five things Friday: on a boat edition

To celebrate their 50th anniversary, my grandparents got the whole family together for a houseboat trip on Lake Cumberland. As first-timers, we didn't know quite what it would be like (or how exactly it would work out for those of us who get seasick - my verdict: dramamine required for first night, got acclimated for the next day and a half, then a couple more woozy days while getting my landlegs back), but it turned out to be a blast.

Five things I learned about houseboating in the couple of days I was able to join the crew:

1. Houseboating is basically camping on the water - you cart along a bunch of food, lounge around with books and games, float on rafts, skimp on showers, sleep in beds tucked into little compartments. Doesn't it just look like a camper on pontoons?

2. There's no internet on houseboats, and while my portable office is great, a few days out on the lake without it is also pretty great... And it gave me the chance to work on summer things, like my surf spray + air dry beachy waves hair technique and my reading list (I finished Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter, then read all of Before I Go to Sleep in one day, then started on The Postmistress).

3. The kind of lakes you go houseboating on look more like rivers to me than the kind of lake I'm used to, but Lake Cumberland is beautiful nonetheless.

4. Lake Cumberland also has amazingly warm water. There were several of us ladies who usually would only dip a toe in the water, but we all had several swims a day.

5. They apparently let anyone take these huge boats and drive them around for a week, which I find a little crazy. My grandpa did a great job captaining, but much hilarity ensued when the rest of the guys tried to tie the thing up for the night and when we had to go back for our little jet ski that came loose from its tow-rope and was spotted bobbing by itself well behind our wake...