Alex wrote: [b] "Careful selection of gear" - who, Ann? She carries everything in this boat that she carries in her minivan, seems to me... [snip] Don't understand her excitement about Trangia alcohol stove, btw. High, hot, non-adjustable flame. (There is a "damper" lid, but it's tricky). May be for on-board cooking this is better than a white gas stove, but why not using small adjustable LPG, same silent and non-smelly as alcohol stove...[/b]
Yeah, she is a real gearhead; "careful selection of gear" is a relative term,; on the beach she pulls more stuff out of a boat than I ever imagined anybody would take. The alcohol stove is part Trangia-sect-related and partly space related, IIRC. She only boils water to "cook," a word which should not occupy the same space as she does.
I admire her willingness to experiment with the edges of the envelope; her account of fighting that behemoth across oyster-encrusted mud flats over a couple "tide" cycles, well Florida tides, anyway, is a study in silliness and an object lesson in what is required to explore that part of the world.
Anyone would get a chuckle out of that story. Even if you have no interest in sleeping out in your boat at anchor, it is a fun read.
Ann is a good friend to all, and a sometime visitor at our house. A very remarkable, quirky individual. She loves the west coast of Vancouver Island as much or more than she loves Florida's mangrove areas. One of the few truly bicoastal kayakers I know of.
_________________ Dave Kruger Astoria, OR -- Folbot Kodiak, Cooper, and Edisto; three hardshells; Mothership: Surf Scoter the Bartender; dinghy Little Blue Duck.
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