The Out-Island Handbook
A small Bahamian survival book
The supply boat comes when it comes. This book covers the everyday things an out-island household runs through, and what the islands themselves can supply in their place. Every item has a short parts list and numbered steps you can follow with hand tools.
$5.99$8.99Launch price
On sale soon
Digital download (PDF). Read it on a phone, tablet or computer, or print it on US Letter paper.
What's inside
- SoapCoconut oil and wood-ash lye make a soap that lathers even in salt water.
- Rope and twineSisal for strength, coconut husk for anything left in salt water.
- Plait and thatchPalm leaf for hats, baskets, mats and a roof that sheds rain.
- Cooking fuelSeasoned firewood and pit-burned charcoal, and the two trees never to burn.
- Lime, plaster and tabbyBurned shell becomes mortar, plaster and whitewash.
- FertilizerSeaweed, fish scraps, compost and pothole planting in limestone.
- Washing and cleaningSalt water, sun, sand and vinegar in place of bottled cleaners.
- LightA coconut-oil lamp from a jar, a rag wick and a foot of wire.
- Partial substitutesFive stand-ins that work day to day, and where each one stops working.
- Bottom careDrying a catamaran out on a sandbar to scrub the hulls.
- Seven shared techniquesAsh lye, coconut oil, retting fiber, reverse-twist rope, charcoal pit, lime kiln, vinegar.
- The stockpileA checklist of what nothing on the islands replaces.
Read this before you buy
- Three of these jobs can hurt you badly. Lye burns skin and eyes, quicklime boils when it meets water, and kilns and charcoal pits burn for a day or more. The book opens with the safety rules. Read them first.
- The measures are starting points. They are worked out from general practice, not laboratory-tested recipes. Make a small trial batch of everything and adjust.
- It does not replace a doctor, a dentist, antibiotics or epoxy. Those are on the stockpile list for a reason.
Who is Walt Mercer?
Walt is the narrator of the Make-Do Handbooks and the face of @makedowithwalt. He is an AI-generated character, created to teach these skills in a plain, patient voice. The handbooks are researched, written and published by Make-Do Handbooks.