The Bahamas
Bahamas Provisioning
Getting Organized
We use a spreadsheet downloaded from The Boat Galley and tweaked for our needs. This covers every consumable from chick peas to shampoo. We add how much we use of each item (i.e. 1 tin of , 1/8 bottle of shampoo) per week (I mean, who has time and water to wash their hair anyway?), how many weeks we are provisioning for, and how much of each item we already have onboard. The list then tells us how much to buy of each product. At some point it gets ridiculous - Lucy might want 2 bags of salt and vinegar chips a week, which would be 32 bags for 4 months. We’re doing a regular food provisioning for 6 weeks and planning on supplementing with local groceries and hopefully fresh fish (but no cigueterra carrying fish, of course) We’ll be baking our own fresh bread, making yogurt, and making ginger beer. Yum!
Dry Beans
We are taking dry chick peas, black beans, and kidney beans to save on weight, space, and cost. No, we haven't forgotten the mung beans for sprouting!
Dehydrated Veggies
We bought the pantry stuffer from Harmony House, which includes red and green peppers, onions, etc. We’ve made omelets and hash browns with these veggies and used them as stir-ins and they taste good. They are light, come in screw top jugs, and you only use what you need.
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| Dehydrated Veggies and Freeze Dried Fruits. So pretty! |
Again, we bought these from Harmony House. SO GOOD! I don’t think they’ll even make it to the Bahamas, I’ve been eating so much of these fruits. The papaya is out of this world! I’ve always hated freeze dried fruits because they are too sweet, but this brand does not add any sugar. Matt offered me a fresh banana today, and I said, no, I like my fruit dry and crunchy now. We’ve been eating as a snack and stirring in to scones, oatmeal and yogurt.
Alcohol
We’re taking 1.5 liters of rum, 1.5 liters of gin, 4 bottles of wine, 29 cans of beer and 12 bottles of beer. This should afford us one beer each a week and one sundowner a week. (Editor Matt’s note: This miserliness is a result of a foundering New Year’s resolution. Hopefully liquor stores will be easy to come by so this resolution can settle to a watery grave in Davy Jone’s locker!)(There are exceptions for guests and special occasions, like arriving in a new country, new anchorage, nice sunset, successfully made water, did the dishes, etc)
Hastings’s food
Hastings is getting a full 4 months of food, since he is a picky eater and has a food allergy. He has a total of 39 pounds of dry kibble, 10 pounds of “roll” food, plus remains of dehydrated food that he isn’t that keen on. He also has 5 bags of treats.
Galley Prep
Paper towels take up space. We use maybe one roll every two months because we use Trader Joe’s kitchen wipes for everything we used to use paper towels for. And, obviously, this goes without saying, we have a Lunatec scrubber for our dishes instead of a sponge. I think I caught a communicable disease just writing the word “sponge”.
Spare Parts
We have them. Mountains of them. We will not, however, under any circumstances, by no fault or planning of our own, have the parts to fix what breaks next. C'est la vie.
Entertainment
A bunch of downloaded free books (older books like Dickens and Austen are free to download). I may have a Pride and Prejudice coloring book. Mr. Darcy can keep me occupied while Matt is flying his drone (since it is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of a GoPro must be in want of a drone). Matt also has a pile of books (probably Star Trek Wars <sigh>) and an iPad full of nerdy Podcasts.
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| Coloring book. I know you're jealous. |
I ordered a Bahamas sim card from MrSimCard.com a month ago and it still isn’t here. We might pick a sim card in Bimini or we might just survive on finding Wi-Fi and using our sat phone to stay in touch. It will be like North Carolina and Virginia, where I never had cell service. So, basically, my current concept of the Bahamas is that is is like North Carolina but with clear water. We'll find out soon!
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| Gas and diesel all topped off. |
7 comments
It sounds like you guys are in the final days of your preparation -- that's so exciting! There's one thing I'd love to know, though: Why are there 29 cans of beer?
ReplyDeleteStephanie @ SV CAMBRIA
We bought 24 and we still have 5 left from the last beer purchase in September!
DeleteAnd yes, we are planning on leaving in the dark hours of tomorrow morning....Matt has vetoed today's planned purchase of 24 bottles of beer so we're going even lighter.
DeleteThat's interesting to hear that Mr Sim hasn't come through for you. I was thinking of ordering a sim card before we left from them, but now I think I'll hold off. Also, much cheaper (I think) to get one there. I've got some Harmony House stuff too which we haven't tried yet. All the best for the crossing and maybe we'll see you guys over there.
ReplyDeleteI don't know that it's MrSims fault. Dinner Key has hundreds of slips and moorings, and they get the mail, sort it, and look through their bins for you. You can't search yourself. It's totally possible that it came, and was mis-organized, or just keeps getting overlooked. And yes, hurry up and meet us there! We might even award you a closely guarded cocktail!
DeleteThose are some meticulous preparations and serious stock-ups! Bahamian Rum is tasty and quite affordable. I think you will run out of beer very quickly and regret not having bought more. :-) Have a fantastic passage and an incredible time in the islands!!!
ReplyDeleteGood to know about the rum. We aren't heavy beer drinkers- we've only gone through 40 cans and maybe 24 bottles in the last 8 months. (We just did split a beer while listening to the inauguration, but these are desperate times!) We do love a good rum and coke or dark n stormy though!
DeleteThank you! We can't wait to cross!