How do you do laundry on the boat?

While I'm here alone I've been keeping myself busy with daily chores since even simple chores take a long time on the boat.  Take laundry for instance.  The yard we are at doesn't have laundry and while I could go to a laundromat or my friend Ginette's house I have been doing it on the boat.  I figure it is good practice for the Bahamas where we could be away from civilization for fairly long stretches. Since I don't have anything really exciting to blog about right now I thought I would show you how I do it - maybe this will help some other future cruisers.

Although we have a water heater it is fairly small so I like to supplement using solar showers.  Down here in the Keys a good one can get the water really hot by mid-afternoon.  This is the one I use (as recommended by Carolyn from theboatgalley.com - a great resource for cruisers):

Advance Elements 5 gallon solar shower. $30 US on Amazon

I put my clothes in a bucket with warm water from the shower and a pinch of oxyclean.  That sits overnight until I'm ready to wash in the morning.  The overnight soak is needed because the water isn't warm in the afternoon but by then there is no time to line dry.  In the morning I agitate the clothes using a fancy laundry plunger:

EasyGo Washing Wand. $19 US on Amazon

I was skeptical that this hand method would actually get the clothes clean but it is amazing how much dirt comes out of the fabric:

After washing clothes I didn't think were that dirty.  Gross, right?

Next step is to rinse in fresh water.  I use the washing wand again to get the clean water through the clothes.  After that is wringing and hanging the clothes out. It would be helpful to have something to wring the laundry as doing it by hand isn't very effective.  I'm thinking about making something like this to help push the water out:

Thanks, Pinterest

Line drying.  In a busy marina you have to be
OK with everyone seeing your underwear

The only thing I'll change when we get to the Bahamas is that I'll use seawater for the wash as water is a precious and costly resource in the Exumas.