Dirty boat

In case anyone out there is feeling jealous of our glamorous new lifestyle, here’s the ugly truth about what it’s like cleaning a boat that’s been closed up in the tropics for a year. It’s disgusting.

Over the last three days, I’ve been working my way around the inside of the boat, cleaning cabins, toilets, kitchen storage spaces, bilge pump areas. This means wiping down walls and floorboards, removing mattresses, cleaning the under bunk storage spaces. Lifting up floorboards, discovering standing water, strongly yellow of colour, with dead cockroaches floating in it. ‘Why is there pee under the floor, Mummy?’, asks the kids. David just asks me to taste whether the water is salt or fresh – he is worried about a saltwater leak. I can’t bring myself to taste it.

The worst is what looks like pubic hair, absolutely everywhere. Under floors, in storage space, floating in the bilge pump water, glued to bathroom walls, stuck in a bit of grease on the engine. In the sink, the cutlery tray, attached to the window. Thousands of strands of short, curly black hair. I realise that it is most likely just the head hair from a prolifically moulting French or afro-Caribbean previous charter guest. Even so, it is still gross, and hard to clean, as the little hair stick to cloths and are not easily rinsed off.

It is hot, 32 degrees in the shade. So I’m cleaning in a bikini, trailing a strong sour vinegar (our main cleaning agent) smell behind me, only occasionally sticking my head out a hatch to breathe some fresh air, and see the beautiful scenery around me.

Through all this, the kids are amazing. They are heads down in Lego, off in their imaginary world, while we work away. As I clean I listen in on their conversation, bringing to life the Lego figures, constructing outrageous plots, a hybrid tale mixing Starwars, Captain Underpants and sailing. Luke Skywalker is on the beach, and then he meets some pirates, led by Wedgie Woman. He fights bravely, alongside his apprentice Lloyd, Jabba the Hutt’s illegitimate son who can change from a slug into a human and back again as and when it suits him. A panda bear is in there too, fighting on the goodie’s side. Too hard to follow, really, but wildly entertaining. It strikes me how perfect these two boys are for this trip – so adventurous, independent and imaginative, so good at initialising their own games, at playing with nothing more than a few Lego figures. They have amazing attention spans and can keep a game going for days on end. They rarely need organised activities, are never bored, and haven‘t once asked for TV or the computer – they are just off in their imaginary world. And they get on so well, hardly ever fighting.

We feel lucky. Soon the cleaning will be over, we’ll go for a sail, and show the kids what it’s really supposed to be like. But in the meantime, everybody are still happy and coping, even as we’re stuck on a mooring, cleaning a filthy boat.