The galley

We have a fresh water supply in the galley which is working really well. We bring the water on board  in 20 litre drums and syphon these from outside the boat into the water bladder that Neil and Aaron installed. For now, sink drained water is emptied manually, this will eventually be pumped directly into the bilge. 

Neil made a great plate/cup/spice rack complete with paper towel dispenser that we installed last week. Over the next week or two we will work on completing the rest of the galley storage. It's a cozy space and we've had a few nice meals in it already including a pancake breakfast:) 

 Neil bought a stove from Norway that needed some restoration work. I relate to the sentiment of this stove but my mind can't help wandering to the lovely modern two burner gas stoves you can buy at camping stores. Having said that, kerosene is safer than gas - it doesn't explode. Neil spent many hours getting this old thing working well, he made an aluminum lined timber shroud and the stove sits in it on gimbals, the result being that the boat can be rocking back and forth and any food cooking on top won't spill  because the stove stays upright. The stove works with kerosene, and takes some skill to master, a skill I'm still working towards! The kerosene inside the stove needs to be pumped in order to pressurise it. Once this is done, metho is sprayed into the hotplate area and lit; as it burns the kerosene inside the tubes heats and changes from a liquid to a vapor, and just before the metho goes out you turn the hotplate burner on. However, as I have learned the hard way, if the kerosene isn't hot enough, it is released into the burner as a liquid rather than a vapor and so a big flame of burning kero shoots forth, (lucky for me the stove is underneath a hatch and we have a fire blanket and two extinguishers on board :)). With practice I'm getting better at knowing how much metho to use and how to listen for the sound of vaporising kerosene! Watch this space.