Somehow I believe that garlic doesn’t become me all that well. I love the taste, but usually after eating a lot of garlic I get very thirsty. The ribs that I’d eaten at the LoLo the night before had a lot of garlic and I woke up at around 4am and had to drink some water and then couldn’t really fall into deep sleep again. I think that this has happened before, with garlic, so it seems to be a pattern – just as Monosodium Glutamate doesn’t do me very well, either.
I spent the morning measuring the decks and checking for possible positions to place various sizes of solar panels. I received an answer from Solbian in Italy regarding making some panels of specific dimensions for me and I got a price and availability. The downside is that they collect 22% VAT despite the fact that they are exporting out of the EU and thus VAT is not liable. Since Solbian panels are among the more expensive ones on the market (they are semi-flexible and just 2mm thick) that makes a very big difference in cost and I’ll have to re-evaluate my options. The picture below shows the foredeck space, where I could put a total of 280 Watts of Solbian panels. The rough formula for solar is to take their output at 6 hours per day – so in this case I would probably generate 280 x 6 = 1680 Watt/Hours, which at 24V means I could add about 70A per day. I think that with both the fridge and freezer running plus normal coffee-maker and sundry electrical expenditures I am close to 120A usage per day (a[art from the fridge, the notebook/monitor with the inverter running account for much of the energy consumed). If I time my generator runtime to be in the mornings and charge the batteries plus make water, heat water, run the oven, fill up the dive tanks, and do any other 220V tasks (vacuum cleaner, charging electric devices, etc.) then the solar panels should keep up with daytime electric consumption plus top up the battery bank if it is almost full. If it works out as planned, then I would only need to run the generator every 3 or 4 days for 2 hours which would be perfect considering my water use. Since watermakers do better if run frequently, this is a good solution. An additional advantage of solar is that I can get the batteries up to 100% charge occasionally, something that is not economical using the generator.
After doing my calculations and e-mails (using a very spotty internet connection from the boat which only works for about 30-60 every 10 minutes) I lounged in the cockpit for a while, drinking cappuccino and soaking up the warmth; then I got my energy together and set about putting the diving gear together and refilling the dinghy fuel (which was getting precariously low). Once set I debated which dive site to go to – either Creole Rock or Turtle Reef. I feel like I know every fish at Creole Rock so opted for Turtle Reef today, the winds had settle a bit in the anchor so the trip back from there wouldn’t be too arduous.
At Turtle Reef there was another dinghy tied up to the marker and I joined them, fastening my line with some spare length to put the camera onto. My knot wasn’t too good, since I saw the camera drift downwards soon after attaching it. After shortening my line so that my engine wouldn’t bash into the other dinghy, I got my gear on and dove. Luckily, the current wasn’t strong at all and the camera was resting on the sandy bottom almost directly underneath the dinghy! The dive was uneventful and the visibility wasn’t great, but I saw lots of wildlife on the dive and was happy I’d chosen the reef rather than Creole Rock (which has too many divers to allow large congregations of fauna).
Back on board Zanshin I washed off the dive gear and whittled the photographic collection from 158 pictures down to 20 (discarding some good photos of subjects that I’d already got pictures of). By the time I finished the editing it was approaching sunset and I made some Edamame to give the sundowner Presidente beer something to wash down. I prepared to head ashore for dinner but changed my mind at the last second and opted to make some sliced egg and homemade bread sandwiches for dinner and the sat back in the cockpit with the LED lights at full power to read the hardcover book “Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5 Book for digital photographers” which I’d purchased so that I could use this complex and feature-rich software to its full potential.
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