Don't Hate Me Because I've Got it Good

I do a lot of different things; like any long-distance sailor, I'll try my hand at any number of jobs that require a bit of know-how.  I've even gotten used to the pace of learning new skills on the boat - you count on doing a half-ass job the first time around, and from the second time on you find that you can do it a bit better.

But one thing that I do not do, unless you count making coffee and oatmeal in the morning, is cook.

Alisa is the cook for our family.  She's really good at it, and I figure there has to be at least one job on board that I hardly ever do.

Actually, Alisa is really really really good at keeping the team well-fed in spite of the various exigencies of rolling boat, irregular provisioning and clamoring kids.  If you want independent confirmation of how well she treats us, take a look at our friend Zoya's account of eating the Galactic way.

Any Excuse to Sail

We had an excuse to go sailing last week, and it was a good one - our friend Zoya's visit.

Without her visit, we would have missed this morning light in Barnes Bay.

We would have missed this rainbow in the D'Entrecasteaux Channel...

...and these wallabies on Simpsons Pt.

Our time away from town was a great reminder of how remarkable any regular run of days can be if you break away from the routine and go have a look at the world.

And, lucky us, our routine here in Hobart is pretty easy to break away from.  And we've been able to spend a lot of time during the last five years just looking at the world.

Finally, though we have some great Hobartian friends whom we have been able to see a lot of during our two stays here, much of our sailing life has been characterized by powerful, but ephemeral, friendships.  So it was great to be visited by someone we've known, jeez, for ten years or more.

The Other Kind of Childhood

 (Yes, that is a boomerang.)

(Yes, that is a skull.)

The visit of our good Kodiak friend Zoya coincided with an oddity of the Albuera Street Primary School calendar.  Last Wednesday was Anzac day, and thus a school holiday.  Friday was a teacher in-service day, so no school.  

It seemed a little wasteful to hang around town for the second half of the week just so Elias could go to school on Thursday.  So we went sailing instead.

Elias doesn't get any independence when we're sailing, and Eric even less.  At five and two, they're completely dependent on us in the watery realm.  But when we go sailing they do get time every day just mucking around in the natural world - throwing a boomerang or finding a skull on the beach and trying to figure out what animal it came from.

Or whacking the water with sticks.

We're enjoying this winter in Hobart, and Elias in particular is loving the experience of going off to school five days a week.  But it was great to get a few days away on the boat and to be reminded of how different, and wonderful, the kids' lives are when we're out sailing...