It may surprise some, but the single biggest hassle most folks on boats have to deal with is not fixing engines, repairing sails or dealing with problematic customs and immigration officials...
The really hard part of cruising on a sailboat is simply doing the laundry.
Not only is doing the laundry a hassle at the best of times but it eats up fresh water and anyone who has been on a boat for a while becomes seriously stingy about water usage which makes doing the laundry doubly frustrating... It's a yucky job at the best of times and all that water going down the drain!
Over the years we have tried just about every sort of hand washing regime including buckets with plungers, buckets with hands, washboards and suchlike and it just seems a little backwards in 2010 to be doing your wash in a bucket...
We've also tried manual pressure wash machines which sorta/kinda work and currently have a small electric agitate only machine which works but we never ever use so it just takes up room in the cockpit locker...
We have considered the various RV/Small apartment units but having noticed that most folks with these systems seem to be doing very expensive repairs on a regular basis and even when they work still wind up taking their laundry to the local laundry service if one is handy.
Actually the problem has never been about washing clothes, as washing is easy. The real problem is in the rinsing of said clothing and that is the difficult part of the equation as it is the part of the process that eats up water, time and energy.
I keep hoping for some sort of George Jetson harmonic dirt removing gun or robot thingy...
Not going to happen!
I do see just a little glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel with a new washing machine that Electrolux has up its sleeve though I'm afraid it is still in the concept stage.
Apparently this unit is so small you can hang it on a wall and while it only does small (cruiser sized?) loads, the important thing is it uses less than a gallon per load. I'll certainly be keeping an eye out for this one when it comes to market...
