Settling In

The past week has been all about settling in. Settling into life on the mooring ball, Ripley settling into full-time living aboard, and getting accustomed to the cooler temperatures while living over the water. Let me tell you, 40 degrees feels a lot colder over the water than it does on land. Luckily, the temperatures seem to be rising this upcoming week and we’re looking forward to some sunny and 75-degree days. Ripley somehow always finds the sunlight on deck and basks in a couple of hours of warmth each day. 

Unfortunately, we don’t have much of an update on our solar project from last week, but we did purchase all the last parts needed to complete the setup. We’ll be enlisting the help of some others in the mooring field to assist Evan in the wiring. One exciting thing we did, however, was mount a small TV in our salon. Although not a necessity by any means, it has made the boat feel more like home, and it’s been a great addition during the football playoffs.

One thing that’s made us a bit anxious is the idea of leaving Ripley alone on the boat. She’s an anxious dog by nature and loves being with us (which may be our fault since we tend to bring her everywhere!). We finally took the plunge by setting a camera up inside and leaving for a short time to the dinghy dock. We were surprised to see how well she did, even if we were saddened by her constant gazing out the window. The next step will be attempting again for a longer period of time. 

Over the weekend, we both experienced bioluminescence for the first time. Bioluminescence is light produced by a chemical reaction within a living organism. Humans primarily see bioluminescence triggered by a physical disturbance, such as waves or a moving boat hull, that gets the animal to show their light off, but often animals light up in response to an attack or to attract a mate. To say it was magical is an understatement. As we left the dinghy dock around 7 p.m., we noticed our wake was a lighter color than usual, looking as if we had an underglow on our dinghy. The further we got from the light on land and the faster we went, the glow became brighter. We truly couldn’t believe our eyes, considering we didn’t go out actively looking for it. Apparently, it will be even brighter at the end of the month, so a nighttime dinghy adventure will most likely be in our future.

We are back to regularly scheduled YouTube videos each Sunday, so you can check out our most recent video here. In this video, we briefly walk you through our 2024 adventures and give a look at what to expect over the next couple of weeks. For now, we’re taking it one day at a time and attempting to live in the moment. Cheers to another week on the water!