a 10-month supply of liners.

Spitfire has adapted to living aboard as well as we have. While he may not appreciate the 52's many amenities, he loves the extra space and is constantly finding new places to perch and check out the surroundings. We love having him aboard and some of the systems we've developed help ensure that he has many years of safe, comfortable and relaxed cruising ahead of him.

We have three Lenovo ThinkVison L1900ps for navigation monitors. They have a low-profile bezel and controls in the front, so can readily be flush-mounted into the pilot-house dash. The display is crisp and clear, and we're very happy with them. But we found they were a little bright for night running, even with the screen brightness turned down and the chart plotter in night mode. So we needed some kind of dimming cover.

We wanted something that would be simple to use, and in particular wouldn't require dimming the monitor itself. We couldn't find a commercially-available product, so we asked Tap Plastics for a quote on building custom covers. The price turned out to be quite reasonable: ~$25 for two 1/8" pieces of transparent solar grey acrylic bonded together to form a corner.

We had one built as a test and it fit perfectly. The monitors were still a little bright, however, so we added AT-5 (Limo) auto tint film to the covers and that solved the problem. With the covers in place, the monitors are acceptably dim, even with the chart plotter in day mode. And should we want additional light-reduction, we can change to dusk or night mode. The screens fit snuggly over the display and stay in place without attachment, although we do plan to add velcro attachments to secure them in rougher water.

We've found the covers handy when moored as well. We usually have a couple of monitors on to display weather and other data, but they are a little bright for sitting in the pilot house in the evening with the lights dimmed. Instead of turning off the monitors and losing the information display, we can just drop the covers in place.

Below is a shot taken before and after the cover is in place, with no adjustment made to the display brightness.

Last year, Bayliner Magazine interviewed us for a story about our travels and experiences aboard Dirona, our Bayliner 4087 (article). Soon we will take delivery of a Nordhavn 52, and turn the 4087 over to new owners.

We are, of course, eager to have the Nordhavn, but are not desperate to get off the 4087. Dirona has been a wonderful boat, far exceeding our expectations. We would not sell Dirona if it weren't for our desire to get into longer range cruising. For coastal cruising, it's near perfect. At 7.75 knots, it burns only 2.2 gallons per hour, making it even more economic than many trawlers. The basic design has been ideal, with sufficient space to allow rigging for comfortable and independent cruising (Dirona specifications and features). It’s been our home for the past year (Living aboard: one year later), and has taken us to some amazing places over the past decade. Since purchasing it new in 1999, we’ve put 4,100 trouble-free hours on the engines travelling between Olympia and the Alaska border, including the West Coast of Vancouver Island, the Outside Passage, and Christmas trips to Desolation Sound, Princess Louisa Inlet, and the Broughtons. We have used the boat in all of the research for Waggoner sister publication Cruising the Secret Coast, and our published articles.

While both our families had boats, it wasn’t until we bought the 4087 that we became seriously hooked on boating to the point where we have sold everything that won’t fit aboard, and can’t imagine life without a boat. Dirona has had a major impact on our lifestyle and future plans, and it is with some wistfulness that we prepare to leave it behind.

We've been living aboard for just over a year now, and are absolutely loving it. What started out as an experiment ended up with our selling the house and car and becoming permanent liveaboards. We had a number of infrastructure issues to solve when we first moved aboard, and most solutions will carry forward to the new boat.

Connectivity was our first challenge. Bell Harbor Marina, where we moor the majority of the year, does have WiFi. But connectivity is intermittent, even with a large WiFi antenna. We instead purchased Clearwire. The 3G bandwidth (up to 2 Mbps) was workable, but not close to WiFi speeds (6-10 Mbps). A recent upgrade to 4G WiMax (3-6 Mbps) has improved speeds considerably. And Clearwire works throughout the Puget Sound area, so we've got reasonably connectivity for local cruising as well.

We'd been planning to buy bicycles when we got the new boat, but decided to get them right away that first week at Bell Harbor. We wanted something that would work well around town, but also that we could take on logging roads along the coast. We spent ages talking with Aaron at the excellent Velo Bike Shop in Seattle and left with two Giant FCR 2s. The lightweight aluminum frames make them easy to lift and carry, and their 27 gears are ideal for travelling around hilly Seattle. The bikes have been invaluable for living without a car. We can easily travel throughout the city, either completely by pedal or by bus using bus bike racks. James rides his bike to work downtown and Jennifer rides & buses to Redmond. And with bike racks installed, we can carry a huge amount on them. Some of the crazier things we've brought home include a full-sized dehumidifier and two 600' spools of line.

Pump-out was next on the list. We opted for PumpMeOut.com and continue to be happy with the service. We'll definitely be using them with the new boat.

For mail, we rented a large box at the UPS store in downtown Seattle, about a mile from the marina and on the way to James' office. This gives us a regular street address, not a P.O. box, so couriered items can be delivered. And someone is always there to sign for a parcel, which is a nice plus. And we get lot of parcels--with no car, we rely heavily on mail-order. Amazon Prime has worked out particularly well for us. With free two-day shipping, it's barely less immediate than going to a store. Our initial plan was that James would pick up the mail on his way home, but with the bicycles, either can easily do this. To reduce the amount we had to carry home and store aboard, we opted for paperless billing and statements wherever possible, and requested that any mail-order companies we used stop sending catalogs. Initially, we just forwarded our mail from the Post Office to the UPS box, but changed our address to the box once we decided to move aboard permanently. We've just renewed the box for another 15 months.

Laundry was another big challenge. Bell Harbor Marina was designed for transient boaters and has no laundry facilities, and none are nearby. The only laundry capability our current boat has is a hand-wringer. While this works well for us when we're on extended cruises, doing laundry by hand while working full-time was out of the question. And even if a laundromat were nearby, a weekly laundry trip wasn't appealing either. We eventually found an excellent solution with University Laundry Center. Every Monday morning we put out a big, red bag of dirty laundry, and every Wednesday that bag is returned with the laundry washed, dried and folded. They charge $1.10 per pound, which for us works out to a reasonable $120 per month. The service and results have been excellent, and is wonderfully convenient. But being an industrial laundry, it is a bit tough on the clothes, so we are looking forward to the washer and dryer on the new boat.

Bell Harbor Marina does, however, have excellent shower facilities. But we prefer to shower aboard. Our 10-gallon hot water tank limits the water consumption, but we still need to fill our 77-gallon water tanks twice a week to support that usage. This so far hasn't been too much of a hassle. We could attach the hose permanently to the boat, but we're not confident that the bilge pumps could keep up should we have a leak. On the new boat, we'll have sufficient bilge pump capability that this would be less of a concern, but we may just continue to run off the tanks anyway.

Cleaning dirty dishes is one of the few problems we didn't find a good solution for. As with laundry, we generally don't mind doing them when we're out cruising, but it's more of an imposition when we're working full-time. We could use disposable place settings, but that would generate a lot of garbage. The marinas supports paper and plastic recycling, but everything else, including food waste, goes in the garbage. So we currently wash the dishes by hand and the new boat will have dishwasher, so that problem eventually will be solved.

For groceries, we initially shopped at the Pike Place Market and Kress IGA in downtown Seattle. We purchased two Ortlieb bicycle panniers and brought them home full almost every week. The IGA has a good selection, but we did miss a number of products that we purchased at QFC, notably Boddington's ale. Jennifer's bus stops near the QFC in lower Queen Anne, so we began shopping there instead of the IGA. After a few months, AmazonFresh began delivery to Belltown, so we primarily use that service and supplement with QFC for those few items that aren't available or come in larger quantity than we want. And we still shop regularly at the Pike Place Market as well.

Filling the propane tanks is about the only thing we've not been able to manage by bike. For those few times that we do need a car, we've joined Zipcar. We've only needed to use it a few times, but it's worked well.

Moving aboard raised a number of issues to resolve, including internet connectivity, laundry, mail and pump-out. For pump-out, we initially planned to use Bell Harbor Marina’s portable pump-out cart. You wheel the cart to the boat, pump out the boat into the cart, then wheel it back and pump the cart into the plumbed sewage pipe. The only problem was that the cart wasn’t working when we arrived, and it sounded like it might take a while before it was.

Bell Harbor does have a pump-out dock also. Our two 30-gallon holding tanks wouldn't last 2 weeks, however, and moving the boat to the pump-out dock eash week wasn’t very appealing. One solution would have been to just use the marina’s well-maintained bathrooms to reduce our holding tank requirements. But we would have found that almost more hassle than moving the boat to the pump-out dock.

We searched online for a solution and came across PumpMeOut.com—a mobile pump-out service. We loved their website—in describing the various options for dealing with a full holding tank, one was “Stop at the pumpout station. (Everyone could use more practice docking.)” They work between Tacoma and Point Roberts, including the San Juan Islands, and will service boats in their slip or on the water. The prices looked great, and they had a live-aboard plan of unlimited pumpouts for $65/mo. They came out that day and have been servicing our boat ever since. The service has been professional, reliable and hassle-free. And we like their creativity and approach. After their first regular visit, we found a small gift of environmental toilet paper thanking us for their business.

The portable pump-out at Bell Harbor has long since been operational, but we’re much happier coming home to find the little removable tag on our railing announcing “I got pumped!”.

We started living aboard early this year at Bell Harbor Marina as an experiment. We hadn't planned to live on our current boat--our initial plan was that we'd eventually live aboard on the new boat. We'd been on the waiting list for Bell Harbor for ages, and weren't expecting a slip to come available for a few more years. But we popped to the top of the list as James was taking a job in downtown Seattle. The opportunity was too good, so we had to try it.  

We made one big trip from the house with the car stuffed with everything we could think we might need. And in four months, the only thing we ended up needing from the house were international adapters for a trip James made to China. We had previously spent most weekends on the boat, and had been about as close to live-aboards as you could get without actually living aboard. So the boat was reasonably well setup already, and about the only modification we made was to add a couple of towel racks in the aft stateroom.

After a couple of weeks, we were hooked. We loved the downtown lifestyle, and didn't miss the house at all. And we'd almost completely stopped driving our car. We'd been planning to buy bicycles when we got the new boat, but decided to get them right away that first week at Bell Harbor. We wanted something that would work well around town, but also that we could take on logging roads along the coast. We spent ages talking with Aaron at the excellent Velo Bike Shop in Seattle and left with two Giant FCR 2s. James rides his bike to work downtown and Jennifer rides & buses to Redmond. Parking downtown is expensive, so we kept our car at Elliott Bay Marina, and just biked over there when we needed it. (Bell Harbor doesn't have permanent moorage through the summer, so we kept our slip at Elliott Bay Marina and have to move around a bit over the summer months. That's a minor hassle compared to the reward of living downtown.)

Within two months, we had spent a day interviewing real estate agents to start the process of selling the house. We chose Mary Lee and Jeff Shaffer, who did an astounding job in preparing the house for sale, creating marketing material, selling the house, and managing the offer and closing process. We recommend them without reservation. They are real professionals who made the experience efficient, successful, quick, and easy, especially given the current weak housing economy. Our house went on the market on April 16th, we accepted an offer on May 21st and the sale closed on June 23rd. Amazing.

We sold most of our furniture not required for staging on craigslist prior to going to market, and the remainder after. And last week, we sold our car, also through craigslist. So now we're down to just the current boat and a 5'-by-5' storage room that is stuffed solid. When the new boat arrives, we'll empty out the storage room, sell the current boat, and be down to just the boat and our bicycles.