I’d purchased the ingredients for a beef chili the day before and began the day at sunrise with preparations – slicing, dicing and frying up the ground beef before mixing it all together. It turned out that I had a very large amount that wouldn’t fit into my slow cooker, so I used the big frying pan instead and slow cooked it on the stove top all day. This meant that I had to run the generator for an hour (my galley is electric) to charge the batteries and I had to watch it for the first couple of hours to make sure that it wouldn’t overcook at low heat. I did make a quick run ashore before 09:00 to drop off my empty propane tank at Island Waterworld for a refill.
I used the generator runtime and the excess power to plug in the vacuum cleaner and give the cabin sole as well as the bilges a good clean. The whole time I could smell the savoury chili cooking and it was difficult not to think of food all day! I got some exercise walking to Ace Hardware for some purchases and checked out the prices of Yamaha, Nissan and Tohatsu outboard engines as I really want to upgrade my 9.8HP for a 15HP engine; the prices for the Tohatsu were the best and I think I might get that model; particularly as all of the Tohatsu engines that I’ve had so far have been reliable. Andy from 5 Star even told me that he has an old cover for it – one I plan on bashing up and patching to make it look old and uninteresting to thieves.
I went to the SMYC for the 17:00 bridge opening and chatted until I realized it was 10:00pm already and I really should be returning to the boat to turn off the stove top and ensure that my batteries haven’t been run down. The batteries were fine, as was the chili.
