Winter / Spring Life at Lewisporte Marina

…. and with 4 dogs. After we arrived in Lewisporte NL I needed quite some time to get settled with life in the school bus with 4 dogs. Edward, Flynn, Elske and Chloe are good dogs but I was not used to “walking dogs” and picking up poop. Usually I just open the door and they walked themselves back “home” at the ranch. I underestimated the time it takes to give them their daily exercise and the amount of plastic bags you need to clean up behind them. Plus the weather in March, April and May in Newfoundland is mostly rain/snow and once a week we saw the sun. I was glad we had the mud room in the front of the bus to dry the dogs. After about 2 weeks I got settled and considered our school bus conversion “Wanderer” as my home. I also discovered that there are huge doggy bags available which can hold up to three poops ergo less plastic.

Talking about garbage … Wes already told you guys how much stuff and trash he kicked out of the boat. Well, I was the one who picked it up and brought it to the garbage container. As they filled up very quickly I randomly had to climbed into the container to flatten the stinky “whatever was in there”.

While Wes is mostly working on the boat, I make sure we were all not only fed but healthily fed. Surprisingly we have been able to buy a few organic produce even in the our little Independent Store in Lewisporte. Once a week I drive to Gander or Grand Falls-Winsor for the big shopping tour where I can get everything we need. To top our healthy eating I am raising 3 different kinds of sprouts in the dash of the Wanderer.

Cleaning dishes without running water was another challenge to start with but quickly I got the hang of it. It is not only NOT having a tap but also to safe water because hauling water was another chore that took a lot of time. As the ice was finally gone I started to pre-wash dishes in the ocean to safe water, which is one of my favourite things to do, but again this all needs time. So is doing laundry. All the convenience you have in a normal home like quickly stuffing laundry in the machine isn’t a thing here.

Anyway, it's all worth it having a place on the ocean and having our Wanderer parked just beside our dream boat which soon will bring us new adventures and new territory to explore.

My “free time”, and I was always looking forward to that part of the day, was helping Wes on the boat, cleaning bilges and the deck, helping putting tarps up that served as a roof (which had to be repeated after every windy day), emptying the chain locker and other subordinated jobs.

I am currently back in Manitoba working on publishing our book and selling the ranch while Wes is putting mega hours of work in, to have the boat finished by the end of the summer. I can’t wait to be back!

I am very excited to publish “HEALTHY - EASY - DELICIOUS - recipes from the Galley” very soon. Subscribers will get a discount on the book, so stay tuned!