Adventures of a Tribe

Bombing the boat.

Posted on January 27, 2016

Our sweet Kjira texted me today, and she is loving her job at Big Sky Ski Resort. One of the perks of her job is that she gets to snow board for a couple of hours every day, and she has become quite the boarding ninja. Yesterday she ‘flew’ down from the very top of the mountain.

Yesterday morning, the girls and I ran some errands while Jonathan and Aidan played at the skate park, and Danny finished up his battery projects on the boat. We caught a taxi and made a few stops, including dropping off the saw we had rented, and hitting the grocery store. It’s always an adventure grocery shopping with the creatures, but somehow amid our goofiness we get the job done.

When we returned to the dock, we loaded everything into the dinghy and made our way to Tanda Malaika.

While en route we thought of a marvelous idea…before putting all the groceries away, we thought it’d be a good opportunity to bomb the boat. When we purchased her we noticed the odd cockroach here and there, and placed traps and lay bait down. As time moved on, and especially after leaving the boat for a couple months when we were in Idaho, the little critters multiplied, and ever since we have been seeing them here and there far more often than we would like, even though we are careful to not have cardboard on the boat and have been removing all paper on packaging. When we reached Tanda Malaika and made the suggestion to Danny, we all got to work emptying every cupboard that had food or eating/serving utensils etc in it. We hauled it all out to the stern salon, left all cupboards, lazarettes and drawers open, and Danny set a bomb off in each hull as well as the main salon.

We took the dinghy in to shore and for two hours, sat at the skate park watching the creatures do tricks. Danny and I rode around for a minute too, and as always, Danny impressed me with his unending skills.

Once returning to Tanda Malaika, we opened her hatches and doors to air out the chemical smell, and then the work really began. Danny attacked every surface and crevice with the vacuum while Mycah, Jonathan and I washed out drawers, lazarettes, cupboards and shelves, and the twins washed every can in bleach water and dried them.

The entire place was turned completely upside down, but after several hours we were able to sit down and relax in the cleanest boat on the ocean. It was a huge job, but so worth it. I made lasagna and we watched ‘Grumpy old men’ together before resting our aching backs in bed for the night.

The sunset was so beautiful this morning, and it’s going to be a whopping 76 degrees today. Life is good, and we are so grateful for the experiences we share together in it.