Life in Isolation - some ideas from the high seas

The children have just started school.. but for how long?

Current location: Norsand Boatyard, Whangarei, New Zealand

We have been watching the deteriorating situation at home with increasing disbelief, and deep sadness in our hearts.  Victoria came out of the water last week for a routine mini-refit, which we are half way through.  Our plan had been to sail to Australia mid-April, fly home in May for my brother, Will’s wedding, then return to Australia and sail Victoria up to Indonesia, before returning to the UK in September.  During the single week that we have been out of the water, everything has changed for everyone.  We cannot even begin to understand the enormity of the knock-on effects of what is evolving.  Our plans, like those of the rest of the world, are no longer possible.  Borders are closed and every single person on the whole planet is facing turmoil.  There is definitely no place for yachties exploring the world on a prolonged jolly.  Our hearts are with you at home, every single one of you.  New Zealand has only a few cases at present.  They have closed their borders and we wait to see what will happen here.

Victoria will be relaunched in a week, and in the meantime we need to finish the refit that we have started, so we find ourselves in DIY and boating shops, selecting anti-foul and searching for paint in a shade of blue which matches our stripe at water level.  Earlier this week, I was in a sewing shop, using their machine to make us new lee cloths (to stop us falling out of bed when the boat tips).  Today I took Jack to a playgroup at a children’s centre, where the support staff were worrying over every detail for an upcoming inspection.  Eloise and George started at school last week, and we have had letters home detailing the school fair at the end of term, in three weeks’ time.  And all the time, our mobile phones are buzzing and flashing with messages from home, and we are looking at what we are doing here, and thinking, “This is all ridiculous.  It’s completely irrelevant.  We are in the calm before the storm, and the UK is in the hurricane.  Who cares what colour our stripe is?  We’re not going to be sailing off-shore anytime soon, so we won’t need smart new lee-cloths.  The children’s centre will be closed before the inspection they are preparing for, and the school will have to shut before the fair…”

Victoria out of the water
(We do have some steps at the back now)

Anyway, ridiculous as our little boat jobs seem, we need to get the below-water ones finished and get back into the water, because at the moment we are using communal shower and loo facilities, and the boatyard is very clear that no-one is allowed to self-isolate here.  If any of us develop a cough or a fever in the next week, I’m not quite sure what we will do.  Once we are back in the water, if any of us becomes unwell, it will be easy enough to go and drop our anchor in a quiet bay while we sweat our way through our paracetamol supply and drive each other even crazier than usual. 

Anti-fouling kit.  No masks in shops, but luckily we had these
from visiting the volcano in Vanuatu

The penny only dropped for us yesterday that our trip is over for the foreseeable future.  Our house in Winchester is rented out, and getting on a plane at the moment is madness anyway, so we have decided, for now, to stay in Whangarei until things become clearer.  I am going to start the process of registering to work here as a GP, because that feels like the right thing to do.  In the meantime, following several requests from friends who are going stir-crazy in self-isolation with their children, I am going to share with you a daily routine, followed by a drip-feed of other tips and tricks about living together as a family in a confined space (whilst also attempting to home-school..), how yachties support each other, what to cook when the fridge is empty, how to stay married, and what you can do to keep the place vaguely tidy when you are all living in it 24/7.  The difference for us, of course, is that we set ourselves up for all this voluntarily, so any underlying anxiety we had was mainly related to possible semi-submerged containers floating around in the ocean, or bad weather, rather than an unknown and terrifying virus.  I will try to keep these “Life in Isolation” blogs light-hearted, recognising that humour is essential even in the darkest times, and will aim to make it short and sweet. 

We send our love, prayers and and strength to everyone back home, and across the world.    

Laura, Angus, Eloise, George and Jack Xxx

Life in isolation - Our Daily Routine at Sea

At sea, the motion can be tricky, so we don’t try to do any formal home-school, but we do try to have a structure to our day, otherwise it can seem really long.  Do not underestimate how much your children will be learning informally by being with you all day, whatever activities you manage to do, so don’t stress about drawing up a complex curriculum, unless you have been given one by the school.  Learner-led is FUN!  There is lots of maths in the world around us without sitting down with a pen and paper.  Books are your friend.  Dig out all your fact / knowledge books / encylopaedias and spend time reading them.  Ours love reading to each other.  We have a kindle fire, which they use offline, with games etc.  The children each have a separate login which allows them 30 minutes per day, and it turns off automatically after this time.  We are always offline at sea – no 3G out there!  It’s worth considering how you are going to manage your phone which will be a constant distraction. 

This is an idea of how a day might be for us:

Breakfast                             teeth / get dressed (they have been known to stay all day in their PJs..!)

Morning activity                 play dough, lego, papier mache, making paper beads, train tracks etc

Happy Half Hour                good for mental health! – a drink and a snack.  Songs / music / jokes /                dancing / chatting / stories etc.  Everyone is together for this.  Also a                  good time to share news, have family discussions, votes etc.

Free Play                              Just one or two things at a time and then put them away..  Our biggest                (now blindingly obvious) discovery has been to tip the lego out on a                  sheet, so it’s super easy and quick to pour it back into the container at               the end.      

Lunch                                    One child to help prepare.  All to help lay table and clear.  One to help             dry.

Afternoon activity            mini aquariums, doctors / hospitals (they love bandages and slings),                    making beds for teddies, junk modelling, origami, obstacle courses,                     drawing / painting

Happy Half Hour               another drink and a snack and some kind of together fun.  Kids can take             the lead on the activities if old enough.  We have lots of riddle / joke                 books on the kindle.  Otherwise singing, read a story, play “I Spy” or                 “Who am I?”

Tidy 20 things                    This is one of my obsessions.  When everyone spends 5-10 minutes,                  together, putting 20 things back where they live, the place is transformed.          (Adults obviously end up doing way more, but 20 seems a manageable              target for the children.)  It only works if the “things” actually have                      somewhere that they definitely live. 

Film                                       On passage, which is comparable to being in isolation, the children                    watch a film every day.  Or episodes of David Attenborough etc. There               are a lot of hours in the day so this gives the adults a bit of peace to tidy            up (again) and cook dinner, and also an opportunity to check your phone            without ignoring the children..

Dinner / Free time / PJs / teeth / stories / bed

This is what happens when you don't supervise children at all..

Don’t forget life skills too – using the washing machine, hanging out the laundry, folding their clothes, putting things away etc.  We spend time in different parts of the boat for variety.  We always have our Happy Half Hours on deck in the fresh air.  For reading, the kids head to their bunks.  They do school and craft activities in the main saloon, lego in the aft cabin, and watch movies on our bed.  They all help out with normal chores - setting and clearing the table, keeping their bunks tidy, putting away what they have played with etc.  We also write pocket money jobs on the board, which they can choose to do, worth 50c each.  These are things like vacuuming, cleaning the cockpit, helping to make the bread, folding up washing, helping with a specific fixing job, cooking supper, making the packed lunches for school etc.

This is our “at sea” routine, so not much exercise in there.  In a house this would be easier - DVDs etc, and if you can actually leave the house, then easier still.

I hope something in here might be helpful  Our three used to require a lot of adult input at the start, and fight a lot.  We’ve been on the boat for a year now, and over the weeks and months they have learned to play together and sort out most issues between themselves.  Stay strong, stay sane, and be kind to yourselves.  Being with your family 24/7 is a huge challenge! 

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