A song for winter, sung to the tune of Sealed With a Kiss
Yes we had to say good bye to the summer,
And now it's come down to this
Minus twelve in November,
Now it's way too cold to kiss
Guess it's going to be a long nasty winter,
I'm huddled in bed writing this
Too cold to get up and start a fire
Don't know how I'll make it through this
The water pipes are frozen
The propane hose is cracked
Ice is on the docks
Not enough wood got stacked
I didn't want to say good bye to the summer,
Knowing the heat I would miss
If I could have left in September,
Then it wouldn't have come to this
Guess it's going to be a long nasty winter,
Promises of lots of ice and snow
If only I was was rich, I could get on a plane and go
to Mexico
Where it's warm enough to kiss
And away from all of this
Bah Humbug, I hate winter and more so with every passing year. There was a few years in my twenties and thirties once I had learned how to ski, where I found a modecum of enjoyment from the sight of fresh snow, but now that I am older, stiffer and poorer that small joy is forever gone. Now it's just a struggle to survive each day. Living on the water makes that job even harder.
It's a constant battle against the elements here. We are limited to one hundred amps of electricity for the whole marina and that has to be shared by everyone. That means there isn't enough electricity for everyone to run a million space heaters
24/7, so alternative sources of heat must be found.
First you have to insulate EVERYTHING! Seal all the windows with plastic, stuff all the cracks with insulation, and hang blankets in all the doorways. Our main source of heat is the woodstove which eats firewood in amazing quantities. We seem to spend a large part of each day chopping wood which then vanishes in a a few short hours and requires setting an alarm to get up in the middle of the night to stoke the fire.
Luckily we live in a climate where it rarely dips below freezing but when it does we are in trouble. All of our water comes to us through garden hoses which freeze solid. The regulators for the propane tanks also freeze meaning no hot water or cook stove. Any dampness on the docks turns to ice making them extremely treacherous to navigate. If the cold snap lasts long enough, the river itself freezes, sending large dangerous chunks of ice sailing down river to crash into us.
Over the last two years, so much sediment has built up under us, that Dave's house sits on the hard at an angle during low tide. With last night's full moon making an extra low tide and the extreme cold, his house was making huge cracking noises which sounded like all the beams were breaking.Thankfully they didn't but the noise was something fearful to experience.
Even with 4 heaters and a fire going for most of the night, when we woke up the temperature in the house was at zero, the water pipes all frozen and this is just November! Our really bad weather typically doesn't start until the end of December.
I wish I was a bear so I could just hibernate until this is all over! Or rich enough to just leave for somewhere tropical for the next four months.
Showing posts with label woodstove. Show all posts
Showing posts with label woodstove. Show all posts
Monday, November 22, 2010
Friday, November 9, 2007
Update Time
Well work has finally picked up for me lately. Many of my clients have extended medical which allows for so many treatments per year. Most of them hang on to them till the end of the year, then realize they have 10 left or something and want to use them all before the year is over. I"m now working 6 days a week for the next while. Good for the wallet but hard on the body. This will probaly continue till Christmas, then I'll be lucky to get any work for January.
I havent had much time to work on the boat lately. Last week I finaly got around to insulating the bedroom. There was a big hole under the bed that led to the back deck, that was letting in tons of cold air. I plugged it with styrofoam, then laid a piece of aluminum foil covered with insulation over it and covered that with plastic, pink insualation and more plastic. I put a whole bale of insulation double wrapped in plastic under the whole bed and stapled more plastic over the whole thing. I also stapled plastic under the bedroom floor in an effort to stop all the cold drafts. I dont think all my work made much difference. I still can feel drafts blowing around my feet. Cant figure out where they are coming from, but I give up for now.
We had tons of problems with our satellite tv, kept losing the signal with the tides. The guy came back a few times trying to sort it out. Yesterday, he took the reciever off of Davids house and mounted it to a piling nearby. Hopefully that does the trick, it seems to be working good now. Everytime David would phone to bitch about it, they kept saying they were sorry and offering us more channels and free months ect, but whats the use of that if we have no signal??? They finally got the point and fixed it proper.
I havent had time to cut firewood, so have been buying presto logs in the meantime. I am looking for a big woodstove that I can give to David, so I can have the one that's at his house. Its bigger than mine but will fit in here nicely. The best part is it takes regular size logs. Mine is so small I have to cut the firewood to toothpick size which is time consuming to do and doesnt burn very long at all. I called the guy that was going to installed my propane furnace and asked him to order the parts it needs so I can get it hooked up. It will be nice to have another source of heat in here.
Im still waiting for the Mike to come back and install my hot water heater, there is a rumour he is coming this weekend, I cant wait to get that going. Hope it happens! I repainted the bathroom panels white, it needs another coat of paint that Im hoping to get done today. IM SICK OF PAINTING! Ive done a terrible job of it, if I had known he was going to take this long to get back to me, I would have just stripped the green off and left it wood. Oh well, another lifetime perhaps.
My Dad and his wife stopped by last week on their way to Indonesia. Im not sure what he thought of my living conditions, probaly not much, it looks pretty rough down here. I took them out to the River Rock Casino for a buffet dinner( belated birthday present for him), it was really good, lots of tasty food. Ill have to go back there again.
One of the issues we face down here at the marina is the river mud. It has been building up alot this year and is pushing us all out further into the river. This is causing alot of grief with the Port Authority and Seaspan who want us to move back. We have been experiencing super low tides lately that leave half the boats sitting on mud and tilting over on their sides. Makes life very difficult, esp for Tana who is closest to shore. Her houseboat is listing so bad, its filling the hold with water, knocking all her stuff of the shelves and making the toilets and shower unuable for large chunks of the day. Not good for any of us as she has one of the only working bathrooms down here. Greig has been using a tugboat to propwash the shoreline trying to clear out the mud beside her so she can float again. In the process he uncovered an old piling that had been cut off and is now stuck under her bow. Not sure how they are going to deal with that yet, but its an ongoing battle.
The Port Authority is going to be dredging the river around here in the next few weeks, so we want to clear as much mud out as possible before they get to us. We would love to have it dredged right up to the shoreline but that would mean moving all our boats and docks, not a feasable thing for us as we have nowhere to put us all, so will have to make do with the propwashing and hope that does the trick.
Well back to my painting, take care all xxoo
I havent had much time to work on the boat lately. Last week I finaly got around to insulating the bedroom. There was a big hole under the bed that led to the back deck, that was letting in tons of cold air. I plugged it with styrofoam, then laid a piece of aluminum foil covered with insulation over it and covered that with plastic, pink insualation and more plastic. I put a whole bale of insulation double wrapped in plastic under the whole bed and stapled more plastic over the whole thing. I also stapled plastic under the bedroom floor in an effort to stop all the cold drafts. I dont think all my work made much difference. I still can feel drafts blowing around my feet. Cant figure out where they are coming from, but I give up for now.
We had tons of problems with our satellite tv, kept losing the signal with the tides. The guy came back a few times trying to sort it out. Yesterday, he took the reciever off of Davids house and mounted it to a piling nearby. Hopefully that does the trick, it seems to be working good now. Everytime David would phone to bitch about it, they kept saying they were sorry and offering us more channels and free months ect, but whats the use of that if we have no signal??? They finally got the point and fixed it proper.
I havent had time to cut firewood, so have been buying presto logs in the meantime. I am looking for a big woodstove that I can give to David, so I can have the one that's at his house. Its bigger than mine but will fit in here nicely. The best part is it takes regular size logs. Mine is so small I have to cut the firewood to toothpick size which is time consuming to do and doesnt burn very long at all. I called the guy that was going to installed my propane furnace and asked him to order the parts it needs so I can get it hooked up. It will be nice to have another source of heat in here.
Im still waiting for the Mike to come back and install my hot water heater, there is a rumour he is coming this weekend, I cant wait to get that going. Hope it happens! I repainted the bathroom panels white, it needs another coat of paint that Im hoping to get done today. IM SICK OF PAINTING! Ive done a terrible job of it, if I had known he was going to take this long to get back to me, I would have just stripped the green off and left it wood. Oh well, another lifetime perhaps.
My Dad and his wife stopped by last week on their way to Indonesia. Im not sure what he thought of my living conditions, probaly not much, it looks pretty rough down here. I took them out to the River Rock Casino for a buffet dinner( belated birthday present for him), it was really good, lots of tasty food. Ill have to go back there again.
One of the issues we face down here at the marina is the river mud. It has been building up alot this year and is pushing us all out further into the river. This is causing alot of grief with the Port Authority and Seaspan who want us to move back. We have been experiencing super low tides lately that leave half the boats sitting on mud and tilting over on their sides. Makes life very difficult, esp for Tana who is closest to shore. Her houseboat is listing so bad, its filling the hold with water, knocking all her stuff of the shelves and making the toilets and shower unuable for large chunks of the day. Not good for any of us as she has one of the only working bathrooms down here. Greig has been using a tugboat to propwash the shoreline trying to clear out the mud beside her so she can float again. In the process he uncovered an old piling that had been cut off and is now stuck under her bow. Not sure how they are going to deal with that yet, but its an ongoing battle.
The Port Authority is going to be dredging the river around here in the next few weeks, so we want to clear as much mud out as possible before they get to us. We would love to have it dredged right up to the shoreline but that would mean moving all our boats and docks, not a feasable thing for us as we have nowhere to put us all, so will have to make do with the propwashing and hope that does the trick.
Well back to my painting, take care all xxoo
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Victory at last
So last night we were contemplating our options for a late night pee after a few beers. My toilet is still non functioning, didnt want to bother Tana to use hers so late and if we went to Davids, it meant filling up buckets of river water to flush the tank( he is not hooked up to water yet). That seemed like a lot of bother for 2 half asleep people. So I did something I never thought Id ever do . We went to the edge of the dock and David did his thing while I squatted precariously beside him, ass hanging over the dock, trying not to pee on my socks( too lazy to put on shoes). If thats not a bonding experience, I dont know what is.
This morning I had to go to Anthonys to pick up some stuff I had forgot I stored there. He had this awesome print on the wall that I fell in love with and he sold it to me for the paltry sum of 20 dollars, SCORE! It is huge and I worried it wouldnt find a home on the boat. I finally ended up putting it in front of the woodstove. It is blocking one of the big portholes but that isnt really a problem as I have tons of windows to let in light.
Jerry ( the new roomate) came over this afternoon and decided the first order of the day was to get the woodstove hooked up. I pulled all the tarps off the boat and cleaned all the stuff off the back deck . After much pipe wrestling it was finally time for the inagural firing of the stove. I said a quick prayer to the fire gods, loaded up the stove and lit it. Whoohoo, success!! The stove draws very well, the fire started right away and no smoky leaks anywhere. The built- in table beside the stove was getting quite hot , so I dismanteled it. The beam on the roof right above the stovepipe was very warm as well, so on Monday, I will by some asbestos to protect it. I have to say, I feel alot better knowing I have a good source of heat, bring on winter , Im ready now. Ok well maybe wait a day or two, I still have a tarp frame to build. Its been awesome to have the tarp off the boat. I didnt realize how suffocating it was to be competely covered like that. Today I could have all my doors and windows open and enjoy the river view once again. I wish I didnt have to put it back on but the rain will be back soon enough and I need the protection. Once that is taken care of, the toilet is next. I still have no idea what to do about it, hopefully I can get some help sorting that out.
Well one more load of wood on the fire and its off to bed, goodnight, sleep tight and dont let the bedbugs bite, xxoo
This morning I had to go to Anthonys to pick up some stuff I had forgot I stored there. He had this awesome print on the wall that I fell in love with and he sold it to me for the paltry sum of 20 dollars, SCORE! It is huge and I worried it wouldnt find a home on the boat. I finally ended up putting it in front of the woodstove. It is blocking one of the big portholes but that isnt really a problem as I have tons of windows to let in light.
Jerry ( the new roomate) came over this afternoon and decided the first order of the day was to get the woodstove hooked up. I pulled all the tarps off the boat and cleaned all the stuff off the back deck . After much pipe wrestling it was finally time for the inagural firing of the stove. I said a quick prayer to the fire gods, loaded up the stove and lit it. Whoohoo, success!! The stove draws very well, the fire started right away and no smoky leaks anywhere. The built- in table beside the stove was getting quite hot , so I dismanteled it. The beam on the roof right above the stovepipe was very warm as well, so on Monday, I will by some asbestos to protect it. I have to say, I feel alot better knowing I have a good source of heat, bring on winter , Im ready now. Ok well maybe wait a day or two, I still have a tarp frame to build. Its been awesome to have the tarp off the boat. I didnt realize how suffocating it was to be competely covered like that. Today I could have all my doors and windows open and enjoy the river view once again. I wish I didnt have to put it back on but the rain will be back soon enough and I need the protection. Once that is taken care of, the toilet is next. I still have no idea what to do about it, hopefully I can get some help sorting that out.
Well one more load of wood on the fire and its off to bed, goodnight, sleep tight and dont let the bedbugs bite, xxoo
Friday, October 12, 2007
Hmmm.....Now What
Well the tent poles didnt fare too well in the end. That night we had 35 mile an hour gusts and heavy rain. One pole broke right off, another fell out of the bracket and ended up in the water. The one pole left still did a good job of sluffing off the water up front, but the back end got filled with water again. I dragged myself out of bed at the crack of dawn, tied my housecoat around my ass and crawled out onto the motor mount to bail it out. I hope the condo neighbors werent too offended by my mooning them. I finally got 15 1"x4"x12' cedar boards that Im hoping to build some kind of "A"-frame for the tarp . It looks like I will have to screw them into the hull of the boat which I really wanted to avoid doing( the less holes in my boat the better, is my motto) but the storms are supposed to get even worse next month, so I want a solid cover.
I hadnt heard back from the fellow thats trying to get my propane hooked up, so gave him a call this morning. He still hadnt heard back from the company thats supposed to be fixing my furnace, so thats all on hold for the moment. I did get the rest of my stovepipe for the woodstove today only to find out its now 2 inches too long, "sigh".... I will have to tie down David tomorrow for 5 minutes and get him to cut it for me. We have a new roomate at the marina that has some ideas for my tarp frame, so hopefully I can get that built tomorrow, tape the tarp around the exit for the stovepipe and get a fire going in here. I cant wait!!
David got an excellent deal on a huge truckload of material today. Along with my 1x4's he got a huge amount of plywood for floors, enough huge beams to finish supporting the floors, 3 propane forced air furnaces, enough tile to do his bathroom ( and a piece for me to put under my woodstove, now I just need to find someone to cut it), and some other stuff to build a bathroom. My toilet has decided to stop functioning altogether for some reason. The pump is really hard to use and I cant get water to flow in or the stuff thats in there to go out. I dont know much about the toilet so am scared to take it apart. It sits below the water line so I have visions of the sea pouring into the boat if I loosen the wrong thing. I can live without alot but a toilet isnt one of them. So many projects, so little time. I want to take advantadge of this dry weather to get the tarp sorted out tho, so guess thats top of the list for the moment. The list is subject to change at a moments notice .
We have finally put in an order for satellite tv, they are coming on the 21st to hook it up. I cant wait. I want to get a flat tv to mount on the wall. Luckily work has finally picked up again and I should have the money for it by the time its installed. Im not sure when Ill have time to watch it with all thats needed doing around here, but will be a nice distraction in the background. I can always use it to drown out the sound of the flapping tarps. One things for sure, I wont be bored this winter.
I will try and take some pictures tomorrow. Our marina has changed alot in the last few weeks. We now have a monterous huge boathouse that goes right across the middle of the marina. New docks had to built alongside and behind it so people could get to the boats on the other side. We have a few new additons as well. I hadnt been up to the Bowie in a few weeks( funny its only a few feet down the dock, I just never go there), so all the changes were quite a shock.
Well Im suffering from a Grand Marnier induced hangover, so off to bed early tonight so I will have some energy for tomorrows adventures. Nighty-nite........
I hadnt heard back from the fellow thats trying to get my propane hooked up, so gave him a call this morning. He still hadnt heard back from the company thats supposed to be fixing my furnace, so thats all on hold for the moment. I did get the rest of my stovepipe for the woodstove today only to find out its now 2 inches too long, "sigh".... I will have to tie down David tomorrow for 5 minutes and get him to cut it for me. We have a new roomate at the marina that has some ideas for my tarp frame, so hopefully I can get that built tomorrow, tape the tarp around the exit for the stovepipe and get a fire going in here. I cant wait!!
David got an excellent deal on a huge truckload of material today. Along with my 1x4's he got a huge amount of plywood for floors, enough huge beams to finish supporting the floors, 3 propane forced air furnaces, enough tile to do his bathroom ( and a piece for me to put under my woodstove, now I just need to find someone to cut it), and some other stuff to build a bathroom. My toilet has decided to stop functioning altogether for some reason. The pump is really hard to use and I cant get water to flow in or the stuff thats in there to go out. I dont know much about the toilet so am scared to take it apart. It sits below the water line so I have visions of the sea pouring into the boat if I loosen the wrong thing. I can live without alot but a toilet isnt one of them. So many projects, so little time. I want to take advantadge of this dry weather to get the tarp sorted out tho, so guess thats top of the list for the moment. The list is subject to change at a moments notice .
We have finally put in an order for satellite tv, they are coming on the 21st to hook it up. I cant wait. I want to get a flat tv to mount on the wall. Luckily work has finally picked up again and I should have the money for it by the time its installed. Im not sure when Ill have time to watch it with all thats needed doing around here, but will be a nice distraction in the background. I can always use it to drown out the sound of the flapping tarps. One things for sure, I wont be bored this winter.
I will try and take some pictures tomorrow. Our marina has changed alot in the last few weeks. We now have a monterous huge boathouse that goes right across the middle of the marina. New docks had to built alongside and behind it so people could get to the boats on the other side. We have a few new additons as well. I hadnt been up to the Bowie in a few weeks( funny its only a few feet down the dock, I just never go there), so all the changes were quite a shock.
Well Im suffering from a Grand Marnier induced hangover, so off to bed early tonight so I will have some energy for tomorrows adventures. Nighty-nite........
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Every Day its Something New
Well I never thought living on a boat would be easy, but with winter breathing down my neck, this is getting a bit daunting. Its looking like I will have to wait until spring to do the outside of the boat. A friend of Davids who is a wood boat restorer is supposed to come by someday , take a look and give me an estimate on the repairs. In the meantime my priority is to stay dry, warm and get some running water on the boat.
To that end I have covered the boat in a huge 30 ft x 40ft tarp. It was a rush job last week when we got a 24 hour squall with force 10 winds and torrential rain. I basically just threw the tarp over the boat and tacked it to Davids house. Not ideal as every time the boat moved it pulled on the tarp. At one point the tarp had come loose in the back and water pooled in it in the back. I got the fright of my life when I went out and found the equivalent of two full bathtubs of water sitting in the small deck in the back. If the tarp had slid down anymore, all that water would have poured into the boat under my bed. I spent 20 minutes bailing it out and realized I needed a better setup. Today, I installed metal brackets to hold long tent poles and built a frame over the boat to keep the tarp suspended and to give it a better pitch for the water to run off. Its supposed to be windy and rainy tonight so cant wait to see how it all holds up.
As far as keeping warm, I finally got the money together to order some stainless stove pipe for the woodstove. It took me 4 days of wrestling with it to get it to fit over the hole in the woodstove. A good smashing with a wood hammer and some rearranging of the bottom edge with some pliers and I finally got it on. I was thrilled until I got it all hooked up and realized I was still 8 1/2 inches short and needed two more elbows for the outside. I phoned and ordered it but with the long weekend I probably wont get it till late next week. Meanwhile the temperature continues to drop daily. A friend had given me a Force 10 Cozy Cabin propane furnace which he figures should heat this place nicely. I am having a heck of a time getting it hooked up tho. I must have called 50 places trying to find someone that knows how to do it. One place quoted me $1800 to do it, sheesh , not in this lifetime! I finally got a response for an ad I had placed on Craigslist for help. He has been working on it all week, finally got the parts to hook it up to test it, but it was spitting flames out the side, so took it in to get looked at. No word back yet.
The hot water heater is another story. There was a Paloma on -demand propane heater on board when I got the boat, but the seller took it with him. After weeks of searching, I finally found a used one for $250 , a new one is worth $1000 so thought I had got a good deal. It seems that the venting system to exhaust the gas has to be all one brand that comes in a kit. The one I need costs $500. There is an existing chimney but it looks way to big for the heater I have, so somehow I have to change it and make the hole in the ceiling smaller. That should be fun!
Ive been shifted around the marina several times now. I started out in between David and Tana's right up front. That was nice, good view, easy access to Tana's shower, and her cat Tobias used to come visit me all the time. I had to move so David could put his house on shore to get it foamed, so I got tucked behind his place between the dock and the Express. That was not so good. I was exposed to all the noise and dust from the cement factory across the road, got all the foot traffic going by on the docks and every wave that went by was crushing me into the Express which is about 10 times the size of my boat. We needed to have more dock access to work on the boat, so ended up putting a dock along the back of Davids house and tying me up in the corner. This is the safest and quietest spot I can be, so think I will stay put.
I didnt get hooked up to shore power until I got to the last spot. David was running two 50 foot extension cords from the shore to his house and I had an extension cord from my boat to a socket in his wall. I was hardly getting any juice, the toaster and microwave ect wouldnt work, so I bought a heavy duty cord which helped to some degree. When we got home the other night, the extension cords to the shore had pulled loose. We had just bought $200 worth of groceries and needed to get it refrigerated. When I plugged the cords back together, they started smoking and making popping noises, freaked me right out! David had some serious heavy duty wiring cable, so in the dark and cold, took several hours to splice it together and got his house rewired. Nothing ever easy here! We had a long soak in the hot tub after that, well deserved and needed.
Getting internet was another experience. We were having problems with our connection in general, its through a phone line and was down more than up. After a couple of weeks we finally got the Telus guy down here. He said we were too far from the base transmitter, boosted our signal as much as possible and said that was the best we could do, pay for high-speed but get a weaker signal. We cant get cable down here as this island is commercial, we are the only ones living here and thats not exactly on the grid. Anyway, he no sooner got us up again, then my hardrive died. It took me 3 weeks or so to come up with enough cash to get it fixed.Got it home and tried for a week to get my wireless modem to work. Finally gave up and spent another $70 on more computer cable so I could wire right into Tana's modem. It seems to be working ok now, so can cross that off my massive "to do " list.
The bedroom is about 20 degrees colder than the rest of the boat. Part of it is because it has a wall that blocks most of the heat from going into it and the door is much lower than the ceiling in the living room. Im contemplating a small ceiling fan to push the heat back down. The bed is a platform with a large drawer in the middle. However, there is a ton of open air space under it and a hole which goes out to the back lower deck. Ive tried plugging it with plastic bags filled with insulation but need to do a better job. I want to line the whole place with plastic, stuff it tight with pink insulation , more plastic on top. Today I took a caulking gun with silicone and did all the seams in the room trying to block any drafts.
The bed is a huge piece of foam that was resting on a piece of plywood. Because there was no airflow, it was making the foam sweat like crazy. The underneath of the bed was dripping wet and starting to make mold. I had to dry it all with a heater, spray it with Hydrogen Peroxide to kill the mold, take out the plywood and replace it with boards that were spaced apart. It seems to be working but its a bit colder now as the air below can get through. Hopefully, the plastic and insulation will take care of that.
Im really missing tv now that winter is here. I need to get one of those flat tv's that you can mount to the wall and a satellite dish. Might be next winter before I can do that, so curling up in bed with a good book these days. In the meantime I have my vcr set up over at Ricks to tape Survivor lol, I can relate to them these days.
As I spend time here, im finding out what works for me and what doesnt. I want to add alot more storage to the kitchen area. There is barely anywhere to store food and pots ect. Every time I want to get at something, I spend half an hour pulling everything out and putting back in again. I want to hinge the stairs so I can store my drum and guitar out of the way. The bathroom has a clawfoot tub that takes up 90 percent of the space. Im not much of a bath person, prefer a shower, so want to take the tub out and build a shower stall and add a sink. The ceiling in the bathroom is only about 5ft 4 inches tall so I cant just put in a regular shower stall. I will probaly have to build a form and fiberglass the whole thing or some such thing. The toilet has a manual pump that has a habit of backfiring on me. Nasty!! I wont say more. I want a plumber to come take a look and see if I can install a regular flush toilet. Oh the small things we take for granted in life.
Boy I thougth I was Macgiver before , this is taking things to a whole new level. On the whole , this has been an awesome experience. I dont regret it at all, but will definatly be happy when I have heat here. The rest will come in time.
I give Thanks for my new home, my family and friends who are supporting me with this, and for the opportunity to live my dream. Happy Thankgiving to all, Bless you, xxoo
To that end I have covered the boat in a huge 30 ft x 40ft tarp. It was a rush job last week when we got a 24 hour squall with force 10 winds and torrential rain. I basically just threw the tarp over the boat and tacked it to Davids house. Not ideal as every time the boat moved it pulled on the tarp. At one point the tarp had come loose in the back and water pooled in it in the back. I got the fright of my life when I went out and found the equivalent of two full bathtubs of water sitting in the small deck in the back. If the tarp had slid down anymore, all that water would have poured into the boat under my bed. I spent 20 minutes bailing it out and realized I needed a better setup. Today, I installed metal brackets to hold long tent poles and built a frame over the boat to keep the tarp suspended and to give it a better pitch for the water to run off. Its supposed to be windy and rainy tonight so cant wait to see how it all holds up.
As far as keeping warm, I finally got the money together to order some stainless stove pipe for the woodstove. It took me 4 days of wrestling with it to get it to fit over the hole in the woodstove. A good smashing with a wood hammer and some rearranging of the bottom edge with some pliers and I finally got it on. I was thrilled until I got it all hooked up and realized I was still 8 1/2 inches short and needed two more elbows for the outside. I phoned and ordered it but with the long weekend I probably wont get it till late next week. Meanwhile the temperature continues to drop daily. A friend had given me a Force 10 Cozy Cabin propane furnace which he figures should heat this place nicely. I am having a heck of a time getting it hooked up tho. I must have called 50 places trying to find someone that knows how to do it. One place quoted me $1800 to do it, sheesh , not in this lifetime! I finally got a response for an ad I had placed on Craigslist for help. He has been working on it all week, finally got the parts to hook it up to test it, but it was spitting flames out the side, so took it in to get looked at. No word back yet.
The hot water heater is another story. There was a Paloma on -demand propane heater on board when I got the boat, but the seller took it with him. After weeks of searching, I finally found a used one for $250 , a new one is worth $1000 so thought I had got a good deal. It seems that the venting system to exhaust the gas has to be all one brand that comes in a kit. The one I need costs $500. There is an existing chimney but it looks way to big for the heater I have, so somehow I have to change it and make the hole in the ceiling smaller. That should be fun!
Ive been shifted around the marina several times now. I started out in between David and Tana's right up front. That was nice, good view, easy access to Tana's shower, and her cat Tobias used to come visit me all the time. I had to move so David could put his house on shore to get it foamed, so I got tucked behind his place between the dock and the Express. That was not so good. I was exposed to all the noise and dust from the cement factory across the road, got all the foot traffic going by on the docks and every wave that went by was crushing me into the Express which is about 10 times the size of my boat. We needed to have more dock access to work on the boat, so ended up putting a dock along the back of Davids house and tying me up in the corner. This is the safest and quietest spot I can be, so think I will stay put.
I didnt get hooked up to shore power until I got to the last spot. David was running two 50 foot extension cords from the shore to his house and I had an extension cord from my boat to a socket in his wall. I was hardly getting any juice, the toaster and microwave ect wouldnt work, so I bought a heavy duty cord which helped to some degree. When we got home the other night, the extension cords to the shore had pulled loose. We had just bought $200 worth of groceries and needed to get it refrigerated. When I plugged the cords back together, they started smoking and making popping noises, freaked me right out! David had some serious heavy duty wiring cable, so in the dark and cold, took several hours to splice it together and got his house rewired. Nothing ever easy here! We had a long soak in the hot tub after that, well deserved and needed.
Getting internet was another experience. We were having problems with our connection in general, its through a phone line and was down more than up. After a couple of weeks we finally got the Telus guy down here. He said we were too far from the base transmitter, boosted our signal as much as possible and said that was the best we could do, pay for high-speed but get a weaker signal. We cant get cable down here as this island is commercial, we are the only ones living here and thats not exactly on the grid. Anyway, he no sooner got us up again, then my hardrive died. It took me 3 weeks or so to come up with enough cash to get it fixed.Got it home and tried for a week to get my wireless modem to work. Finally gave up and spent another $70 on more computer cable so I could wire right into Tana's modem. It seems to be working ok now, so can cross that off my massive "to do " list.
The bedroom is about 20 degrees colder than the rest of the boat. Part of it is because it has a wall that blocks most of the heat from going into it and the door is much lower than the ceiling in the living room. Im contemplating a small ceiling fan to push the heat back down. The bed is a platform with a large drawer in the middle. However, there is a ton of open air space under it and a hole which goes out to the back lower deck. Ive tried plugging it with plastic bags filled with insulation but need to do a better job. I want to line the whole place with plastic, stuff it tight with pink insulation , more plastic on top. Today I took a caulking gun with silicone and did all the seams in the room trying to block any drafts.
The bed is a huge piece of foam that was resting on a piece of plywood. Because there was no airflow, it was making the foam sweat like crazy. The underneath of the bed was dripping wet and starting to make mold. I had to dry it all with a heater, spray it with Hydrogen Peroxide to kill the mold, take out the plywood and replace it with boards that were spaced apart. It seems to be working but its a bit colder now as the air below can get through. Hopefully, the plastic and insulation will take care of that.
Im really missing tv now that winter is here. I need to get one of those flat tv's that you can mount to the wall and a satellite dish. Might be next winter before I can do that, so curling up in bed with a good book these days. In the meantime I have my vcr set up over at Ricks to tape Survivor lol, I can relate to them these days.
As I spend time here, im finding out what works for me and what doesnt. I want to add alot more storage to the kitchen area. There is barely anywhere to store food and pots ect. Every time I want to get at something, I spend half an hour pulling everything out and putting back in again. I want to hinge the stairs so I can store my drum and guitar out of the way. The bathroom has a clawfoot tub that takes up 90 percent of the space. Im not much of a bath person, prefer a shower, so want to take the tub out and build a shower stall and add a sink. The ceiling in the bathroom is only about 5ft 4 inches tall so I cant just put in a regular shower stall. I will probaly have to build a form and fiberglass the whole thing or some such thing. The toilet has a manual pump that has a habit of backfiring on me. Nasty!! I wont say more. I want a plumber to come take a look and see if I can install a regular flush toilet. Oh the small things we take for granted in life.
Boy I thougth I was Macgiver before , this is taking things to a whole new level. On the whole , this has been an awesome experience. I dont regret it at all, but will definatly be happy when I have heat here. The rest will come in time.
I give Thanks for my new home, my family and friends who are supporting me with this, and for the opportunity to live my dream. Happy Thankgiving to all, Bless you, xxoo
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