Fish out of Water.
On land I feel like a fish out of water. Not in my natural habitat anymore. It’s so different to be back on land and in a big city. So much concrete. I could hug every tree. In Berlin every single city tree is numbered …
Tag: sustainable life
Lithium is not the answer.
Hailed as our savior in clean mobility and finally fully embraced by the automotive industry, lithium or 3Li is the main component in the electric car batteries. Tesla Motors jump-started this e-car revolution and its founder Elon Musk took over from the late Steve Jobs …
And then came Greta.
My dream was to live sustainably and Radu’s dream was to travel. We found the SV Imagine and combined our dreams. We pushed off the dock three years ago and I started writing while sailing into Mexico, in the cockpit, typing into my cell phone. …
Ice Ice Baby. Refrigeration on board.
San Diego is playing Miami today. Humidity is through the roof. It’s smoldering hot. I am sweating. Moving just a little bit feels like running a sprint. Even my brain is lazy and I can only come up with some lame 80’s song for a …
The Natural beats the Artificial.
Nature is exuberantly creative, inventive and expansive but always, well, natural. The artificial is a human invention. Only humans can and want to escape the natural. Humans pursue the artificial relentlessly. The artificial seems to make us feel secure. Germs are fought with drugs and …
Mine is bigger than yours.
Is it in us on a cellular level that we have this urge to compare? Or is it a left over animal instinct when being the first to eat in a pack meant power and a better chance of survival? Anyone sensitive enough to consider …
No Copper on Our Hull.
In 2020 regulations dictate in Washington State and California that the hull paint on pleasure vessels should be of the non-copper kind and/or have a very slow leaching rate. Thousand of pleasure boats are mostly sitting at the docks and are continually leaching copper into …
The Lost Art of Day Dreaming.
You might remember a time when sitting around and staring into space was a pastime. A pastime of a time past. Now young, old, women, kids, men, everyone is busy all the time. Every increment of time is filled, with work, commuting, family, entertainment. I …
The Richest Country in the World.
Iceland has everything: breathtaking landscape, glaciers, volcanoes, waterfalls, fish, sheep and energy. And so much of it. Countries worldwide try to save energy and find alternative energy sources. Uniquely Iceland will never have to worry about energy nor fresh water. This volcanic island is sitting …
Clothes on board.
We don’t have many clothes on board. Most are geared toward living on on boat in a warm climate and some cold weather gear for sailing. We have enough clothes to last us about 2-3 weeks and all together fit in two large duffle bags …
A Love Affair with Bats.
Ísla Partida has a thriving bat population. Uniquely adapted, these bats catch and eat fish with long clawed feet and carry their catch in a pouch between their legs and wings. An ocean upwelling nearby provides constant supply of the little fish these bats feed on. The …
A Big Scheme.
I cannot help but wonder if everything we have been taught about a successful life is nothing but a big scheme. It seems that only a few and, most often, other people profit from it not us. The perfect life, money and success is dangled in …
Tiny is Great.
Tiny living come in all forms, can be on land or on water, mobile or permanent. Tiny is making an impact. It’s a game changer. Tiny houses are now trendy in the US. So trendy that there is a program on the American Home&Garden cable …
Water Part 4 – We are Water.
Our use of fresh water is frivolous. I understand that it feels great to stand under the running water of a shower. We are mainly made out of water, perhaps we like being one with our element. Shockingly, one in ten people on earth live …
Water Part 3 – Conquering the World.
Either greed or ignorance seem to run away with projects like Keystone and DAPL as well as the building booms of desert cities like Puerto Peñasco and Las Vegas. We built it and then hopefully have made the money to deal with the problems we …
In Flight.
From a cruiser’s perspective, modern air travel is quite tedious. You have to drive somewhere outside of town, stand in lines, pass security checks, wait some more, squeeze yourself into a small seat. And there you sit until you’re released. I try not to think …
Time on Land.
Beginning of August we hauled out the Imagine. The prices here in Puerto Peñasco for sanding and painting are so good, that we decided to go all out and sand the whole boat from top to bottom including the bright work (wood parts). The bottom …
Water Part 2 – Water in Puerto Peñasco.
Water is very scarce in Puerto Peñasco, where we spend over 3 months in summer of 2016. Puerto Peñasco supplies its population of 60.000 with 6-10 city wells, depending who you are talking to, and it has one large water reservoir. Several wells were being …
Water Part 1 – Water is Life.
The Sioux tribe of Standing Rock, North Dakota is protesting and fighting in court a pipeline green-lighted for construction crossing several states to Texas. It is planned to cross the entire US from North to South and go under the Missouri and the Mississippi rivers …
Trash on Board, on Land & on the Beach.
Living is minimized on board, we have less clothes, toys, books. But we need equal amount of food. It’s just that on land, we can produce as much trash as we like. On a boat, we keep our trash until we reach land. Some people …
Electricity Junkies.
We are addicted to it. Me, Radu, our society, we all love electricity. The majority of sustainable energy effort goes towards replacing energy from fossil fuels with electrical energy. Rarely have I seen a community without it. In Bahía Magdalena rattled and huffed a ginormous …
Civilization Wuss..
Imagine living in 250 sq feet/ meters with your husband and a dog. Imagine your closet contains 10 T-shirts, 7 shirts, 5 shorts, 5 pairs of shoes, a jewelry box the size of a large shampoo bottle. Most of your clothes are sailing and fleece …
Plenty of Time.
Radu is learning how to filet a fish, a Pargo rojo (Pacific Red Snapper). We met Antonio, the sheriff of this small village, when he secured our dinghy on the beach the tide had broken loose and was about to float away. They started talking …
A little bit of water can go a long way.
Personal hygiene on a boat can be a challenge. It’s interesting to live on the water and to have so much water around us and not to be able to use much of it. We have two water tanks of 40 gallons/ 151 liters each …
She Believes in Sustainability.
A while ago, back in San Diego, we had sundowners with a young couple who are renovating their powerboat in our marina. He has been fascinated with motors and is a mechanic from when he was a teenager. She defied her parents and studied marine …
The Airhead Story
Thursday 5 FEB 2015 | Boat plumbing nightmare Just ordered our Airhead composting head (toilet). I am elated. Can’t remember ever being so happy about buying a toilet. We moved on the boat a week ago and we have been using nearly only the onshore marina …
Imagining our Future.
We want to imagine how the future and how we can help shape it. How will we live in 50 years? Will we have found ways to sustain our thirst for energy? Or will we have found ways to scale back? What will we drop …