Normally betwen 10/15 liters per day. If we are doing the long passage we reduce the showers to salt water. And we have showers every 2/3 days deppending on the weather conditions and if there is something to celebrate like a birthday, or after a bad weather things like that.

Always taking a look on the watermaker wich was producing 30 liters a day

Buena proa!!

Bill & Nath here from Tilly Mint- We carry 2 tanks @ 700 liters (185 gal) each so 1400 liters or 370 gal total. We also have a watermaker that produces about 25 gal/hr (fills one tank in 8 hrs). Cruising or chartering with guests onboard doesn't really count towards this converstation because we use shitloads of water and make another full tank every day. Offshore where it matters, (usually with 4-5 crew) we stretch a tank for about 5 days. That means about 37 gal/day or about 7.4 gal/person/day - giving us a range of about 10 days with out making water. I guess thats a lot of water! We also shower regularly and generally don't worry as much about consumption since we can make water. If we lost the watermaker we would go into conservative mode. My practice is to always keep one tank full, so if we contaminate the other or lose the watermaker, me have 185 gal to getus to port. I'm glad you asked for comments here because I've actually never broken down that calculation before, but its something to think about!

We are currently tied to a dock, and we use about 15 gallons a day total (2 people and a dog). Some people will surely be shocked but we use fresh water to flush our head which accounts for some of that. The reason we do that is to prevent the head smell that happens when organisms get trapped in there from saltwater. I wash dishes pretty often and liberally but like you, trying to do better about conserving water there. We take pretty quick showers but I do admit washing my hair with shampoo and conditioner and shaving accounts for more water usage as well although I only wash my hair every 3-4 days. So we could certainly do better if necessary by cutting down on dishwater, shorter showers but we still will insist on freshwater flushes for awhile! :)

Living on a mooring we use 75 gallons every 3 weeks. Check out my post about our hot water heater made by Eccotemp. It's an instant hot propane heater that uses 1 pound propane an hour and no electricity. It is VERY efficient in conserving water but you still have to be aware, of course.

Hi,
We've been on our boat for about 4 years. Obviously our water consumption varies a lot depening on the weather, where we are and what we do. When in a marina, if it's cold, if we do some, not all, showers on board, we refill our (app.) 300 L tanks every 10-12 days. (25-30 L per day divided by two persons.) We have a washing machine on board, and that obviously gets the water from the jetty.
If we are sailing or on anchor, when its hot, and we do more swimming and less showers, we can go more than a month on our 300 L. And quite often we drink the water in the tanks. That would be less than 10 L per day, divided by two persons.

Good luck :)

Last year we did a passage from Bermuda to the Azores. We have a 130 gallons of water in two tanks and carried 40 gal extra extra in jerry jugs because we were concerned about our endurance with 4 crew on board. Overall we used around 100 gal on an 2 week passage.

When we leave port we switch as much as we can to salt water (flushing the heads and washing up). We also turn off the fresh water pressure pump and use a fresh water foot pump in the galley or the hand pump in the head. We do not shower regularly but use water in the basin. For personal hygiene we also use baby wipes to supplement between washes with water. We had a fair amount of other liquids (pop and juice) for drinking so we did not need as much water.

Monitor your water supply enroute and as you get closer to your destination you will probably have some extra water than you need and you can treat your self to a shower.

I like to have a few of jerry cans of water that I put off using as long as possible. Leave enough air in them so that they can float. Keep a tether on them and they make a good emergency water supply for your life raft.

Good luck with your passage. We hope to be doing the same passage in 2 or 3 years after we leave Europe.

Lyndon

When my former girlfriend (current wife) and me went round with a 21 feet boat, fresh water (and anything else, actually) were at a premium. We managed to do everything with about 7 liters per day + drinking water.
All dishes were on salt water only, and showers were on salt water too with a last second rinsing with fresh water (one liter is more than enough to remove almost all the salt... make one and a half with your long hair).
Don't despair, there is ample rooom for improving ;-)

Crossing the Atlantic (ARC) we use 1000L during 20 days with a group of 8. Dishes done with saltwater, daily swers as well - freshwatr shower only every 3rd day. So honestly Alex is right. Cheers Markus

You can buy special soap that can be used in the saltwater so you can shower with that.

Guys, build your own watermaker. It is absolutely simple. I built mine before we left and it works superbly without any bells or whistles. There is no need for electronics...only a simple diaghram pump, filters, pressure guage and a needle valve. Get on ebay, there is a guy selling plans for building your own watermaker, and it works. I think I paid about $1500 for everything and I was able to keep our 300 gallon water tank full all the time and we took hot showers everyday cross the pacific. It makes all the difference in the world in your enjoyment level. There is absolutely no excuse for rationing water when the solution is so simple and affordable.

I highly recommend that you join Behan's "Raft-Up" which is a small group of fellow women sailors who answer any and all questions you may have.

http://sv-totem.blogspot.com.au/

According to my current favorite author Nigel Calder - standard is 1.5 gal/person/day - and he has a lot of experience

I dislike sleeping salty. But a sponge bath uses much less water than a shower. A couple of changes of water in a dishpan will only cost a couple of gallons per person.

We lived aboard with 3 children (under 10) and our 1000 litres would last 4 weeks, which is just over 7 litres per day). We always had a quick shower each every day, and washed the dishes usually only once a day, in fresh water, with maybe a pre-rinse sometimes in salt. We also carried 4 x 20 litre containers in the cockpit (a catamaran) to collect rain, tank, well or river water to wash clothes, rinse feet etc. 10 litres a day each should be plenty.

The thing with making water that most cruisers realize a year into a jouney is that you want the largest watermaker you can power. In general, you want to make as much water as fast as you can. We would typically spend 6 hours while motoring during a crossing to fill our 1000 liters of tankage. When our water tanks were empty, we knew it was time to pull anchor and head to the next island.

Here's a beauty tip for the skin to try if you decide to only have salt water showers on long offshore passages.

Skin can become quite sore and sometimes raw over time, but Sudocrem, which is actually for nappy rash, can work wonders.

Cruised 6 years, primarily in the Sea of Cortez (hot in the summer). Averaged 7 gallons a day for two of us. Big thing is to use a SunShower -- 4 gallons would give each of us a decent shower every other day. Use a small plant watering can to rinse dishes (I used fresh both for wash and rinse). While we paid attention to not wasting water, we never felt like we were just making do.

Yes SunShower is a great thing, we bought one ages ago and used it occasionally on our previous boat so it must be somewhere around here..