Snowmagedden approaches!

Smowmagedden approaches!  We are due for a major snow event tomorrow, bigger than the one last weekend!!

I totally stole this from someone's facebook post

This whole last week I've been running my water at night to keep the hose from freezing and heating the intake valve where the water comes into the boat.  So far so good, but today I learned that the marina is going to turn off the water tomorrow and most likely keep it off for the duration, potentially into Tuesday.  Besides the long shower I will take tonight, and the last load or so of laundry, there is more I can do to prepare.

Turns out I have a fresh water tank in the hull.  I even have nifty knobs to turn that are labeled, water from the dock, water from the tanks, and how to fill the tanks.  The thing is, there is no gauge so I'm not comfortable just turning on the water into the tanks, and I really don't know how long the water had been in there.

So adventure tonight, got myself into the hull and checked out the tank.  Looks like there are two but it's not easy to tell.  I turned the nobs and ran the shower/sink to drain the existing water.  That seemed to work ok so I filled them back up.  Only took about 20 mins so either they're not as big as I thought or I have really good water pressure!

Water controls but no gauge!

Update: It's the next day and we couldn't get the hose disconnected so I turned off the water coming into my house and we turned off the hose connection as best we could.

Snow Day in Seattle!

It snowed today in Seattle!  I got about three ish inches but I heard of people getting 9 or more.  Roads were terrible so snow day at work! I knew this was coming but it wasn't supposed to get that cold last night so I didn't leave my water running.  And yet no water this morning!

View off the front of the boat

My neighbors did leave their on and they had water, so the issue was in the hose between my dock and my boat.  I pointed a heater at the intake valve from inside but it wasn't helping.  I had planned for this, I got five one gallon jugs of water yesterday, I did all the laundry and dishes, but if it was already frozen the chances of me getting water before the end of the week were slim.  My awesome neighbors offered their shower, so not all was lost, but it still sucked.

View from the back of the boat, and we got more after this was taken

I was googling on what to do and finally came across something so obvious I felt kind of dumb.  Pour boiling water over the hose dummy.... /sigh So I boiled some of my water and it took two tries, but it finally worked!  The first try I just poured it on the hose, but the second time I took dish towels and draped them on the hose and then poured the water.  It seemed to work a lot better, longer contact with heat I'd imagine.  I could hear the ice in the hose once it got going, and the sound of water coming from the house was wonderful!

It's supposed to be down to about 20 tonight.  I am going to leave the kitchen and bathroom sinks running and I"m going to leave the heater at the intake valve.  I may have to move the electric blanket to my bed but this is not a hardship.  I am dreading the traffic tomorrow so we'll see what happens, but for tonight I have power and water and all is good in the world :)