Friday Funny 03/31 (Tides)

Good pun!

High and Dry

It's important to pay attention to tides when you are boating or cruising on bodies of water that are not lakes or rivers.  There are several ways we check the level of tides, and at what time they occur.

One of ipads is dedicated to Garmin Charts, it has a selection to view the tides at the location that is shown on the screen.

High and low for the day at Wrangell.

In Alaska, you'll find these 5"x3" booklet Tide Tables in every outdoor store, and they are free, take as many as you need. I was really surprised one time in Washington to find a tide table book that had a price on it! You have to decide which region you want to know about, and they can be $5.00 to $16.00. The internet can also give you the information you need, but what if you are in a place without a wifi or cell signal? It's better to be prepared in advance.

They come with different covers too, pick your favorite!

There are also apps, (of course), for tides.

Then there is the "rule of twelfths". I'm trying to wrap my mind around it, but, it just goes to sleep every time I think of it. I might wish I hadn't fallen asleep when trying to figure this out sometime.

Wikipedia:

The rule of twelfths is an approximation to a sine curve. It can be used as a rule of thumb for estimating the height of the tide at any time, given only the time and height of high and low water.

Snooze, (head drops to table), snoring........

How the sun, and moon affect the tides.

We even have to be aware of the tides when we are in the marina.

You may recall the evening in November, when I posted this on Facebook Denali Rose Sailboat, we had a full moon, and a minus tide which caused Denali Rose to gently sit on her keel in her slip. (As in NO water under her.) It was very disconcerting to see the depth gauge at 0.

A minus 4.6, settled the keel in the mud.

Denali Rose draws 6.3 feet, and our gauge is set at what the water level is under the keel. For instance, if the gauge reads 16 feet, then it is really 22 feet deep. The previous owner set it up this way, and we left it. We have since had a diver check out her bottom, and he said it was all good.

Carrying items to the boat can be interesting if you haven't timed the trip at the correct time. The ramps to the docks move up and down with the tide level.

Steep!

The ramp can be quite steep at a minus tide, this is Bill with a load in a dock cart, being very careful on his way down the ramp. Hopefully no one is standing in the way at the bottom. That's one of our safety rules, the dock cart goes first, and everyone else follows it. 

After all, we wouldn't want to damage or drop the wine!

Even the wine needs a PFD.

Do you know the rule of twelfths? Let us know here in comments, or on our Facebook Denali Rose Sailboat page.

Friday Funny 03/24 (Refrigeration)

Whew...

Is refrigerator cleaning a part of your spring cleaning? We have to do it routinely, or who knows what science experiments will actually begin to move on their own. Maybe we could employ Mr. Death to clean out the deceased items on a regular basis.

Snidely Milk Lash

We have choices for refrigeration on Denali Rose. We have the usual in-counter (deep dive) fridge, which we try to keep organized with small crates.

Well organized.

Not so well organized. I do know that the cheese bin is on the bottom.

We were keeping our leftovers in hard sided containers, but we found they took up too much room, and switched to zip-lock bags.

Various sizes of this, you use the pump tool to pump out the air after you seal the container.

Various sizes of zip-locks, I made the holder, and it hangs on the wall above the counter.

We also have a sharpie pen close by to label the bag. Items inside these bags can quickly become those "dead things" if you don't know what it is, or when you put it there.

We also have a front door fridge that is mounted under the countertop.

Also with organizational bins.

This unit is very old, eats power, and I have to get on my knees to see in, and pull items out. I'm dreaming of a new drawer model to fit in here.

My dream fridge.

We would already have installed one of these except for one problem.

The aft side of the galley.

The current fridge is in the lower left, and it is 23 inches wide. The width between the handrail on the left [in the above photo] and the mast on the right is 19 inches. Soooo, it's either dismantle a wall, or pull the mast off of the boat to get the old one out, and the new one in. [This predicament is also why our stove has an oven almost tall enough for a pie...] Neither of those options will be happening anytime soon, so for now we will use what we have.

We also have a dedicated freezer, it's the size of a large cooler, and it holds quite a lot. We need to eat up what's in there now, so we can make room for all of the fish we intend to catch. (Wishful thinking, please send positive vibes.)

The aft side of the lower dinette.

The Engel freezer inside the bench seat.

Organized meats, but no room for ice cream. Alas!

We turned off the heater to the v-berth, and closed the door. This action created another cool storage room, so we put large refrigerator items in there on the port side upper bunk. It has worked out great, but just today, it's getting too warm, (finally), and almost everything got moved out.

Fruit, onions, veggies, yogurt, and pickles were stored up there.

Maybe......   

Clearing off the countertop, always need more space.

What is on your spring cleaning list? Do you have more than one fridge to clean? Let us know here in comments, or on our Facebook Denali Rose Sailboat page.