Our crew: Alex, Sasha, and Pasha got delayed on their flight to Halifax, so they were at S.G. at almost 5am. Surprisingly, at 8am they woke up full of energy, ready for breakfast, exploration of Halifax, and the coastal waters of Nova Scotia. We left the city at 1pm after getting provisions, souvenirs, wine -- the important stuff -- headed to Lunenburg once more.
It's kind of sad for me to say goodbye to the coast of the bay which I've criss-crossed a few times now. We passed by Pearl island once again. It's almost exactly on the way from Halifax to Lunenburg, and Margot and felt that we would love to see it again, and that it's such a special place in this part of Nova Scotia that we had to share it with our friends. It almost seemed as if the puffins recognized Salty Ginger. Some of them were floating in the water, maybe 50 feet away from the boat before they took flight. Good bye, puffins.
With three long-distance sailors aboard we inevitably talked about systems, power consumption, etc. The primary resources that we require are:
a) diesel: it gives us propultion, heats up water for showers, enables the anchor windlass to operate, and is the back up power source for recharging batteries. Since leaving NYC we burned about half the ~55 gallon tank. That's less fuel than we used in rental cars for crew changes.
b) propane: we use it to cook. Today Margot and Sasha made chocolate chip cookies, so we used the oven for the first time. Cookies turned out great, and made the 5 o'clock tea wonderful.
c) water: we are very cautious about using water, but since I didn't have time to commission the desalinator in Brooklyn, we have to fill up our tanks every now and then.
Previous owners of Salty Ginger installed a wind generator. I thought that 200 watts of solar panels in addition to the 100W wind should satisfy our power requirements. The primary consumers of 12V power are refrigerator, freezer, navigation instruments, and auto-pilot. On our passage from NYC to Lunenburg we learned that solar+wind is not enough to operate all 4, and we had to run the engine a few times in order not to destroy the batteries by discharging them too much. Auto-pilot can frequently be resting if someone is hand steering, navigation equipment is absolutely necessary, and so is the fridge. My mom suggested I eat everything that's in the freezer and turn it off. That's what we did today, so we cooked sausages in dough, chicken, and scallops.
It will be interesting to see whether the reduced power consumption will enable solar panels to generate enough power to satisfy the load.. In the meantime we are catching up on sleep in Lunenburg. The heat wave is gone, so it's kind of cold outside, or perhaps just more Nova Scotian.
It's kind of sad for me to say goodbye to the coast of the bay which I've criss-crossed a few times now. We passed by Pearl island once again. It's almost exactly on the way from Halifax to Lunenburg, and Margot and felt that we would love to see it again, and that it's such a special place in this part of Nova Scotia that we had to share it with our friends. It almost seemed as if the puffins recognized Salty Ginger. Some of them were floating in the water, maybe 50 feet away from the boat before they took flight. Good bye, puffins.
With three long-distance sailors aboard we inevitably talked about systems, power consumption, etc. The primary resources that we require are:
a) diesel: it gives us propultion, heats up water for showers, enables the anchor windlass to operate, and is the back up power source for recharging batteries. Since leaving NYC we burned about half the ~55 gallon tank. That's less fuel than we used in rental cars for crew changes.
b) propane: we use it to cook. Today Margot and Sasha made chocolate chip cookies, so we used the oven for the first time. Cookies turned out great, and made the 5 o'clock tea wonderful.
c) water: we are very cautious about using water, but since I didn't have time to commission the desalinator in Brooklyn, we have to fill up our tanks every now and then.
Previous owners of Salty Ginger installed a wind generator. I thought that 200 watts of solar panels in addition to the 100W wind should satisfy our power requirements. The primary consumers of 12V power are refrigerator, freezer, navigation instruments, and auto-pilot. On our passage from NYC to Lunenburg we learned that solar+wind is not enough to operate all 4, and we had to run the engine a few times in order not to destroy the batteries by discharging them too much. Auto-pilot can frequently be resting if someone is hand steering, navigation equipment is absolutely necessary, and so is the fridge. My mom suggested I eat everything that's in the freezer and turn it off. That's what we did today, so we cooked sausages in dough, chicken, and scallops.
It will be interesting to see whether the reduced power consumption will enable solar panels to generate enough power to satisfy the load.. In the meantime we are catching up on sleep in Lunenburg. The heat wave is gone, so it's kind of cold outside, or perhaps just more Nova Scotian.
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