Newly Salted

Hafskip at 12 months

2011-09-30T14:30:00.000-07:00

Ralph and Penny have been cruising for 12 months on Hafskip, a 43ft John Pugh Windsong hailing from Melbourne Australia.You can learn more about them, and see pictures of their vessel, on their site. Here is their self-interview:

Background and contact information
We have been water based for just on 12 months now...having given up land, full time employment and decent closet space for the challenges, excitement and joy of our vessel. In this short time we've been incredibly blessed with an amazing array of experiences that just can't be imagined if we'd chosen to set off with a backpack rather than a set of sails.

Ralph as Capt'n, has had a great deal of sailing experience and an incredibly handy background in motor mechanics and marine electronic systems (maybe one day he'll also learn to fish). I (Penny) on the other hand had never been on a yacht until the search for Hafskip commenced so has been on a rapid learning curve (unfortunately Human Resource Management consulting does not adequately prepare one for the cruising life).

Whilst we've been on board and bobbing around for just over a year, we didn't leave Australia until November 2010 as it took us a couple of months to get things moving as they should. You see Hafskip had been let lie on a mooring for nearly 18 months with only sporadic use, so we had a lot of work to do. She was also more of a coastal play thing rather than a blue water cruiser so there were changes to be made... some of which we are still chipping away at.

What general route did you take on your cruise:
Left Townsville Australia for PNG, skirted the PNG mainland, then headed east ,south of New Britain and then north via Rabaul, New Ireland via Kavieng to Chuuk (FSM). Island hopped westward to Yap then zipped down to Palau where we are currently anchored. We had planned to wait out the typhoon season in Palau before heading to the Philippines and then Indonesia, but now be heading back to PNG then on to the Solomon Islands to take up a volunteer assignment...gotta love being flexible.

What are some of your favourite pieces of gear on your boat and why?
Given we hand steered about 4,500 nautical miles after leaving Australia, we're unanimous in our joy at the acquisition of an autopilot! Every one of those miles spent doing 2 hour shifts, nursing callouses, sleep deprivation and back aches has made the purchase of an autopilot a cause for celebration.
Our Radar has also been pretty damn useful, not only has it meant we've been able to dodge canoes approaching an anchorage at night, but we've been able to monitor the speed and direction of squalls as they approach. You're only watching he rain associated with them of course but knowing how fast they're travelling greatly assists a decision to either heave to, divert or keep on moving.

Hafskip's Deck cover is also a favourite, as adequate protection from the elements has been a godsend. It's hard to imagine when day-sailing around your home turf that the sun, wind and rain can be so harsh, but when one is slowly boiling and burning in the middle of the Pacific without a lick of wind (often for days at a time) or alternatively being stabbed with pre-squall rain you realise weather protection is critical.

Probably our last piece of gear we wouldn't like to do without is our Pactor modem/HF Radio combo. With it we have been able to stay connected with friends, family and other sailors on passage and get weather information specific to our location. Whilst grib files are more affectionately known as 'fib' files they still give a good weather overview and they certainly help establish a weather pattern that is more often than not correct.

What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?
In terms of gear... we've tended to acquire stuff rather than jettison it, but you have to remember we were under-equipped in the first place. Contrary to even our own initial thoughts we have used pretty close to every piece of gear, every spare, every tool we brought along with us...and when we haven't used it we've found someone else who can.

The problem then arises as to how to store all this useful, vital stuff and that's where we've had to either prioritise or become creative with what and how we carry stuff. We have either given away, traded or vacuum packed clothes we don't wear. We have loaded videos and books on hard drives and kindle. We have almost used every nook and cranny below deck we can and despite this we are still picking up new and useful bits!

Is there a place you visited where you wish you could have stayed longer?
Our passage through the Federated States of Micronesia to Palau meant we were often in the company of some incredible people and remarkable beauty. We would happily have missed our visit to Chuuk State but as soon as we left it we were overawed by the kindness and generosity of the people we encountered in the neighbouring State of Yap. Unfortunately we were cruising through this region a little late in the season (we were there in April and Typhoon season starts in May) so we felt the need to press on a little and return to lower latitudes. I we could've we would've stayed longer at every stop we made!

Another amazing place was Gasmata in New Britain PNG.... Incredible people and stunning place...
There are a few blog entries on our website that cover these places and the rationale behind our decision to up anchor and leave when we did....so feel free to have a read if you're interested.

How often have you faced bad weather in your cruising? How bad?
We have travelled out of season a lot and mostly through the ITCZ (Doldrums) so aside from a couple of passages we have not had consistent trade winds. This means squalls are the norm for us, in fact we have been known to chase them just to get a little extra propulsion....but this doesn't answer the question.

Just to preface our response... the notion of 'bad weather' is directly related to one's ability to handle it. On our initial passages (bearing in mind I'd never sailed before) I (as the novice sailor) found bad weather to be any gust of wind over 25 knots, simply because I did not know how to handle it...now the same bluster simply requires vigilance and brings a smile to my face.

There is no doubt that sailing in the tropics will bring with it daily squalls. Wind gusts can easily reach 35 knots in a matter of moments and the accompanying rain can make your life pretty miserable for a while, but at least they do not usually last for long. Whilst a squall tends to hit you...a weather system is a little easier to avoid (sometimes) and we have been known to simply heave-to while waiting for a system to pass, divert or duck under it before it develops fully, but these are decisions and exercising the options available can control your experience of the weather.

Somehow I feel compelled to add here that in our experience so far, bad weather (in whatever manner you define it) is always a factor and it is rare that in a passage of 5 days or more to avoid it....How bad it has been however, depended on how well we have known our boat and how we managed the risks associated with it. These days, with the application of common sense 'bad weather' is simply a matter of sailing....some days more comfortable than others.

What mistakes did you make in your first year of cruising?
Thousands and still running a tab!

A couple of big ones though are related to our preparation for departure. Our shakedown in particular was not adequate for our purpose. A good shakedown requires days of open sea travel and a return to port to make the necessary repairs/alterations. We, on the other hand, simply did a couple of day sails and took off across the coral sea, which has meant all of the changes to Hafskip we've needed to make have been made in places that are poorly equipped and meant we have had to either be rather innovative in obtaining spare parts or have them shipped in (very inconvenient). We have also learned that a steel boat is an excellent choice for a first boat but it requires a very good paint job to cope with the demands of extended voyages...unfortunately because we took short cuts to get moving quickly it means we will have to haul out sooner rather than later...possibly even 12 months earlier than we'd intended.

Live and learn eh....This first year has been nothing short of an enormous learning curve but some of the things we've learned would have been moot in the early days as we had little concept of their importance. Sometimes you just have to go do it to know.

What is the most difficult aspect of the cruising lifestyle?
Dealing with mess, mould and maintenance can put a dampener on a good time but when you think about it it differs little from owning your own home (perhaps minus the mould).

People tend to assume cruising is one big holiday, but there's a lot of work to be done on a boat (any boat) and “another port, another part” has been our standard cry. Initially we found this a little disappointing but over time we learned everyone has repairs and maintenance to do...no matter how old, young or spiffy the boat was!

Dealing with personal challenges also rates here...one is continuously problem solving and there's always decisions to be made. Be it about an approaching weather system, an anchorage, the next port of call given prevailing winds, a part that can't be obtained or even where to put some newly acquired piece of equipment. There have been times when we'd have liked it to be easier and even had the odd throw-down, but we learned over time to simply 'get on with it' and take time to enjoy the good stuff when it arrives (of which there is plenty).

How do you learn about the rules and regulations of your next port of call before arriving or do you just arrive and find out?
This is a must do...research is vital...cruising guides, pilots, other cruisers and internet are all useful of course, but we have found blogs to be awesome when looking for the really useful goss. Blogs provide info about most technicalities for any port of call or passage you could imagine, and can provide an indication of costs/fees/bribes you are likely to incur or even the names of officials your likely to be paying them to. In short, to simply arrive would be a mammoth mistake.

It's not just the rules and regulations that require research either.... language and cultural distinctions, weather windows, seasonal variations, tide tables, alternate charts...and the list goes on. All of these mean that you're not only prepared for your arrival at a next port of call but you're prepared for most things you're likely to encounter after you check in.... even where to find your first, well deserved, land based beer.

It all sounds like an enormous chore but actually this is something we enjoy doing and keeps us amused during our passages. We often spend hours reading about secluded anchorages or simply learning more about the people and culture we're about to encounter.

What is a tip or a trick you have picked up along the way?
We sail to windward quite nicely but when we began to travel west along the equator we began to sail downwind, often in light winds. We have a whisker pole but it's use made for risky sailing in areas where squalls tend to make a sudden appearance. Our problem has since been rectified with a brilliant tip from a seasoned sailing couple on the yacht Asylum. Katie and Jim shared with us their 'pole thing' which involves the use of a good snatch block and pole positioning guys that enable the genoa to be reefed quickly without having to haul in the pole....absolutely awesome!

Aside from 'The Pole Thing' most of the tips and tricks we've learned have been behavioural. Probably the most useful relates to 'letting go'. Sometimes you have to relinquish control and simply wait for a more opportune moment to continue on. Unfortunately the sea doesn't always understand your schedule or your desire to make a repair in 3 metre swell, so there are times when doing nothing at all is the only choice you have.

In your own experience and your experience meeting cruising couples, can you convince a reluctant partner to go cruising and if so, how?
The decision to swap your land life for sea legs is not a small one and to be honest most of the other couples we met had made a joint decision. Whilst there may have been one partner with more experience than the other and perhaps a greater desire, the actual move onboard was one made as a couple so we haven't met anyone that required convincing.

As a result of different peoples experience and preferences we've noticed many different divisions of labour....ranging from partners that claim they sail single handedly with their significant other, to those that divide their new life straight down the middle. In our case I (Penny) didn't need convincing but I did need a little time to become useful. Luckily I had a good and patient teacher, although it should be said that the ability to remain patient in high risk situations is not everyone's forte and can be the cause of dispute. In our case we took a large gamble by departing with such limited experience, which in our case paid off but it's not necessarily something I'd recommend.

In short... in short I am sure it is possible to convince a partner to hit the waves but I would recommend that you don't. It needs to be a joint decision made consciously, with both participants in the journey happy and excited to be commencing it.

How would you recommend that someone prepares to cruise?
Unlike us I'd recommend a lot more time sailing in different weather conditions. I'd also recommend doing courses and cruising where possible on other boats, preferably before purchasing your own. If these activities are not possible or desirable, the next best thing would be to research til you drop. We read books, blogs, manuals, guides...in fact anything we could get our hands on and we scanned, burned and made notes on every topic we could imagine, from anchor winches to zodiac liferafts. We also spoke, emailed and posed questions in forums when our research came up short. All of these activities not only helped our preparation but have continued to assist us as we've cruised.

Mental preparation is perhaps a little harder. In our situation we found we simply had to learn flexibility and resilience as we went. Luckily we were reasonably well versed in such things otherwise we may well have thrown in the towel a lot earlier. As it stands now, we fully understand what a passage will bring... a lot of sunshine, a little sweat, maybe a few frustrated tears, a few nasty squalls, an inevitable malfunction of something and some tricky solving of aforementioned malfunction. That said, there will also be some days of 15-20 knots of constant wind filling the sails, crystal clear blue water, the odd dolphin playing at the bow, the occasional sporting tuna wrestled onboard, a few awesome full moon sailing nights, loads of amazing sunrises (often better than a sunset) and the most incredible feeling of achievement and satisfaction when you finally reach your next port of call.

Silas Crosby at 12 months

2011-08-09T21:40:00.000-07:00

My name is Meredith Lewis and I am from Vancouver Island, Canada. I started sailing as a little kid when two of my Uncles built a 36 foot Brent Swain steel boat, the Silas Crosby. I spent most of my summers with one family or the other cruising up and down the BC coast. In 2003 I joined Steve at the end of his family's year long cruise to Mexico/Hawaii for the Hawaii-Victoria leg. I was sixteen and it was a great introduction to offshore sailing. In September 2010 Steve and I left Vancouver Island aboard the Silas Crosby bound for Chile. After stops in Mexico, Galapagos and Easter Island we arrived In Chile in April. The upcoming southern summer will be spent cruising in Patagonia. My website is www.meredithlewis.net.

Describe a "typical day" at anchor on your boat

For lots of reasons, cost among them, we try to anchor whenever possible. In the nine months between Vancouver Island and Chile we spent less than two weeks tied up to a dock (the police dock in San Diego was the notable exception). One of the other major reasons is that we way prefer places where there are no docks - the more remote the better. In order to make this kind of lifestyle interesting/bearable, however, we have made sure that exploration off the boat is easy, possible and fun. We have two fourteen foot kayaks on board and gear for paddling in any kind of weather. Paddling allows us to explore places hard or impossible to get to by sailboat and allows us to get some of the exercise seriously lacking in a liveaboard lifestyle. It also allows us to be completely independent - if we had to coordinate dinghy rides constantly I'm not sure how long we would last. I know that Steve was worried at first about having the boats on deck in rough weather, but after three offshore passages the conclusion is that things seem fine.

Describe a "typical day" on passage on your boat

While on passage we both spend lots of time reading. We both have Kindles and lots of digital books. Steve spends lots of time chatting on the radio (I chat when we set up scheds with boats we know - nets, not so much). I am learning to knit (although I spend more time thinking about knitting than actually knitting). Also, hours and hours are spent just sitting on deck and looking around. There is an amazing freedom to the singularity of the project of passage making; unlike most of life, which can be complicated and confusing, the project of sailing from point A to point B has a marvelous simplicity.

What type of watch schedule do you normally use while offshore?
From chats with other passage-making cruisers, I think that our passage routine is a little bit unusual. In the interest of being able to sleep for longer, we choose to stand six hour watches. We break the night into two - Steve stays up to talk on the radio for the evening and early night and wakes me up in the wee wee hours. I stay up until sun rise and then go back to sleep until noon. We are very relaxed about the schedule and things obviously change based on weather conditions. When on watch we do mostly all of the sail changes etc. alone. We have found that few things actually require two people and can usually wait until daylight/watch change.

Tell me your favorite thing about your boat
To be clear, it's not my boat. However, after my time aboard, I know it pretty well. It's hard, because I think my favourite thing about the boat might also be the thing that most commonly frustrates me. The boat is homemade and was built with function, not fashion, in mind. To this end, it works incredibly well - every system has been thought through and most are in their third or fourth reincarnations. Steve knows the boat inside out and is always looking for ways to improve things. However, it is not a luxury yacht - the center cockpit is small and very secure but not very comfortable. It is perfect for one or two people to sit in while sailing but gets really crowded when we try to socialise. The same goes for the main cabin. However, I wouldn't change this for the world - it speaks, I think, to one of the most important things to think about when considering a boat for cruising: what kind of cruising exactly are you going to be doing? The Silas Crosby is decidedly NOT a tropical destination, social drinks for all kind of boat. However, with the diesel heater, secure cabin and cockpit and pilot house/dodger combo it is perfect for the high latitude sailing that it mostly does.

How often have you faced bad weather in your cruising? How bad?

We faced our worst weather in the last couple of weeks before arriving in Chile (at about 40 degrees south). Steve generally thinks that I am overly nonchalant about these situations but it's because I have total faith in the boat and the work and thought Steve has put into it over the years. From our few heavy weather moments, I have learned that it's rarely a mistake to have less sail and if the thought "perhaps we should chuck out that drogue" comes up, it's probably time for the drogue. We put out the jordan series drogue twice coming into Chile and it was really cool to see how well it worked. Another thing that we discuss a lot on board is how hyped offshore heavy weather gets - to be sure, it can be really challenging and definitely dangerous. However, if the boat is prepared and all of the sail combos/heavy weather gear has been thought through and nothing breaks, the boat will be able to handle it. It's all of the hard bits (ie. navigating near land) that is the really challenging part of sailing.

What is your most common sail combination on passage?

Our sail combos while offshore are almost totally dictated by the ability of the windvane to steer. Therefore, while sometimes we may be able to squeeze another half knot or knot out of the conditions, if the windvane is overpowered and can't steer, we're happy to reduce sail and go a bit slower in order to not hand steer. Therefore, we almost always have at least one reef in the main and more sail up forward. We are almost constantly reefing - both the roller furler head sail and the main (it has three reefing lines). Some squally watches I think I have reefed/unreefed ten times. Another sail combo that we use to exhaustion whenever the wind is even remotely behind us is wing on wing with the headsail poled out. The whisker pole is unbelievable important, as far as we are concerned, and we are generally surprised by how few people have them/know how to use them. The boat seems to calm right down and great naps/book reads can be had.

What do you miss about living on land?

Life on board lacks almost all of the convenience of life on land. Everything requires effort and thought - grocery shopping almost always takes an entire day and requires lots of walking with a heavy pack and laundry either costs or takes a long time. I don't miss the convenience, but sometimes I miss the independence of living normally. Not many other twenty five year olds choose to live on a small sailboat with their uncle for a couple of years. I definitely miss being part of a fixed community (remember running into people you know on the street? I don't) but that said the cruising community goes a long way to make up for that. I also miss regular, land based exercise. When at anchor, it requires serious motivation to paddle ashore and go for a run. Things were awesome in Mexico when I could just jump overboard and swim for an hour.

What is something about the cruising culture you like and what is something you dislike?

Generally, I like the cruising community for the fact that everyone has opted for a life less normal. However, I was surprised and a bit disappointed by how hard so many people seem to try to make their cruising lives more closely resemble the lives they lived on land. It's hard to explain, but a few hours at the La Paz morning coffee hour will more than explain my point; so many people seem to spend so much time trying to make their lives on board easier rather than more interesting. Hours are spent trying to fix broken, superfluous systems rather than choosing the simple option and actually getting out to all the amazing anchorages a day's sail away.

I was also surprised/disappointed by how few cruisers are seriously into sailing. It might sound funny, but it's overwhelmingly true. We are by no means purists - we have an engine and it lets us get places that would be seriously hard/impossible to get to by sail alone. However, sailing is always the background project. We will wait days for wind to avoid motoring and are always pumped by perfect downwind conditions (does it get any better?).

I kind of knew this before hand, but apart from a few notable exceptions, there are relatively few young people out there sailing. Obviously, it's an expensive project and not many can get the funds together to make it happen on their own. Without a doubt, if I see a boat with anyone under thirty five on board I'm bound to be knocking on the hull before too long.

All of this said, what an amazing community - friends are made fast and everyone has interesting stories to share.

What do you think is a common cruising myth?

I think that it's important to acknowledge that cruising is pretty just like normal life; it's not always fun. We have met lots of people that seem to be waiting for the real fun to start - always looking into the future to the next destination for the moment when they will be stretched out on deck in a bikini with a margarita in hand watching the sunset. This is possible, don't get me wrong. However, with such fixed ideas of what success or fun looks like, it is too easy to be disappointed. Those who seem to be having the best time are up for anything and recount with relish the rainy, cold, windy moments just as readily as the sunny, margarita bikini moments.

What do you find most exciting about your cruising life?

Every landfall after being offshore is absolutely exciting (even if I pretend to be really nonchalant). There is something about gliding into a new harbour and dropping the anchor thousands of miles away from the last place it was dropped that is seriously cool.

Eagle at 3 months

2011-07-29T15:49:00.000-07:00

Tom Brown and Jeanne Walker sail aboard SV Eagle, a 36' Freeport Islander. You can follow their journey on their blog.

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We met in 2003 and our third date was on Eagle, Tom's first time on a sailboat. We were married in 2005 and the plan to sail away began to take shape shortly there after. We already had a great boat, a Bob Perry designed Freeport Islander. She is a modified full keel sloop, with a set of three large window down each side of the main salon. She is incredibly comfortable to sail, as well as a roomy live aboard boat. After an intensive complete re-fit of the entire boat, we sailed away from the dock, full time on April 19^th, from Des Moines Washington.

What are your plans now?

Our first 90 days were spent doing a tour of the Canadian Gulf islands and Desolation Sound. Now we're back in the San Juan Islands, getting ready to head down the Pacific Coast in September on our way to Mexico.

Is there some place that you wish you could have stayed longer?

The farthest north we got was a place just above the Desolation Sound area called The Octopus Islands. We were able to take a stern tie back in a small cove in the north east corner that was just magical. Most of our travels were so early in the spring, that the weather was pretty miserable, and when we got to Octopus Islands, the sun came out and it was beautiful. There were some nice hikes, we caught fresh prawns and ling cod for dinner. Unfortunately, our water supply was running low, and there was a nasty red algae bloom in the water that prevented us from using our water maker. So we had to leave sooner than we had wanted.

What do you enjoy about cruising that you did not expect?

After a lot of years working in the corporate world, and noise and stress of the city, we have been awed by the pure quiet. Sitting in remote anchorages, the loudest thing being a song sparrow or a loon calling. Even the occasional air plane or other boat motoring by has seemed like a violation of our 'ear' space. In all our dreaming, that part never really occurred to us. Along with the silence, the clarity of the sky and the scenery. We've been so far away from even small towns that there has been relatively no smog, pollution or trash. It's nice to see a beach as it was long, long ago. The sky's are brilliant blue, the trees, deep green, the stars...well, there are stars!

Is there something from your land life that you brought with you that you feel silly about now?

Tom: I spent several years as a PGA Golf pro, and have my entire set of golf club, and two pair of shoes along. I gave up some valuable hanging locker space to have them along, and now am really considering it a bit silly. I guess time will tell on that one huh?

Jeanne : I've always wanted to try my hand at watercolor. I've got a drawer full of supplies. I've also been reading on the techniques and steps involved. I'm not sure that we have the space on board for me to start a project. Perhaps when we're in a warmer climate, I'll pull out the colors!

Is there something from your land life that you brought along that you are especially glad to have along?

Jeanne: My cookbooks, good knives, pans and utensils. After 10 years of living aboard, it was all here anyway, - I've moved many of my cookbooks to a box in an attic!

Tom: Given the amount of photography work we do, the only thing I can think of is our cameras.

Share a piece of cruising etiquette.

Every one talks about other boats anchoring too close, and that has been a problem a couple of times, but my pet peeve right now is the speed which some people run their dinghy’s around the anchorages. Even when there is no posted speed limit or “No Wake” zone, a small amount of common courtesy would go along way when you need to go from point “A” to point “B” and my boat is on that direct line. I feel that if you need to run your dinghy right next to my boat at the highest possible speed, there better be a medical emergency.

How did you (or did you?) gain off shore experience?

Jeanne: I was a participant in the 1994 Pacific Cup race from San Francisco to Hawaii on the first all women team. I also was part of the delivery crew returning a sailboat from Hawaii after it completed the Vic-Maui race, and a delivery up the Pacific Coast. I've been boating since I was a baby, and sailing since about twelve.

Tom: I had never even been on a sailboat prior to meeting Jeanne, and have yet to really have any offshore experience. I've been off shore in fishing boats, and helped deliver a large power boat to Seattle, but no real off shore sailboat experience. It was a steep learning curve, but some great coaching from Jeanne, and some local racing around the Puget Sound have helped a lot.

What would you recommend to someone preparing to cruise?

One of the things we are truly happy about, is that we had lived aboard for a while prior to starting this adventure. You might be cooped up for several days if the weather turns bad or you have a long crossing. You will be spending a lot of time with the other person on the boat, in a smaller space than usual if you have been living in a house or apartment. We encountered several straight days of rain when we took off to Canada and were glad we had something of a routine down for the close quarters living. Bad weather only intensifies this, so it is best to have gotten used to sharing these cramped quarters at a time when it is not forced upon you. The other thing would be to make sure that you have things to do together, and things that you can do apart. Hobbies or other interests, that can be done apart will make your time together way more enjoyable.

Make sure your communication with each other is good. Be able to say, “ I need some space”, or alone time, and don't take it personally when it's said to you.

Get into the habit of putting things away after you've used them or removed them from a locker, and back to the place it came from. It's amazing how fast an 'explosion' of clutter can happen!

Your routine 'systems' make everything run smoothly – like how you tie up your lines, and sheets, stow things in a locker, or turn off systems at the end of a passage. If your system works, for you, do them the same way, every time.

What did you do to make your dream a reality?

Jeanne: For many years, 30 +, I've dreamed about living on a sailboat and traveling. For many years I lived in small apartments, or rooms, and didn't gather or collect 'stuff'. I read most of the cruisers stories. If there was some 'change' I could make while on land, that they did while cruising, I did it to make the transition to a boat easier.

The reality came in steps. First, I purchased a boat on which I could live and sail locally. That was good. Then, I found the best partner/mate – Tom, and together we revived the 'sailing off' part. Next, plan it: We budgeted what we wanted to leave with in our cruising kitty, how soon we could pay off the boat, the projects we wanted to do to the boat, courses to take, etc.,and how much time it would take us to reach those goals on our current incomes. Once we figured that and set a date we were very particular about any expenses not related to our goal. Being realistic about our incomes, expenses, the projects and a good balance of work and play got us here. The closer we got to our departure date, the more intense the work became, knowing the 'play' would get balanced out once we left.

What else did you do beside sail?

We both enjoy photography, exploring by dinghy, foot and sometimes bicycle when in an anchorage. Tom likes to fish, enjoys messing around with the SSB, and writing stories for our blog. Jeanne likes to cook, do an occasional sewing project, and writes stories about our adventure for our niece and nephews. We're both voracious readers and often flip a coin for time in the hammock.

Class of 2011

2011-07-01T01:00:00.000-07:00

Three Sheets NW is doing a series on cruisers casting off the docklines from the Pacific Northwest in 2011. The first two interviews are already published and you can keep track of the series here.

Estrellita 5.10b at 12 months

2011-06-25T16:20:00.000-07:00

Livia and Carol began cruising in 2010 and have spent the last year exploring British Columbia in their Wauquiez Pretorien 35. They leave this August for California, then Mexico and beyond.

Read this interview as originally posted on The Giddyup Plan.
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What do you love about cruising?

Carol: The sense of adventure.

Livia: I love that I spend most of my days in nature. I used to camp or hike to be near nature but, at least in the regions we have been traveling in, I am in nature rather than towns most of the time. There is something calming and centering about being in the wild.

What do you dislike about cruising?

Carol: Having no control over mother nature and not being fast enough to divert somewhere else to avoid incoming weather.

Livia: When the weather is crappy, our options for fun are limited compared to the options we had when living in a city. I no longer feel cramped in the space we have except when it is very cold and/or rainy. It's like camping in the rain except of course we have DVDs and popcorn.

Being alone in an anchorage too often. We dreamed of that kind of solitude, and we still look forward to it, but after so many days of solitude we start craving people. A boat finally comes in and we have the binoculars out trying to see if they might be new friend material. I call it the ?misanthrope wannabe syndrome?.

What do you worry about?

Carol: The boat or gear breaking. Anything necessary breaking at a bad time ? something like the heat exchanger in the engine, the head, our heater ? things that if they break we need to alter our plans to fix so our life isn't miserable.

Livia: I worry some about money in the future. I worry about hitting debris in the ocean like containers from ships. I worry that the demands of this lifestyle will overwhelm the fun factor. I worry about what we'll do if we don't love the tropical portions of our travels.

What are you looking forward to?

Carol: Warm places, sandy beaches, morning swim.

Livia: Jumping off of the boat into warm water after coffee and before breakfast. Snorkeling.

Favorite place recently was

Carol: Hecate Strait ? the wildlife surrounding us that we could see and the sense of adventure of a multi-day passage.

Livia: We just spent a few hours soaking in the pools at Hot Springs Island in Gwaii Haanas Marine Park in the Haida Gwaii. That was fantastic.

Least favorite place recently was

Carol: Kostan Inlet ? nothing to look at, full of bugs, prisoner because of a bar at the entrance.

Livia: We haven't visited anywhere that I actively didn't like lately. A few places fell short of our expectations (Blind Channel Resort, Octopus Islands Marine Park) but they weren't bad.

A lesson learned is that

Carol: The sound of the wind in the rigging is scarier than it actually is.

Livia: If we are in light air and there is a swell running, we quickly learned to use our preventer on our boom on almost every point of sail, not just when reaching and running. It minimizes the popping of the sail.

Best gear award goes to...

Carol: Wallas. For keeping us warm and dry.

Livia: I have to say our solar panels. It is so amazing to have power silently charging our batteries all day. Our new clutch for the main halyard is also a big improvement.

Worst gear award goes to...

Carol: Wallas. For being a high maintenance heater.

Livia: Our Wallas diesel heater. Any unit that requires regular maintenance by a factory rep in order to run properly is bull in my opinion.

Newly Salted questions:

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?

Livia: At least in the areas that we've traveled, most of the horror stories we've heard about various Capes and various Straits seem to be from people who don't pay attention to the direction of the wind and the direction of the tide. If you align those two in your favor, and pick a wind strength you are comfortable with, the Capes and Straits in BC are lovely sailing, no sweat.

Carol: That there is no perfect boat. Who you are (do you *really* like to sail?) makes a difference in what boat is right for you. But even knowing yourself, nothing is clear. The same make/model of boat can be good or crap depending on the specifics (wiring, gear, etc) and there is no hard and fast rules about any of the specifics (how thick of fiberglass does a ?solid? boat have?).

As you started cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?

Livia: Once we were completely in charge of our own schedule, we had to find a balance between comfort and stability (staying in one anchorage for a bit) and novelty (moving frequently). We still often err on the side of novelty. A problem with erring on the side of novelty is that there are always times when we intended to stay a few days but were chased out by winds etc. If we are already exhausted and were counting on a few days of down time, a surprise move is exhaustion on top of exhaustion. We need to keep some emotional and physical reserves so the unexpected can still be fun rather than a slog.

Carol: Losing my identity, but I got over it pretty quickly. Not having a hamburger when I want one.

What mistakes did you make as you started cruising?

Livia: I felt tied to the boat. Last winter we should have moored the boat somewhere cheap and flown somewhere sunny and cheap. It would have cost the same as mooring in a city in BC and been a lot more pleasant. I try to think of us as vagabonds now, not cruisers, because I feel it leaves a lot more options open.

Carol: Rushing when it was not needed.

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you didn't find to be true?

Livia: Most of what I have read that I didn't find to be true were things that were specific to one region or one style of cruising or things that were outdated. Once you figure out which type of cruiser the advice giver is, or which region they have traveled in, their suggestions are often good information. It's usually the case that bad advice comes when the person giving it fails to realize that we aren't the same as them and/or aren't in the same place as them.

We've heard some odd things from individual boaters lately. I've been told that if we don't have netting on our lifelines we'll be swept overboard (um, jacklines much?). We've also had a number of people who seem to think we are too relaxed and that we need to be more afraid so they tell us all kinds of things we should be afraid of.

Carol: I didn't read much.

A lot of places are described as ?wow, yay, beautiful? but when you get there they aren't for you. If you are a certain kind of person you would love it, like if you like hiking the Gulf Islands are fantastic or the Haida Gwaii might be fantastic but if you don't like the grey you could end up feeling pretty lukewarm about the area because a rainy, grey anchorage is a rainy, grey anchorage.

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you found particularly accurate?

Livia: A number of long distance cruisers we met have emphasized the importance of people (cruisers and local residents) in their enjoyment of cruising. Although we are very social, we love the outdoors and solitude so much that I didn't take that advice to heart but I'm finding it very true. Also, being blown away by the generosity of people you meet ? that's something I glazed over but is striking to me now.

Carol: A lot of things I read were true but I expected them to be true ? like boats break and this isn't a problem free adventure. I had heard that cruising was hard on your body and I am surprised to find how true that is.

Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting out?

Livia: No. Many people start cruising by immediately heading to remote locations. We didn't and for that reason we saved half of our purchases and installs for our first year in order to get some experience before we made decisions. So, there isn't anything we wish we already have because we can still get anything we want. We are going to California next, not a remote island atoll, so we can still buy anything our heart desires.

Carol: No, it's the opposite in a way. The problem is that we cruised but we didn't go for Mexico and the S Pacific right away so it was easier to start with nothing and install as we go.

What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?

Livia: Carol's guitar? JUST JOKING. I probably wouldn't have purchased a navigation program and would use OpenCPN if I could do it all over. I don't have enough experience with OpenCPN (because we have a fancy program) to make a firm call on that though.

Carol: Nothing. Usually I make a list of what I need and install it right away, but with boats I did the opposite, worked with what we had and then figured out if we needed more or less based on experience rather than loading up with crap that we may not need. We use everything we have on the boat.

What are your plans now?

Livia: California this August-ish and then Mexico this Fall. After that, it could be West, or South, or East?just not North.

Carol: Continue. Continue until it's not fun or until I'm too scared.

What question do you wish I would have asked you besides the ones I've asked you and how would you answer it?

Livia: Please ask us a question in the comments of our blog. We love comments.

Sarabande at 30 months

2011-06-07T13:44:00.001-07:00

Alicia and Brian of SV Sarabande (Pearson 45) have been cruising since October 2008*. You can learn more about their travels on their website.

Q: What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?

A: We wish someone had just calmly sat us down and said, "Throw out all your preconceived notions about how you’re going to feel, where you’re going to go, and how long you’re going to take." There are going to be surprises and curveballs coming at you all along the way, and you’ll make the most of these if you stay loose. It's been a good philosophy for us to apply to life in general as well!

Q: As you started cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?

A: Spending 24 hours a day together takes it toll, and it took a while for us to figure out how to work “alone time” for each of us into the plan. So important! Also, coming from New York City, a place where, given the proper amount of effort, you can make a lot of things happen in a day, it was a little difficult to adjust to how much time it can take to accomplish things in other places.

Q: What mistakes did you make as you started cruising?

A: We provisioned as if preparing for the aftermath of WWIII, and didn’t know nearly enough about weather. Turns out people eat food all over the world, and the weather is the single most important variable in a sailor’s life! Cruising makes you interact with weather in such an intimate way. It teaches you to respect, and to pay attention to nature in a way that many people in affluent countries, who spend much of their day indoors, no longer need to do. So after years of living in the city at a dock, sort of oblivious to weather patterns, we made some weather-predicting blunders during our first year.

Q: What do you find the most exciting about your cruising life?

A: We love that this way of living is the antithesis to the modern trend of moving too fast and not paying attention to all the little details and small moments that make life richer. Our style may be simpler and slower than it once was, but we're much more relaxed and aware of simple pleasures than we were before we started. That's exciting, in a quiet way. You only get X amount of days in your life, after all, and we know we'll never regret the way we're spending these. We also love that there are so many beautiful places that can only be seen from the water, and we get to take our whole home with us when we visit them!

Q: What do you dislike about cruising that surprised you?

A: The holiday season just isn't the same. It's the time of year we miss our families the most, and feel nostalgic for cold weather. Then we remember what it's like to live aboard in a New York winter, and we feel better. Also, Alicia hates potlucks and it seems they are inescapable.

Q: What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you didn't find to be true?

A lot of the cruising literature that we read made cruisers, as a group, sound like some sort of utopian community, where everyone can be trusted and nothing bad ever happens. While it’s true most members of the cruising community are the nicest people you could ever hope to meet, a few of them are wolves in sheep’s clothing. We've learned to be friendly, but not relax our guard too quickly. Just like in any group of people, there are a few thieves and crooks looking to abuse the trust of others.

Q: What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you found particularly accurate?

A: That it takes about 6 months to a year after you’ve left to truly calm down from the pace of the rat race. I think we read that in Beth Leonard’s cruising handbook (which is excellent). Also, that it takes as much money as you have, meaning you don't have to be a trust fund baby or retired to sail off. There are lots of ways to make it work.

Q: Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting out?

A: Yes: a good RIB dinghy and reliable outboard! We left on our cruise with a very sub-par dinghy setup. When you live at the dock, it’s easy to overlook the importance of how you're going to get to shore when you're at anchor. But when you’re out cruising, your dinghy is so crucial! We now finally have a great RIB dinghy, an outboard engine that consistently works (knock wood), and a small rowing dinghy for those times that it doesn't, or those times where we simply feel like rowing. Also, solar panels. Our boat came with a wind generator, which has been great, but many times the wind completely dies. Likewise, people with only solar panels bemoan cloudy days, which are often windy. Diesel costs are higher than ever these days, not to mention you don't want to pollute, so definitely consider both wind AND solar power - they will pay for themselves quickly.

Q: What are your plans now? If they do not include cruising, tell us why

A: We plan to continue doing this until it's not fun anymore. Since we've had our baby boy, we're wondering how we'll feel when it comes almost time for him to go to school, but we have a few years to go before then, so we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. We'll know when it's time for us to stop.

Q: What question do you wish I would have asked you besides the ones I've asked you and how would you answer it?

A: Well, one question we have for the world in general is where are all the younger cruisers? Not that we don't love all the older friends that we've made, but the people we meet that are closer to our age (early thirties) are few and far between. We hear that this wasn't the case 30, 40 years ago, that there were lots of lots of young people cruising then. The same generation that was out cruising back then are the ones still out there doing it now! What's up with our age group? Where are they?!

*Editor’s Note: Through my error SV Sarabande was asked to give a Newly Salted interview rather than an IWAC interview.

Kaleo at 6 months

2011-05-11T11:18:00.000-07:00

Read this interview as originally published on s/v Kaleo.
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A quick background:

Matt was born in San Diego and spent his formative years feeding cattle and mucking stalls on the family farm in northern Idaho. After graduating college Matt migrated south to Dallas to start his career in advertising. Where as fate would have it, he met an explorer like himself and that’s where this story truly began.

Christie grew up in a small town near Houston, Texas where she discovered big dreams and a lot of spirit can take you pretty much anywhere. Following grad school, Christie immersed herself in exploring other cultures by traveling worldwide. After which she landed in Dallas to start her career in advertising. Where as fate would have it, she met an explorer like herself and that’s where this story truly began.

Along the way they fell in love with each other and with sailing through adventures aboard a little Fireball Skiff, a week aboard friends’ cruising boat in the Chesapeake, and as part of a racing team at a local lake. Soon thereafter they bought Kaleo, a 1984 Aloha 34, with a dream of cruising and were married 2009.

Early last November they took sabbaticals, cast off the dock lines and cruised down the Gulf Coast bound for somewhere warm and tropical.

Kaleo has since carried them across the Gulf Stream, throughout the Bahamas and as far south as the remote Jumentos islands. You can read more about their travels and contact them on their website.

What did you do to make your dream a reality?
We woke up and went for it. The fastest way to make any dream happen is to take action. So we started turning “what ifs” into “what’s next”. We made a plan, set dates, worked hard, made sacrifices and celebrated along the way.

Our advice for any dreamer (unless you’re independently wealthy) is to get your finances in order. Before we were married, we lived like most people, with some debt and no significant financial plan. Regardless of going sailing or not, neither of us were content with our financial situation. So, we changed that by following the financial principles laid out in the Bible which were made easier by using Crown Mvelopes Software. The biblical principles helped us pay off all debt, empowered us to be more generous with what He has provided and save enough to live this dream.

Why cruising now?
The notion of breaking free, living simply and exploring the world in our floating home captured our imaginations. Since we decided to go now, we haven’t had time to acquire much. In fact, that’s part of the point of this adventure, being liberated from stuff and free to enjoy experiences and life at a different pace.

What’s cruising been like for you so far?
Christie :
It’s humbling and exhilarating. Incredible and intense. Vivid and scary. It’s punctuated by exceptional highs and lows and all very real. It is not easy. And it is not for everyone, but we’re grateful to be experiencing it.

Matt:
I guess with a dream you tend to only envision the good parts. But cruising is just like living any lifestyle. There is a balance of good and bad. The boat doesn’t magically fix itself and the wind isn’t always blowing the direction you want. But the feeling of actually living something you’ve dreamed of makes the challenges worth it.

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?
That there will be days that your heart melts at how much you miss the presence of family and friends but that your heart will be equally filled with the joy of new experiences and connected with amazing people along your journeys that will touch your lives forever. Bonus is that Skype will bridge the miles to loved ones while you’re taking in these new adventures.

What do you miss about living on land?
- Family and friends
- Our home church
- Our own washer, dryer and dishwasher
- Instant connectivity
- Access to organic, fresh produce

Tell me your favorite thing about your boat?
Christie:
How we’ve made it our home. All the little modifications that make it as livable as it is functional. From adding a large double sink with modern home-like faucets in the galley and refinishing the head countertop with granite to resting more soundly on a custom v-berth mattress and sheets.

Matt:
Kaleo is very forgiving. From running aground to having up too much sail. No matter the situation she gets us through it despite our steep learning curve.

What are some of your favorite pieces of gear on your boat and why?
Christie:
- Bullet 2HP WiFi booster – Internet access on the boat when there are unlocked signals within about five miles
- Honda Generator Eu2000i – nearly as much shoreside power without having to be shoreside
- Cruise RO 20 GPH watermaker – more leisurely showers as often as we’d like, no worries when the tattletale water pump kicks on
- Lavac electric toilet – no looking, pumping or flipping a valve from wet to dry bowl. Just lowering the lid and pressing a button takes the guesswork and campingness out of going to the bathroom.
- Adventure Medical Marine 1000 Kit – the ideal cruisers’ first aid kit designed for short offshore adventures. Well stocked to tend to the crew if medical care is 12 – 24 hours away.

Matt:
- Autopilot – other than anchoring or docking, R2-D2 pretty much pilots us everywhere
- SSB receiver – thanks to this and Chris Parker, what to expect for weather is rarely a question
- Handheld VHF radio – in the cockpit, in the dinghy, on the bow or ashore, this is like a cruiser’s cell phone
- Forespar Dinghy Motor Crane – I can’t imagine having to lift the dinghy motor up on the rail each time without the help of this device
- Cruise RO 20 GPH watermaker – freedom from the dreaded blue jerry jugs

What are some little things that made a big difference in your cruising experience?
Albeit not critical gear for cruising, these are a few things that we didn’t know to bring when we tossed the docklines but got as we were underway.
- Waterproof backpack – great for packing a change of clothes or the laptop on a wet dinghy ride
- Platypus PlusBottle – great for toting water on the go. It clips on a backpack and rolls down when it’s empty
- Lookie Bucket – a clear bottom bucket used for checking the anchor or looking at reefs without getting wet
- Hawaiian sling – a slingshot type of device used for spearfishing
- Clear dome umbrella – an easy way to stay dry on a wet dinghy ride while still being able to see in front of you
- Jump drive – for sharing photos and other resources with fellow cruisers
- Carafe – makes serving chilled sangria, lemonade, wine, tea easy and pretty
- Smith Polarized Sunglasses – they look good and cut the glare on the water, making it easier to spot reefs and fish
- Canon Powershot D10 Waterproof Camera – known as the cruiser’s camera, it takes beautiful shots and stands up to the hard life of living in saltwater

What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?
Cape Horn Windvane – This is a superb piece of self-steering gear built for sailing around the world. Since we’re not crossing oceans during this cruising season, it’s underutilized and we could easily live without it.

How are you giving back to the communities you visit?
Kids have a big place in our heart. So, we’ve volunteered as tutors at a local all-age school and have taught kids’ church in the community. In addition, we connect with local churches to share resources that support children’s Christian growth. Our home church, Fellowship Church, donated DVD’s with lessons, songs, bible stories and kids’ gear for us to give out and so far they’ve been warmly received.

What are your plans now?
With hurricane season approaching, our route has taken us as far south as we will travel this season and we’ve now pointed the bow north. We plan to continue exploring the Bahamas until the end of May, then sail back across the Gulf Stream to Florida. But, we’re not ready to end our voyage just yet. From Florida, we’d like to sail up the east coast for a few months before stepping back into land life. And probably start planning our next cruise.

Illusion at 9 months

2011-03-16T15:24:00.000-07:00

Read this interview as originally published on Forest & Fin.

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Background:

Brian and I have been living aboard our 37′ Chris Craft sailboat,Illusion, since March 2009. Although we had originally planned to sail from Charleston, SC, to the Caribbean in November of that year, we realized (much to our dismay) that our boat was not ready to make the trip. After six weeks in the boat yard, during which point Brian rebuilt the engine and we performed projects such as replacing the mast step and keel bolts, we set sail from Hilton Head Island, SC, in May 2010 and headed north to Annapolis, MD. We spent three months there, living on the hook, working, and waiting out hurricane season. In November 2010, we departed from Annapolis, cruised south down the eastern seaboard to Miami, FL, and then across to the Bahamas.

1. Why did you decide to cruise?

Lara – When Brian came back to Charleston after crewing for a family crossing the Indian Ocean, I knew he was hooked on the idea of living and traveling on a sailboat. I had my reservations at first, but I joined him for a delivery of a catamaran from Spain to Greece in the Mediterranean – my first time sleeping on a boat smaller than a cruise ship and sailing around the clock for days. I wouldn’t say that the trip won me over, but after that, I knew I could hang. It was his dream from the beginning, but I have adapted remarkably well and grown to love it.

Brian – I traveled out of a backpack for three years after college, and during part of that time, I cruised on other peoples’ boats for transportation and adventure. I grew up sailing, but never liked racing. I’m basically just into interesting and challenging ways to get from Point A to Point B. If you wanted to bike across the country, kayak the ICW, or windsurf the Bahamas I would be just as into any of those — cruising just makes it all a little bit more comfortable and long term.

My first cruising experience was aboard Karaka. Tom Blancart, the captain, takes crew on as a shared expenses-type of arrangement. He’s an amazing guy, kind of like a social, modern version of Motissier. Anyone who is interested in cruising and wants to get the real experience I highly recommend a few months aboard Karaka. Check him out at http://karaka.voila.fr .

Some people like the sailing, some people like the islands, some people like the adventure, but I think we like the lifestyle the most. Working hard, being closer to nature, living day-to-day – it’s a good life, even if it’s not always easy.

2. In your first year of cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?

Lara – Downsizing was a huge deal for me, especially finding homes for all of my paintings and art supplies. Moving from our rented house in Charleston to the boat was difficult in terms of volume and sorting out what to bring with us, but moving out of my art studio later that year really hit me hard.

Brian – What comes to mind is the transition between moving and stopping — it’s something we battle with all the time. Once you stop somewhere for any length of time, getting moving again can be difficult. For us, there was also the transition between “Project Boat” and “Boat” — deciding when it was ok to start moving or whether the boat was safe/equipped to do any sort of cruising or whether or not we were being overly cautious. I think we ended up somewhere in the middle, we definitely started cruising on a work-in-progress, Illusion is farther along than a lot of projects but not as “complete” as a lot of other boats out there cruising. For us, we just wanted to get moving. We were prepared to work on our projects along the way instead of trying to start with a “Bristol” yacht.

3. What did you do to make your dream a reality?

Lara – Save, save, save, and make lots of sacrifices. We made it this far by living on an extremely tight budget and by Brian’s ability to renovate the boat on a shoestring using his unprecedented talent with Craigslist and Google.

Brian – I was really pig headed and refused to give up. There were a thousand times when this seemed like it was going to be impossible, like when my engine seized, I found out the mast step was totally destroyed, and figured out the keel/hull joint was leaking. But I took everything as a challenge, knowing that one day we’d be cruising and that it didn’t matter what the problem was – every problem has a solution. If you don’t have enough money, earn more. If your engine doesn’t work, fix it. If you want to do it, there’s nothing keeping you from cruising but yourself.

4. How much does cruising cost?

Lara – Many of the people we meet, fellow cruisers included, seem to be puzzled by our youth. Admittedly, I look younger than I am and I am young by most standards (27), but people are constantly asking us how we can afford it. Well, the truth is that we scrape by. We buy boat toys when we can, we fix things when we can afford to, and we spend most of our nights at anchor. If we were living on land, we would probably be paying rent or paying off a mortgage; instead, Brian bought a boat (much cheaper than buying a house!) and we put our money back into the boat. We think of the boat projects as our rent and, without all the additional costs of participating in land-based living, we live on the cheap.

Brian – The typical answer – how much you have. For us, our budget is around $1000 per month. Sometimes we come in under that and sometimes over. I spend a lot on boat goodies and my projects often break the budget, but if you anchor out, cook most of your own meals, and don’t waste money, it’s a pretty cheap lifestyle.

5. What mistakes did you make in your first year of cruising?

Lara – I think the biggest mistake I made (which couldn’t really be helped at the time) was letting most of the preparations in the beginning fall to Brian. The boat wasn’t ready when when we needed it to be, and I had little-to-no experience with which to help him. Although he had a great deal of sailing experience under his belt, Brian had never owned or captained a boat before Illusion, and she wasn’t in the physical shape that we had initially thought. We ended up spending a small fortune in the boatyard in South Carolina and missing our planned departure.

Brian – Underestimating how rough an offshore passage can be on the Atlantic Coast. I’d gone a lot of ocean miles on trade winds routes and done coastal passages during periods of long settled weather, but winter weather systems build up swell for days, and even though the wind may drop to a reasonable level, the swell will still be pretty big. We lost a dingy towing it offshore expecting settled weather but instead had a pretty rough downwind passage that shook up everything and the eye bolt tore off the dingy around 2 am while we were surfing around 10 – 11 knots.

6. What do you enjoy about cruising that you didn’t expect to enjoy?

Lara – Living according to the weather. Brian and I call it luxury camping, because unless it is cold or raining, we always have the hatches and windows open. I’ve learned to embrace the fact that when it rains, you get wet – everything gets wet. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I enjoy my foul-weather gear as I never expected to?

Brian – Engines and fiberglass work: we had some diesel engine issues, and I was lucky enough to have a mechanically minded friend that worked with me during the rebuild. I enjoyed learning about it. I also found working with fiberglass to be pretty intuitive and relatively simple as far as a construction material goes.

I also enjoyed cruising the ICW more than I would have expected. It was a lot of motoring, but we anchored out more-or-less every night and often in the middle-of-nowhere USA. We are in the Bahamas now, and you can’t beat the fishing and clear water, but I liked the ICW too, and wish I would have been able to spend more time at some of the random anchorages in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

Another random one would be sailing with a tiller – a link of our steering chain broke in the Bahamas so we rigged up the “emergency” tiller. I found that I like sailing with it better than the wheel. We balance better and the feedback from the boat is much more immediate. After a few days sailing with a tiller, we’re thinking about making a permanent one.

7. What do you dislike about cruising that surprised you?

Lara – I was pretty spot-on beforehand about the things that I thought would bother me, but I’ve been surprised by how little they actually do get under my skin. Sure, the boat is small, it’s old, so things are still always breaking, and I hate unpacking an entire locker to get to that one thing I need, but really what gets to me more than anything else is that I don’t have the space to work on substantial art projects, and I can’t screen-print on the boat. Still trying to figure out the happy medium between cruising and making art.

Brian – Not much actually. I’d done some cruising on other boats before, so I had some idea of what this was going to be like. I guess what I dislike most (that were unexpected to me) is how difficult it was for us to find homes for things. We don’t have much accessible storage, so we still have things without “homes” and that makes our boat feel cluttered.

8. Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting cruising?

Lara – There have been a number of items that we installed after we started cruising, which we wondered why we hadn’t installed sooner: the saltwater wash-down system, the new faucet, a new head, and the long-range wireless antennae/wireless device, for example. Most of the items have to do with the level of comfort on the boat.

Brian – AIS. We still don’t have it but knowing exactly what (big commercial) ships are out there would have made for less-stressful night passages, especially in the Chesapeake Bay. It is less important in areas like the Bahamas or the islands but great for sailing along the coast of the US. Our radar has really helped, and that was a late addition.

We did put in a saltwater wash-down pump last year that made anchoring in mud much less of a problem. I wasn’t sure it was going to be of much use in sand, but low-and-behold having a saltwater dish-blaster has helped us conserve water. I really wish I had bought a backup stereo though – ours died recently and cruising without music just isn’t the same!

9. What do you find the most exciting about your cruising life?

Lara – The unexpected situations that we find ourselves in just trying to accomplish daily tasks; whether it is a trip to the grocery store or a search for a replacement part, we make new friends everywhere. Remote anchorages are also quite exciting. It’s such a novelty to look at the stars without the interference of light pollution, and I love spotting animals along the way. From dolphins, to sea turtles, rays, birds, and even a black bear, there is always something new to see if you are looking. It is refreshing to find our lives so entwined with the environment.

Brian – Generally we’re not in it for excitement. We are looking for relaxation and a more natural pace of life — but catching a fish trawling is always exciting. When the reel starts spinning, there is a rush to get to the rod and land the fish, usually followed by lots of excited shouts for “gaff! get me the gaff!!!” or “where are the pliers? I need the pliers!!” and quite possibly “where are my gloves?? This thing wants to eat my fingers!” Lara get’s to hear all of this while trying to keep us on course and out of trouble. I’d say those are some of the most exciting moments.

The things I get most excited for are the usual, a drink at sundown, good weather, good friends, exploring islands and those rare occasions when everything just goes right.

10. What are your plans now? If they do not include cruising, tell us why.

Lara – We will sail Illusion around the Bahamas for a few more months before most likely circling back up to the states. I need to get back to my art practice, and it’s time for both of us to fill our bank accounts again. I imagine we will continue to live aboard, but our plans for Illusion are unclear. As young as we are, I don’t see this as an ending, but rather a beginning, and I’m sure this will not be our last sailing adventure.

Brian – Our plans are always, at best, indefinite. We always have a few options that we’re juggling, looking for the best option. Our long term plans definitely involve cruising. We are comfortable on the water, have built up our knowledge base to the point that we are no longer beginners — though we still have infinite amounts to learn — and don’t see any point in “stopping” now. That being said, we’re thinking about a larger boat, which means money and continuing our respective “careers.” Lara’s art has been well received everywhere we go, so she needs a place to create that’s bigger than our boat! We’re leaning towards enjoying the Bahamas for another month or so before heading to the Chesapeake Bay for hurricane season. We hope to start hunting for a larger boat, earning money, and setting ourselves up for the long term.

China Doll at 3 months

2011-03-01T01:00:00.000-08:00

Nicole is 24, graduated from St. Joe's and has her masters in special education from The University of Pittsburgh. She has spent her summers on LBI, NJ waiting tables and managing the sailing program at Haven Beach Yacht Club. She has also spent time backpacking through Western Europe and volunteering in Brazil. I (Joe) graduated from the University of Vermont and have since spent my winters in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Lake Tahoe, California, and South America traveling every spring and fall to surf in Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Central America, South America, and up and down the eastern seaboard of the U.S.

We bought China Doll, our 1973 Sabre 28, as a mutual effort to try something new and keep the traveling going. Our boat was well maintained by the previous owners and has an 18 hp Yanmar. While we had to upgrade a few essential systems, our boat was able to be sailed away from the dock without much trouble. Actually we made it as far as Norfolk before we started upgrading the essential systems. We bulked up our ground tackle, fishing equipment, water capacity, GPS, and electrical system. All done while underway or on the hook somewhere between Norfolk and Rock Sound, Eleuthera.

The photos are of our boat, underway coming into Port Everglades inlet in Fort Lauderdale, FL, my friend and I enjoying a sundowner in Spanish Wells on the dock, and of Nicole and I with the world's largest coconut.

What mistakes did you make in your first year of cruising?
That the bad situations happen to everyone. On our way down the ICW we constantly heard other (potentially much more experienced) boaters' stories about making mistakes and having things go awry on their journey. Some of these seemed very obvious to us. After a while it started to sink in that while we were relatively (I say relatively with great hesitancy) inexperienced boaters that my experience with surfing, freediving, and years of traveling, seeing, and learning different oceans had given us a great leg up on everybody else. Second, Nicole's sailing ability of small boats really helped us with getting places quickly and keep the boat safe in appropriate conditions. We got a strong confirmation of our united belief that we were on the right track in Harbor Island, Bahamas. We met a crew of a mega-yacht that was pretty young. The captain was only 36 and most of his crew was our age. He told us a cool/funny story about how he once came out of Nassau harbor, almost hit two boats, a set of rocks, and ran the boat aground only to realize later that the computer system had malfunctioned and needed to be reset. The boat was 176 TONS. He remained cool and prepped for the conditions presented at each stage of the near catastrophe calmly and efficiently. After he told us the story he simply said, "Yeah...it happens to everybody. Even the people that look extremely professional frequently have issues with their boats and the conditions." If he could say that, I'm no longer worried about stuff falling off the shelves when we make passages.

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you leaving the dock?
That we're not as inexperienced as we think. We learned the hard way. We were coming into a small marina right after Thanksgiving and even with a 30 mph cross-wind and made a very successful docking with minimal effort. Mind you, this was only about the 5th marina we'd stayed at so docking was still extremely new to us. Once ashore the marina owner asked us to kindly move since he had a bigger boat coming in and needed to give them preference. This ticked me off, but he said it'd be a piece of cake and to just keep the nose into the wind when pulling into the slip on the OTHER side of the dock. The problem wasn't pulling in, it was getting off. We wound up getting slammed back into the dock by a 60 mph gust and lost our dinghy engine in the process. The gust of wind was so violent that it ripped out dinghy engine right off our radar tower. To paint a picture, the engine mounts were still attached to the radar tower after the ordeal as they'd been cracked in half. If I had had more confidence in our abilities and our experience level I would have told that marina owner that we were only moving if he had 2 guys on the dock and a tow boat to get us off of there. Live and learn.

Tell me your favorite thing about your boat?
It's simplicity. Everything on the boat is easy to fix and since our boat frequently needs some sort of repair, things are just easier. Recently while coming into Nassau, strong following seas had pushed water up our exhaust and into the engine. It didn't get into the cylinders, but sure did get into the oil. Our engine wouldn't stay fired on the approach in and we had to navigate the entrance to the harbor under sail. Once on the hook, I quickly figured out what was wrong (the signs were fairly obvious, super thick, grey oil and white smoke the time the engine did fire), but didn't know quite how to fix it. On top of that, our Balmar Digital Duo Charge wasn't working so our starting battery wasn't being charged while the engine was running.

Needless to say, I was despairing a bit. However, after a short conversation with Marine Diesel Unlimited in Nassau, the engine was looking remarkably simple to get running again. A few days later in Spanish Wells a mega-yacht pulled up right next to us. Their captain was having trouble with the shore power and after 15 minutes of him telling all the problems he had with the yacht's electrical systems and wiring, I felt much better, and had a simple fix to make sure our start battery was being charged. Since our systems are so simple, I can fix almost anything with a solid day of work on the problem or less. This leaves more time to engine the surrounding environs and sunset drinks in the cockpit.

Tell me your least favorite thing about your boat?
That we don't have an oven. When we first bought the boat the Kenyon Alcohol stove wouldn't work after a few cleanings and it also came with a one burner butane stove. Once we realized this wasn't sustainable, we invested in a 15lb. propane tank, a 2 burner coleman stove, and the fittings to have that connected to the tank as well as our grill. Now we can cook a decent meal, but Nicole loves to bake. And is darn good at it too. She only gets to bake when we're plugged into shore power and can use the toaster oven, which is good and bad. Bad because she misses her hobby and good because I love eating what she bakes and now I won't come home 10 lbs. heavier than when I left!

Can you think of a sailing tip (e.g., sail trim, sail combination) specific to offshore passages (e.g., related to swells)?
Always keep in mind the direction of the swell vs. the direction of the wind. On our passage from Chub Cay to Nassau we thought we'd have a sleigh ride. A front had just passed through and the wind was supposed to be giving us a steady beam to broad reach the entire day. However, I'd forgotten to check the direction of the swell from the ocean vs. the swell generated by the wind. This proved problematic. As we pulled out of the harbor it was fine, but as soon as we got into open water, things rapidly deteriorated. The wind and wind swell was in the perfect direction and we were making great time, however the ocean swell generated by those big cold fronts that dump snow on New England and track a cross the north Atlantic was pushing 6-8 seas from the NE, smack on our beam. We'd get pushed from behind by the wind swell and then spun up into the wind every time an ocean swell would meet the wind swell. The tiller was difficult to handle for me let alone Nicole and she was seasick for the entire 6 hr crossing. Miserable at best. Had we known the swells would be in different directions, we would've never left the harbor.

Do friends visit and how often? Do you have advice for having visitors?
We actually just had our first guests aboard. I prepped them adamantly and specifically that our boat is small and that with the two of them and their hiking packs (they were flying to us straight from a Central/South America adventure), we'd be pretty cozy for their time with us. However, having prepped them and making the boat sound like it was no bigger than a floating coffin, they were pleasantly surprised to find out we could all sit comfortably in the cockpit or below without being too cramped and that they'd have their own bed. We also had to warn them that they'd be doing without, but having known Christian and Kristen for over a decade now, I knew that this wouldn't be a problem. She didn't need to be told that showers and a hairdryer were out for the duration and Christian was happy to use our diving sessions as his showers. One other point on prepping guests is to warn them that they will need to be flexible with arrivals and departures. We picked up Christian and Kristen in Nassau, made the Exumas a couple days later and had planned on crossing the Exuma Sound to get to Rock Sound on southern Eleuthura. The day we tried to leave the sound was super rough and opted to sail northward on the back to Spanish Wells. It went from an eight hour day of slogging into the surf to sailing a broad reach and skimming over the water with near perfect sailing conditions. They both switched their flights to out of North Eleuthura and we all had a much more pleasant experience since we didn't have to cross any gnarly bodies of water and basically slowed the pace down to just relax.

When have you felt most in danger and what was the source?
We always feel most in danger when facing tough conditions with a deadline. The worst part is that almost every time we had serious difficulties it was within our control to stay out of those conditions! Terrible to say, but sadly true. On our trip down we started by always trying to make deadlines and rush the cruising pace. Part of it was due to the weather being unseasonably cold and wanting to get south to the warmth and sunshine, another part of it was our lack of experience. Now we're much better about letting the wind and conditions dictate our path and pace. Being a small, albeit heavy, fin-keeler, our boat is limited in the sense that we HAVE to wait for a weather window for almost any open ocean crossing. Whether that be the overnight we did from South Carolina to Fernandina Beach, FL, crossing the Gulf Stream, or the 30 mile island jumps in the Bahamas. Since hitting the islands, we let the wind and weather completely dictate our course, which has alleviated a ton of our stress and made the pace much more relaxed. Sometimes we start a trip and turn back, sometimes we never leave harbor and sometimes shortly into a trip we head to a backup destination that is more favorable and comfortable for the conditions.

How did you (or did you) gain offshore experience prior to leaving?
We didn't. We put a deposit on the boat on Oct. 26th, scheduled a survey and handed the owner the balance in cash on Nov. 2nd and left the dock Nov. 8th. Nicole knew how to sail boats from her job. I knew weather and the ocean well from 20 years of surfing and a decade as an ocean lifeguard. I had also taking an offshore sailing course through Outward Bound. That included the basics in navigation, water reading skills, provisioning, and living very simply, not to mention I'd been spending every winter since college in the mountains of the West working, snowboarding, and doing overnight trips into the backcountry. While there's not much snow on the boat, having to rely on myself and my friends to get into and out of hazardous places was commonplace. This gave us a good foundation for getting off the dock and we started small. We taught ourselves the offshore skills needed on the southbound trip along the ICW. We started small with just anchoring properly, setting the sails, reefing the sails, learning the engine, improving our navigation skills, etc. When we'd feel comfortable then we'd try the next thing. Also, some of my skills from surfing make me stronger in areas such as weather, swell, and water-reading than my experience on the boat shows. Recently, people were scoffing at us navigating the Devil's Backbone between Spanish Wells and Harbor Island without a pilot. Nicole and I talked about it, studied the charts and did the passage without incident. In fact, it was one of the most gorgeous days we've had on the boat yet. If we hadn't covered 1000 miles on the way down and worked up to that moment step by step, the day might not have been so enjoyable.

What are your impressions of the cruising community?
The cruising community is great. Not only in being the friendliest and most helpful bunch of people I've ever dealt with, but they're almost the most knowledgeable. Often I have trouble getting info from employees at West Marine or the like, but almost any cruiser can give you a solution to a problem on your boat. Chances are they've dealt with something similar or even that exact problem on their own boat at one time or another and they've fixed while not having ideal conditions. Anyone can troubleshoot a problem when their boat's on the hard, they have unlimited time and resources, and good research from the internet and books. Having to fix something correctly the first time on a budget and out at sea or in foreign country is much different. Now whenever I need advice, I go walk around the marina docks and just start asking questions.

What did you do to make your dream a reality?
This was less tough than you'd imagine, but partly because of where Nicole and I are in the phases of our lives. We're both recent college grads with no debt and no real obligations. She spends her summers working days as a dinghy sailing instructor, I spend my days managing a surf shop and doing lessons with that, and at night we both wait tables a local, family owner restaurant. Adventure-wise we have our boss, Steve Dieptro to thank for getting us off the dock. He owns four restaurants where we live and 10 years ago decided he wanted to get into sailing. He chased a stolen Beneteau charter boat around the Caribbean and when he got it the insurance company gave him a great deal. He never looked back and now every winter when the restaurants are closed he spends his down time cruising the Virgin Islands with his wife and two kids when they can get out of school. Constantly, he was pushing us to do it. Handing us articles about other budget cruisers, pulling me out of prep-work to go down to the local boat yard and bang on old boats and learn about sailboat construction, and even meeting us for our passage up the Delaware Bay within 24 hours of getting back from a charter trip with his family in Greece. Needless to say, Steve is a major, positive, gung-ho force in our trip.

Then there's the work side of things. Nicole and I busted our butts and made getting the money for the trip a top priority. Our summers are 60 hrs a week from May 1st to July 4th and the month of October. However, from July 4th till the end of the September we're frequently pulling close to 100 hours of work a week. Six nights a week at the restaurant X 7 hrs/shift = 42 hrs. Plus our full time jobs during the day comes to 80 hrs a week minimum. Add in the extra things we have to do for our day jobs and the occasional late night at the restaurant and the hours are long. The balance is that we get serious time off in the winter and don't have to spend it in snowy, cold New Jersey. Most importantly though in making the dream a reality is actually leaving. You're never going to have a perfect boat, enough time, or just the right budget, but if you can make it work and just get off the dock, the dream quickly becomes an awesome reality.

Knotty Cat at 1 Month

2011-02-21T17:47:00.000-08:00

Read this interview as originally published on Knotty Cat Tales.
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Hans (who has been sailing since he was a teenager) and I (who had never been on a sail boat until I met Hans 7 years ago) bought our Island Packet Cat in January of 2008 and moved her from Massachusetts to Maryland with the intention of eventually moving aboard full time. We moved on board for what we hope is for good in January of this year and finally arrived in Florida a couple of weeks ago.

We both sold our houses so now instead of wondering when we'll have to replace a roof, or the furnace etc... we now spend our time replacing water pumps that break down just before company is due to arrive, leaky hoses that give up the ghost and saturate the contents of our lockers, and "Oh God! that's not the head I smell is it"!?

Of course when I do something I go whole hog and we ended up bringing a pit bull puppy with us.

Wilbur is our rescue project and we couldn't ask for a better companion. He learned to use his potty patch within a week and as you can see here, he also helps navigate.

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?

Actually, I read so many blogs before hand that I think we had a pretty good idea of what to expect. However traveling the ICW has been an eye opener for us both. We didn't realize how much the tides affect the currents and even though we think we've tried to time ourselves perfectly it doesn't always turn out that way and we end up with the current on our nose half the time.

In your first year of cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?

Nothing major but trying to get our mail is a pain. Even in this electronic age I'm surprised by how much paper stuff we still need. Right now my daughter sends it on when we finally know we'll be somewhere to actually receive it.

I also don't like not being able to wash my hair more often, but when we're at anchor I can't use a hair dryer. If the weather is warm it's not a big deal but if it's cold out, my hair, which is really thick, won't dry. Hans doesn't have that problem!

What mistakes did you make in your first year of cruising?

Trying to keep a schedule and biting off way more than we could chew. This summer we bought a new dinghy and motor, picked up our newly repaired sail, a new bimini, brought a dog and cat with us, and then tried to fully provision our boat. All of this in one weekend!

It was a nightmare and of course since the marina wanted us out of there we took off towing our dinghy complete with huge motor attached and ended up sailing in horrible seas!

What do you enjoy about cruising that you didn't expect to enjoy?

I'm surprised that I don't miss TV. We do have one on board but we only use it when we're at marinas. We have a digital converter and a good antenna so it's free and we can always pick up something if we want to. And not that it had a good ending (we're from Pittsburgh!) but we were able to watch the Superbowl in the comfort of our boat and the beer was cheap.

At first when things broke down it would drive Hans crazy but he's really learning a lot. He's done oil and impeller changes, replaced our water pump when it quit on us one too many times, and he loves to come up with too many ideas on how to get our dinghy up on the stern sans dinghy davits!

What do you dislike about cruising that surprised you?

Being at the mercy of Mother Nature. In the old days if the weather was nice, we went sailing. if it wasn't, we didn't. Now it doesn't matter whether we like it or not, we're in it. Period. Getting up in the middle of the night when a 40 knot storm blows through because we want to be prepared for the anchor to drag. Having thunder hit overhead so hard the fillings in my teeth rattle. Trying to stay warm. Trying to stay cool!!!

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you didn't find to be true?

We were both laughing the other day about how everyone perceives our sailing life. Everyone thinks our life is like the covers of all the sailing and boating magazines. The weather is always nice, the sun is always shining, the ladies don't have filthy hair, and we lie around and drink Margaritas all day long. If the magazines showed how glamorous sailing really is; bruises, dirty fingernails, no makeup; I have a feeling boat sales would be lower than they already are!

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you found particularly accurate?

I'd read (via Windtravelers blog) that your working systems are usually going to be 80/20. 80% working and 20% not. Very true and there have been times when 80% would have been heaven!

Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting cruising?

Dinghy davits for sure!!!! There have been a lot of times I would have loved going ashore but messing with the dinghy and its motor both before and after an excursion just wasn't worth it to me. We also don't have a generator and we'd love to get a diesel one but we hate to spend money on a gasoline one right now. We have gas on board for the dinghy motor but Hans hates to have to have large quantities of gas and diesel if we can get by with just one fuel.

What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?

Right now we think we're okay. We learned last summer that we really don't need tons of clothes and I don't really need five pairs of sandals.

I also ditched the microwave since I don't use it. I did buy a portable ice maker for $150.00 and it's already paid for itself. It starts making ice within ten minutes and if it gets left at the dock, I'm going with it!

What are your plans now? If they do not include cruising, tell us why.

For now we'll continue on South and hopefully head to the Bahamas. After that we'll probably come back over and sail back up the Atlantic coast. Having a dog on board limits your destinations a bit as they are not allowed in the BVI because of rabies. But that's okay, we found out last summer when we were in the Chesapeake and Potomac that there are tons of places to see and go and I have no problem with limiting myself to this hemisphere!

What has been the scariest event you've experienced so far?

We've gone through some heavy seas that probably weren't dangerous but certainly weren't fun and a couple of times our anchor dragged but the scariest event for me was when Hans fell off the boat at 4 AM while we were at a marina. He wanted to adjust our dock lines due to the strong currents and because of the frosty surface he slipped and fell in between the boat and the dock. He also broke our rule that no one goes aboveboard at night without notifying anyone and the huge bang he made when he went in is what woke me up. I had to lower our swim ladder (we've rigged it now so that it can be lowered by someone in the water) and he was able to get out. He did end up with seven stitches in the palm of his hand and I think he got off very lucky!

When all is said and done though, living on a boat is different. It's not for the weak at heart or those who live for the Midnight Buffet (not when you're asleep by 9 PM!). Showers (and I'm not talking rain) are sometimes few and far between, and thank God I've never had a manicure so I don't have to worry about missing them. But nothing beats watching a sunset or a full moon rising... sitting in the cockpit and being surrounded by the lights of a new city...grilling a steak in a secluded anchorage and then enjoying a Bloody Mary the next morning... need I say more?

Vicarious at 10 months

2011-02-04T14:15:00.000-08:00

Read this interview as originally published on Sail Vicarious.
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We (Kathleen & Spencer) have been cruising since April 2010 and first went up the coast to Maine, as far as Somes Sound and then we sailed back down taking the ICW at Norfolk, through the beautiful Dismal Swamp, grounded a couple of times in NC, and SC, jumped from Miami to Gun Cay, checking in at Chubb Cay, Christmas at Georgetown, NYE at Rum Cay, sailing to Caicos then onto Luperon DR, bashed our brains out along the north coast and then through the Mona to Boqueron. Now we are in Salinas provisioning until Panama. We are reading Jimmy Cornell's books to make sure we will be going at the right time, taking the right route from Panama to the Marquesas. From there we don't know yet...

Here are the questions and very brief answers from Kathleen.

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising? That is is as difficult as an outward bound course and it will test the bonds of love in a relationship, even the strongest!!

Is there a place you visited wish you could have stayed longer? Big Sand Key, Turks and Caicos.

Tell me your favorite thing about your boat. It is verrrrrrrry tough. Much tougher than I!

Tell me your least favorite thing about your boat. Not enough storage space for a year of provisioning!

How often have you faced bad weather in your cruising? How bad? In the Gulf of Maine skirting hurricanes and then going to windward through the Bahamas, the DR, Mona Passage and PR we faced a lot of uncomfortable seas, BUT it was all under a schedule!!! It is like everyone says, a schedule is the only dangerous thing when cruising! 10-12 ft seas, confused with 20 knot winds were the worst and I hope that is as bad as it gets. I know people face 25 ft seas, but I'm not ready for that!

What do you dislike about cruising that surprised you? The bug bites!

What is something that you were dreading about cruising when you were dreaming, that is as bad or worse than imagined? The bugs!

Is there something from your land life that you weren't sure about bringing and are very happy about having brought now? I am so glad I kept some nice clothes, I like to look nice and not look like a cruiser. It makes me look less like a tourist!

When have you felt most in danger and what was the source? During rough passages, but now that I am safely out of them and have more experience I think it was just in my own mind!

Share a piece of cruising etiquette. ALWAYS say "hello and how are you" in the language of whatever country you are in. You never know if the guy leaning back in the chair with a tee shirt on is the customs guy who needs to check you in and give you all the days you want! Make it a habit to ask everyone!!

Bright Eyes at 1 month

2011-02-01T01:00:00.000-08:00

You can read more about SV Bright Eyes and crew on their blog.
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We were 23 year old office workers when we decided we wanted to live in the Caribbean. We searched online and found cruising. Our first day sailing was at survey to purchase our 1985 Seidelmann 37. After almost 2 years of learning to sail and outfitting the boat we have finally left Maryland! We have two cats, Nomy and Nala. We have been cruising for 4 weeks now and have made it to Florida. Our goal is the Bahamas, after that who knows.

10. What piece of gear seems to break the most often?

Joey: Engine. No doubt.

9. What do you enjoy about cruising that you didn’t expect to enjoy

Joey: Fixing things. There is a sense of accomplishment when it’s fixed.

8. What spares do you wish you had more of? Less of?:

Christine: Less life jackets. We have 5 inflatable ones and about 10 orange puffy ones, in case you know… we have a giant party …. Sike.

Joey: There is a whole section behind one of our couches dedicated to things that we do not know what they are.

7. What do you miss about living on land?

Christine: long showers and the ability to stop by the store to pick up something essential like bread.

Joey: Eating out at restaurants and flushing toilets.

6. What is your watch schedule/ describe a typical day underway on your boat:

Christine: We spend 15 minutes layering up, during which time Nomy, our oldest cat, realizes we are about to start the engine and he starts barking (yes) and jumps into the v berth to hide until we anchor. Joey pulls the anchor up, and from then out its two hours on and off. If it’s a hard day, 8 ish hours, we will spend our off time relaxing to music or warming up inside. I am the designated cook, it’s the least I can do since he does the anchor everyday so I spend some of my offtime cooking. You would not believe how hungry being underway makes you, unless you have been there. SERIOUSLY where does all that energy go?

5. What is the key to making the cruising life enjoyable

Joey: Not getting upset about things that go wrong. It happens.

4. What is the hardest thing about cruising

Joey and Christine: Missing our family, and not being there for important events.

3. What is something you read or heard about cruising that you find to be particularly true

Joey: Its not all easy street, it is just a different lifestyle.

2. What was your scariest moment cruising:

Christine: We hit a shoal, which didn’t particularly worry me, since we have done it plenty of times before. In fact, I started cooking since tow boat was an hour away they said. By the end of the hour my meal was sliding off the pan we were so sideways. Tow boat arrived and yelled and screamed at us and I couldn’t wait to blog about how vicious he was until I realized (after he left) that the tide was quickly and seriously leaving and if we didn’t hurry the heck up we were stuck there all day (we were). The moment he told us there was nothing he could do and to hand him back his line, my fist tightened around it and I looked in terror at Joey. High and dry. Something we didn’t know even existed until it happened.

Joey: The Chesapeake Bay when huge waves were crashing on our boat and everything below was getting tossed and I had to keep steering in the right direction and I was seasick.

1. Tell me your favorite thing about your boat?

Christine: Our V berth is huge. We looked at a lot of boats and they all had us kicking each other at the V, but ours is the most spacious v berth we’ve seen.

Joey: I love how fast our boat is (in the sailing world), our 9 ft wide 11 ft long v berth, and also our drop down living room table.

Arcas at 6 months

2011-01-27T01:00:00.000-08:00

Read this interview as originally published on NASailor.
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We’ve featured many of the entries in the interesting “Interview with a Cruiser” series, a web project created by Livia Gilstrap to document the experiences of long-term offshore cruisers. At her readers’ request, Livia has started a new site called “Newly Salted” to showcase interviews with cruisers who have gone on shorter journeys or just started their cruise. She invited us to interview ourselves about the six-month cruise we took in 2009. We were honored to participate and decided to publish our answers here as well to give our readers more insight into the sailing history of NASailor’s founders.

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?

Beth: I wish that someone had explained the “you can’t rush mother nature” aspect of cruising. Basically, that you have to give up on the idea of scheduling where you are going to be at any given time. Frankly, I don’t know if that’s something you can learn without experiencing it. The first few weeks of our trip were incredibly stressful because we were in too much of a hurry. After trucking Arcas to Florida and fitting her out for our trip, we went for a two-hour sail as our sole break-in before crossing the Gulf Stream the next day. I paid for that stupidity by spending the entire crossing with my head leaning against the dodger, eyes closed, seasick.

Hill: I wish someone had told us, “Don’t go for less than six months.” It takes at least 2-3 months to adjust to the cruising way of life. We planned our trip for six months, but that was just luck on our part.

In your first year of cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?

Beth: The transition to being hyper-aware of the weather and environment and understanding what the potential consequences could be for us and the boat.

Hill: Being a full-time mechanic, having to manage all of the systems on the boat, from the battery to the engine, and knowing that there is no safety net out there. I had to understand how everything worked and how it was wired together. On land, you can just call a professional and you don’t have to know exactly what’s wrong. On the sea, you are responsible for diagnosing and fixing many problems. There is no mechanic, except you, at least for the basic stuff.

What mistakes did you make in your first year of cruising?

Beth: Creating a much more ambitious trip plan than we could realistically accomplish, not only because of timing, but also because of what I was ready to take on as a first-time offshore cruiser in a 29-foot boat.
We also underestimated how expensive the Bahamas would be, even though we’d heard that it would be from some of our cruising friends. The food prices there are ridiculous. We should have stocked up on way more food before we left. We thought we bought a lot, but should have bought at least 4x more than we did before leaving.

Otherwise, we did a good job planning the trip. One of the good things about a 29-foot boat is that you don’t have a lot of room for extra stuff. There wasn’t much we brought that we didn’t use, and there wasn’t much that we didn’t have that we wished we had brought. Most of the credit goes to Hill for planning our systems well.

What do you enjoy about cruising that you didn’t expect to enjoy?

Beth: Watching the sun come up on an overnight watch.

I also really loved planning our routes and destinations. Before this trip, I had only sailed in places like Chicago, where there aren’t many harbors to explore, or Maine, where Hill has been sailing since he was a kid. At first I had no idea how to read a chart to figure out what would be a good anchorage or the best way to navigate from point to point. By the time we got to Eleuthera, I was doing 90% of the trip plotting. I still remember the look on Hill’s face the first time I disagreed with him on where we should go next and then pulled out the charts to explain why I thought my option was better!

I’d pass hours looking at the charts and cruising guides to figure out where we were going to go next. That’s one of the best parts of cruising – having time to do whatever you feel like doing. It’s such an incredible luxury.

Hill: Even though it was stressful at times, I enjoyed the responsibility of being the Captain and managing the boat. It would be hard for me to crew on someone else’s boat now.

What do you dislike about cruising that surprised you?

Beth: To directly contradict the above answer…I hate long offshore sails. More than 36 hours and I want to kill myself. They are either boring or scary, and neither is fun.

Also, doing laundry in a bucket. Hate it.

Hill: To also give the flip side of my previous answer, the constant responsibility of being Captain could be tiring. As the more experienced cruiser of the two of us, I was ultimately responsible for the boat and our safety. Although I had cruised before and also led the crew on Arcas during the racing season, it’s not the same as being Captain 24/7. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy it, but sometimes I just wanted a break.

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you didn’t find to be true?

Beth: Sometimes there’s the perception that cruising = roughing it. That’s not necessarily true, even for those who don’t have a ton of money. You just have to make choices and prioritize what’s important. For example, we knew we would be using our computers and listening to a lot of music, and in general we didn’t want to worry about power. So we had four solar panels and four house batteries on our little 29-foot boat. It got us some interesting looks in the harbor, but we never had to run the engine to charge up our batteries.

You do have to make tradeoffs on outfitting your boat, unless you have money to burn, but you don’t have to give up everything.

Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting cruising?

Beth: A bigger boat.

Cruising on a 29-foot boat (especially one designed as a racer-cruiser) can be challenging. Our euphemism was that she was “lively”. Our friends who did a two-year cruise in a heavy offshore boat needed at least 15-20 knots to really move, whereas our boat started to get hard to handle at 20+ knots.

On the other hand, we could outsail almost any cruising boat under 40 feet, and Arcas’ maneuverability did come in handy at times. Docking, anchoring, etc was much easier. When we bought Arcas, it was for cruising and racing in Lake Michigan – we didn’t intend to do an extended cruise on her. But that’s the boat we had. Next time we’ll go in a real offshore cruiser.

Hill: We should have had all-chain anchor rode instead of chain+line. The chain+line combo was a pain in the Exumas because of the current – it would wrap around the boat and we’d have to undo it. The boat also wagged more at anchor. We replaced it with all-chain once we returned to the U.S.

What piece of gear seems to break the most often?

Beth: Everyone seems to have an autopilot story. We had a Simrad and brought along a backup. Ours never broke, but it did have “issues”. We named it Sinbad and our running joke was that Sinbad had a drinking problem that affected his steering ability. If we didn’t’ treat him properly, he’d pay us back by hitting the sauce.

Hill: The alternator broke before we left and we bought another one. We brought the original one as a spare and ended up switching them back out while trying to diagnose an engine problem. This goes back to my earlier comment about having to be the on-board mechanic.

What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?

Hill: We brought the spinnaker and all it did was take up space in the v-berth. It would have required both of us to be on deck all of the time managing it and we couldn’t have used the autopilot with it. It wasn’t worth bringing.

What are your plans now? If they do not include cruising, tell us why.

Beth: We always planned to do a relatively short sabbatical and then return to “normal” life. Because we are on the younger side (30s) we wanted to come back to continue with our careers and start a family.

When we returned, we moved to a new city, and then a few months later we decided to start an online sailing magazine called North American Sailor. It was the perfect way to combine our career backgrounds with our passion for sailing.

We are already planning to take another long-term cruise after we have a family. But at least once a month we discuss taking off again. Now that we’ve done it once, it won’t take us long to get ready to do it again. The biggest obstacle is the boat…we won’t do another long cruise on Arcas.

In the meantime, we’ve been loaning ourselves out to Hill’s parents, who recently retired, and cruising/racing out of Annapolis.

What question do you wish I would have asked you besides the ones I’ve asked you and how would you answer it?

What do you miss the most about cruising?

Beth: Having a bathing suit and shorts being my outfit for the day. I also love sailing into a new harbor – especially if it’s a town that was originally built around a harbor. I love seeing it first from the water just as people did hundreds of years ago. Like Charleston – that’s a city that is so much more spectacular when approached from water, not land.

Hill: Just the lifestyle and being off the grid. Being able to have a lot of free time to read, swim, chill out, fool around with systems. I also miss the dinghy rides…motoring in with a bunch of empty bags and exploring a new town.

Island Bound at 3 months

2011-01-26T01:00:00.000-08:00

Read this interview as originally published on Sailing SV Island Bound.
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Background: Kevin, along with wife Erin and daughters Hannah (age 8) and Isabel (age 5) are all lifelong boaters, but first began sailing when they purchased and restored a 25 foot sailboat in 2007. They now sail aboard a 28 foot Irwin sloop out of Grand Haven on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. During the summer of 2009, they spent the better part of 3 months and over 1000 nautical miles cruising roundtrip to Lake Huron’s North Channel and nearly every port and island in between. Future cruising ideas include a possible trip out the Erie Canal, down the ICW and into the Bahamas. This interview focuses on their 3 month North Channel cruise experience.

1) What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?

That cruising is addictive and the hardest part is returning to port when the cruise is finished. There’s really no easy way to re-adjust to life back on land. The pace, distractions, complexity and consumerism of being a landlubber become much more visible after having cruised for an extended period of time.

2) What transitions did you find the most difficult during your first extended cruise?

Living in a small space with 3 other people with just a fraction of the possessions and “stuff” that we were all accustomed to back at home. While the transition can be difficult, it is not without great reward. Learning to live with less, growing together as a family, and relying on each other for companionship and our individual strengths are some of the priceless gems of cruising.

3) What mistakes did you make on your first extended cruise?

We wished we had stayed longer in certain anchorages, but felt pressure to move on to see the next great place. In retrospect, slowing down and cruising at your own pace are what it’s all about. Though the North Channel is uniquely stunning, the most beautiful part of the cruise was seeing our family work together to meet the challenge of moving a small boat a very long distance.

4) What is one piece of gear/equipment you have onboard that you couldn’t do without?

Easy answer…our autopilot! We simply can’t imagine putting any serious miles beneath the keel without the help of a good, reliable autopilot. The autopilot (or any self-steering device) not only prevents fatigue but also allows you to do other things while you’re on passage such as cooking, cleaning, repairs, etc. as long as you keep a vigilant eye on your surroundings and position. If money weren’t a factor or if we were on even longer ocean passages, we’d also install wind vane steering to supplement the autopilot and save on battery usage. You can see our Autohelm ST1000 in action in this earlier blog post from the cruise. Additionally, we really enjoyed having a hammock onboard for lazy afternoons on the hook and a small 2-gallon shop vac for easy clean-up on those rare days when we had shorepower.

5) What is one piece of gear/equipment you wish you had onboard?

A bigger solar panel. We carry two very small (2 watt each) trickle-charge solar panels, but they don’t do much. It would be really nice to harvest enough solar energy from the sun to keep our little Norcold refrigerator going instead of relying on block ice. A small (perhaps foldable) bicycle would also be a nice addition for those occasional long treks for provisions while in port.

6) What do you enjoy about cruising that you didn't expect to enjoy?

The food! I was pleasantly surprised that we were usually able to make healthy and delicious meals while cruising. Some of our favorites included fresh caught walleye encrusted with Frosted Flakes cereal, freshly picked wild blueberries in blueberry pancakes, and banana and nut oatmeal. Prior to cruising, I expected that we’d be eating a lot of mac and cheese, ramen noodles and peanut butter sandwiches, but I’m happy to report we mostly avoided those. All in all, cruising seems to keep you healthy because you tend to eat smaller meals (small galley = small meals) and stay active trimming sails, washing the boat, paddling to shore, hiking to the store, etc.

7) What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you didn't find to be true?

We thought we’d find lots of other cruising boats with kids onboard, but after nearly 3 months we hardly ever crossed paths with any other cruising kids. This may or may not be something specific to the Great Lakes, but we fully expected that our two daughters would make lots of new friends. Fortunately, they had a great time being each other’s own best friend. They weren’t bored by any stretch, but I’m sure more kids would have made the cruise that much more enjoyable for them.

8) What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you found particularly accurate?

We had always been told and read how friendly and helpful the cruising community is and are happy to say that our experience backs this up. For example, the crews of the other boats in the many anchorages we stayed in were always stopping by in their dinghies to welcome us and share tips on the current anchorage and suggestions for the next anchorage. Cruisers are a very self-sufficient lot, but that’s not to say they don’t enjoy community and socializing with other cruisers.

9) What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?

We have a relatively small boat for a crew of four and therefore spent a lot of pre-cruise time planning what we should take and where we would store it so there really wasn’t anything onboard that we’d leave behind next time. In fact, we’ll probably take more the next time we go. There are pieces of safety gear (climbing harness for mast climbing) and electronic gadgets (WindMate anemometer) that rarely were used, but we’d still bring them along again either because they are essential for safety and/or repairs or simply small enough, in the case of the WindMate, that they didn’t take up unnecessary space.

10) What question do you wish I had asked you besides the ones I've asked you and how would you answer it?

We always find it interesting to hear how people are able to afford to cruise, both from a temporal and financial perspective. In our case, we have a very modest paid-for boat and only cruised as long as we were able to be away from shore. Erin is a schoolteacher so naturally she can be away from her job for three months in the summer. Kevin is fortunate enough to have a part-time position that allows him to telecommute during a cruise. This of course meant we had to bring along a laptop and printer and find reliable WiFi signals on a regular basis, but it worked out and allowed us to cruise for a summer. If cruising is a priority, you’ll find a way to make it work. There’s definitely trade-offs to cruising, like missing your family back at home, but we’ve the rewards found across large stretches of blue water are not to be missed.

Siempre Sabado at 6 months

2011-01-25T01:00:00.000-08:00

We are Stephen and Lulu Yoder. We sail a 1976 Westsail 28 which we've named Siempre Sabado ("Always Saturday" in Spanish) to celebrate what was our favorite day of the week during the years that we had to work for a living. We are now retired and can do pretty much whatever we want each day, just like we used to on Saturdays. Our hailing port is Silverton, Oregon, USA although there are no navigable waters anywhere close to Silverton. It's more an homage to the place we lived, worked, and raised our children for 25 years. A nice little town. We have only just started our cruising life, having only been away from our former home port of Newport, Oregon since Late July, 2010. Since then we have cruised down the coasts of Oregon and California and the Pacific coast of Baja California. We are currently anchored in La Paz, BCS, Mexico. Please feel free to follow our blog which also lists our email address. We welcome e-mails as well as comments (using the "comments" feature on the blog).

Rather than collaborate on answering these questions, we have decided to answer them independently and then post both answers.

1.) Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting cruising?

Stephen: I wouldn't put off the start of a cruise to get it but I'm wishing now that I had a wind generator to supplement our solar cells. Unless you have a really good way of pointing your solar panels at the sun, at the right angle and can adjust it many times a day, you just can't get what they're capable of putting out. And, at anchor, since the boat keeps swinging around, keeping the panels oriented for the best return all the time is pretty much impossible. On the other hand, the wind does seem to blow a lot.

Lulu: Not Me... I'm very happy with our boat as is. Of course I'm not the one that knows about all of the stuff that's available. Maybe that's good.

2.) What do you miss about living on land?

Lulu: Summer in the Silverton Hills, spending my days outside in the yard and surrounding woods.

Stephen: Nothing really. Oh, maybe my woodworking tools and my shop once in awhile, but only so I can make stuff for the boat. Granted, it's only been 6 months but I honestly don't really miss anything about living on land.

3.) In your first year of cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?

Stephen: Before we actually started our cruise, we lived on the boat, without a car, for a year. Basically cruising without going anywhere (some would argue we've been in La Paz long enough to qualify for that description again). The hardest transition during the living aboard time and the actual cruising time was pretty much the same: Our living space shrunk from 5 acres to 28'. Huge transition and difficult although we try to keep it as easy as we can by trying to keep each others' needs in mind. The other tough transition is getting used to how long it takes to get the most mundane things done. Grocery shopping that used to take us a couple hours (including driving to the store and back home again) now takes all day. And we still have to go back the next day to get the stuff we couldn't carry the first day. And, since we've been in Mexico, there's also the difficulty of just finding what you're looking for and not being sure whether or not it even exists here.

Lulu: Being anxious a lot. Not scared so much as not having the experience to know what is likely to happen in many circumstances and therefore being anxious in anticipation.

4.) How did you (or did you) gain offshore experience prior to leaving?

Lulu: We didn't have much... A 2 week trip on a friends boat and bringing our own boat from Anacortes, WA to Newport ,OR. It wasn't a lot but it was enough to keep it from being a scary "unknown".

Stephen: Basically, we didn't. Okay, that's not entirely true. We went on a trip with friends, on their sailboat, from Astoria, Oregon to Barkley Sound, Vancouver Island, British Columbia. That was pretty much it. After that, we brought Siempre Sabado down the coast from Anacortes, Washington where we purchased her, to Newport, Oregon where we home-ported her. The ocean portion of that trip took two and a half days of round-the-clock motoring. We didn't feel confident enough yet to sail the boat at that point. We lucked out and had a reasonably easy time of it, aside from the multitude of fuel filter changes that had to be made. Saltier folks than us (it didn't take much to qualify) kept trying to get us to do a shakedown cruise before we left Newport. Just head straight out into the Pacific for 3 days and then sail back to get an idea of what works, what doesn't and how we and the boat would handle stuff. But I always figured that, if I was sailing for 6 days, I certainly didn't want to end up back in Newport. I'd rather gain 6 days of southing. And what's the difference what port you pull back into if the boat is everything you have? Also, in hindsight, I'm afraid that if we had done a shakedown as recommended, and had the kind of weather we experienced when we finally left Newport, we may not have continued on with our cruising plans.

5.) How would you recommend that someone prepares to cruise?

Stephen: I can only tell you what worked well for us, and it was more of an accident than a plan. We had originally intended to leave Newport in 2009. However, as our departure date neared we still had a lot of items on our to-do list in spite of working 12-hour days to try to get everything done. Also, doing all the stuff on the list had pretty much depleted our savings. So, we decided to winter over in Newport, get the rest of the list done at a more reasonable pace and save some money. The upshot of this was that we got to get used to living on a 28' sailboat, in usually-crappy weather, without a car. But also without the added stress of big seas, round-the-clock watches, and new places. Consequently, by the time we actually took off, living on the boat and living without a car were just what we did. No big deal. This made it much easier to deal with all the new stressors that actually untying the dock lines brought forth.

Lulu: Just decide what steps you need to take and get started. Stephen really did all of the planning and I helped with the actual projects.

6.) Tell me your favorite thing about your boat.

Lulu: I feel safe and cozy at anchor and cruising.

Stephen: You mean besides the fact that she's the prettiest, saltiest looking thing in the harbor? My favorite thing about Siempre Sabado is that she's a Westsail with all that includes. The most important thing it includes is the amazing feeling of safety she gives us. We got tossed around a lot in Oregon and Northern California. It was very uncomfortable, But neither of us were ever scared that the boat couldn't handle it. We've talked about it so this is not just me putting words in Lulu's mouth. We had complete confidence in the boat to get us there safely. She's also small enough that you don't have to be worried about being tossed across the cabin in rough seas. You just can't get tossed very far.

7.) Tell me the least favorite thing about your boat.

Stephen: She's so SMALL! It would really be nice to have enough room to entertain another couple comfortably, or have the occasional overnight guest, or just to have enough room so that both of us could be doing something that requires moving around the cabin at the same time. And, of course, who couldn't use more storage? At this point in our cruising/liveaboard life, I can't think of much of anything else I'd want to store, even if we had a bigger boat. I'd just like to be able to store what we have in a more organized manner.

Lulu: Not enough room to accommodate family for more than a day sail. We used to have lots of room for visitors and I miss that.

8.) What did you do to make your dream a reality?

Lulu: Stephen has been reading about and planning this for years and has acted financially towards making this work for us. Once that was in order we just had to accept parting with all of our stuff and did all of the many things that that entails.

Stephen: We stayed out of debt as much as possible so we could save the money to buy our boat outright rather than finance it. Of course, this is why we ended up with a smaller boat, because it's what we could afford. Aside from that we both stuck with our jobs over the long haul so we could qualify for retirement and then cut out as many expenses as possible (sold our house, cars, no storage unit, etc.) so that our retirement income would be able to meet our expenses. I guess we basically burned our bridges so we didn't have much choice except to turn the dream into reality.

9.) With the benefit of hindsight, what are the boat selection criteria you would use to purchase a boat for long term cruising?

Stephen: Heavily-built for that safe, secure feeling. I would look for a larger boat, but not much larger. Maybe 32 to 34 feet, no larger. A pilothouse would really be nice a lot of the time. An actual u-shaped galley area. Simple electrical/plumbing/navigation/communication infrastructure. I like the simplicity, room, design and overall class of a Westsail 32. Since they don't come with pilot houses, I'd want a very strong removable canvas enclosure for the cockpit area. And, although not my first choices, I certainly wouldn't turn down a Fisher 34 or a Gulf 32 (though I'm partial to double-enders). For me, it's about safety, security, livability and aesthetics. How fast it sails or how high it points are secondary. That's why they make diesel engines. Oh yeah, and access to the engine without infringing on the living area. Kudos go, once again, to Westsail.

Lulu: Once again, Stephen is the one who has studied all of the choices and particulars. I feel like he did a great job. Siempre Sabado is small but very well equipped and comfortable for us.

10.) What question do you wish I would have asked you besides the ones I've asked you and how would you answer it?

Lulu: What is the most difficult aspect of the cruising lifestyle? It's hard to get used to being such a rookie. In my former life I had become pretty good at most of the things I needed to do. As a cruiser I have a lot to learn and I'm not real good at some of the new things I'm learning to do, yet.

Stephen: If you had it to do over again, would you? In a heartbeat! So far, there's really nothing about this lifestyle that I don't like. Sure, there are uncomfortable (sometimes VERY uncomfortable) passages, but there are also really nice magical passages. I've liked pretty much everywhere we've been so far, at least for awhile. Now that we're finally in the warm weather we were seeking, every day is so sweet, even the days that all we do is go get groceries and mule them back to the boat. I feel healthier, I've lost weight, I'm more relaxed, and I have more fun, more often. Yes, we're still novices, mere beginners. Will I be singing a different tune in a year or two? Who knows? But I kinda doubt it.

Estrellita 5.10b at 2 months

2011-01-21T01:00:00.000-08:00

Read this interview as originally published on The Giddyup Plan.
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Carol & Livia cruise aboard their Wauquiez Pretorien 35, SV Estrellita 5.10b hailing from Victoria, BC, Canada. They are spending their first year of cruising in British Columbia and plan to head South this summer.

The snapshots idea is that periodically over time we answer the same 9 questions and in the comment section readers can each ask us their own 10th questions. Two people with only two months of experience cruising.

We answered these independently and resisted the urge to change our answers after reading each other's. It was fun to see how the answers were sometimes identical and sometimes very different.

Carol
What do you love? Feeling like an intrepid explorer.
What do you dislike? Sails flapping on a no wind day and inflating/deflating kayaks and dinghy.
What do you worry about? Major things breaking.
What are you looking forward to? The unknown, the unexpected stuff.
Favorite place recently was the Bunsby Islands - specifically Scow Bay. Very peaceful.
Least favorite place recently was Nuchatlitz Marine Park. Not a good place to go after the Bunsby's.
A lesson learned is that guidebooks are great and useful and I wouldn't go without one but they can stop you from exploring. We stayed overnight at a few places that the book warned against staying overnight (probably covering their ass) but the conditions were right and we were fine.
Best gear award goes to...our electric system. It's the combination that makes it perfect - the batteries with the inverter etc.
Worst gear award goes to...the Ronstan snatchblock. It rusted and cracked with barely any usage.

Livia
What do you love? What I will be doing on any given day is based on my own whimsy and on the state of mother nature. On the one hand, the weather dominates our daily life. On the other hand, my life is completely free to direct as I will.
What do you dislike? "Bing Bong Bang" (the boat in no wind and a good swell) and inflating and deflating the dinghy/kayak.
What do you worry about? Dropping out of the social grid. Leaving old friends. Making new friends that I will soon leave.
What are you looking forward to? In the near future, seeing my family and spending part of the winter docked in cities in Washington I know well but haven't visited by boat. In the far future, snorkeling in warm water.
Favorite place recently is a tie between the quiet swimming holes at Mary's Basin and the busy but delicious Hot Springs Cove.
Least favorite place recently was Port Hardy.
A lesson learned is that because we were always sailing in busy places (e.g., the Gulf Islands) I thought I wanted isolation but now I realize that what I really want is something more like 40% just us, 40% anchorages with other fun boaters/paddlers, 20% towns.
Best gear award goes to...our solar panels...and our SSB.
Worst gear award goes to...our expensive snatch block which we bought for our preventer set up and which rusted and cracked in less than a year.

((Anyone a fan of the 7/14/21/etc up series? Or that movie by the Russian (?) director (Title: Anna?) in which he asks his daughter the same questions every few years? These snapshots are inspired by both plus my general interest in growth and development. ))

Windtraveler at 3 months

2011-01-20T01:00:00.000-08:00

Read this interview as originally published on Windtraveler.
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Us, the very day we left Chicago! Taken by our good friend, Les.

We are about three months into our journey. I cannot even believe how far we have come! We have come over 2,500 nautical miles, traveled through 11 states, endured all sorts of mishaps and adventures, met some incredible people and had the best time. In a lot of ways it feels like we've been gone longer than three months - and in some ways it feels like we just left yesterday.

I got the idea for this post from Livia of s/v Estrellita who also happens to be the author of the super cool Interview With A Cruiser Project . She granted us permission and encouraged us to use questions from their 'question bank'. So with no further ado - here's our little version of he said/she said - cruising style - in ten questions. Keep in mind we are only three months in - so these answers should be taken with the understanding that we are still "newbies".

What is the biggest lesson you have learned so far?
Brittany: That your imagination is much worse than the reality. That, and the fact that we selected a FANTASTIC, dare I say, "kick ass" cruising boat.
Scott: As of yet, cruising doesn't offer as much "free time"... or "down time" as you'd expect.

What is your favorite part about cruising?
Brittany: Living freely, traveling in your home, seeing new places, meeting new people. There is nothing that compares to traveling to a place by boat. Somehow it's just 'different'. I love it.
Scott: After hoisting the sails, the moment you turn off the engine... as well as the moment you turn off the engine after dropping anchor in a calm anchorage at sunset. [Editor note: true dat!]

What is your least favorite part about cruising?
Brittany: The fact that everything (even tiny things like making a cup of tea) require 10X more effort than they do on land. But you just learn to live with it. I hate doing dishes the most. Dish washing is the current bane of my existence. I have mastered dirtying as few dishes as possible and pretty much don't cook if it requires more than one pot.
Scott: All the motoring that's been necessary through all of the canals and ICW. As we head out to the Caribbean after the new year, I'm really looking forward to having the canvas up more and letting the horses rest.

What is something potential cruisers worry about that they shouldn't? And something they don't worry about that they should?
Brittany: I would say people worry about the basics like, "how do you shower? how do you eat? what will I pack?" - all this is really minor stuff that requires nothing more than some adaptation and a little homework. More people should worry about whether or not they are willing to do this 'adapting'. An "endless vacation" this is not, but a bad day on the water still beats a bad day on land!
Scott: Brittany will tell you, I do not believe in worry. My favorite Zen proverb is... If the problem has a solution, worrying is pointless, in the end the problem will be solved. If the problem has no solution, there is no reason to worry, because it can't be solved." That being said... stop worrying and just go! [Editor note: Yes. This is 100% true. I am slowly getting there.]

What was the biggest mistake you have made?
Brittany: We've made lots of little mistakes, but the biggest is probably when we went outside a channel marker and hit a rock. That sucked.
Scott: Actually, that was my mistake... not "we." The other was when I put out a fishing lure to troll for lunch and forgot that it was there. Then we came in to get fuel and had to do a few circles to wait for a boat to leave the fuel dock and proceeded to wrap the fishing line all around the prop. This was probably the 4th time I had to put on the wetsuit to dive under the boat. The others being... retrieving my cell phone I dropped in the water at the dock in Michigan, checking the prop shaft for what might have been causing the noise that we were hearing in the transmission, and checking the keel for damage after I hit the rock.

What is the most important attribute for successful cruising?
Brittany: Open mind, no agenda, realistic expectations, ability and willingness to adapt. Oh - and you should probably like sailing.
Scott: Not having inflated expectations. With anything, when you expect to much, your chances of being disappointed are much higher. We both looked forward to everything that cruising had to offer - including the ups and the downs.

What do you miss about living on land?
Brittany: Not much! Bikram yoga, unlimited water for showers/dishes, and access to free laundry. That's about it (besides friends and family, of course!).
Scott: I've gotta admit, every time I pull out the credit card, I miss having an income. Don't get me wrong, as much as I miss all of you at SweatVac, I don't miss sitting in front of a computer and phone all day.

How would you recommend someone prepare to cruise?
Brittany: Read as much as you can in books and forums (and learn to take some advice with a grain of salt - otherwise you'll never leave) and do as much of the work on your boat that you can - you will learn, pun intended, a 'boat load'. As first time boat owners and cruisers we didn't feel super 'prepared' when we left, per se - but we have learned that we were actually very prepared and know a lot more than we thought! Also - SAIL! Both of us raced for years and found this taught us a lot of the basics. Though racing on a boat and owning a boat are HUGELY different.
Scott: Don't get attached to your "stuff." Garbage bags and dumpsters... and craigslist... are your friends. Get rid of it!

When you are offshore, what keeps you awake at night?
Brittany: Gear failure. Period.
Scott: That mysterious ticking noise.

Is cruising as good or better than you imagined?
Brittany: Better. I already have no idea how we're going to go back to "land life"! Out here, away from the constraints of 'society', anything seems possible and that is a pretty incredible place to be.
Scott: As good and better and it get's better every day as we gain more experience and confidence with our abilities and our boat.

Zero To Cruising at 5 months

2011-01-19T01:00:00.001-08:00

You can read more about how Mike & Rebecca went from “zero” to “cruising” on their website.
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Mike and Rebecca Sweeney began cruising 5 months prior to this interview aboard Zero To Cruising, a PDQ 32 Altair Classic sailing catamaran hailing from Kingston, Ontario, Canada. They left Lake Ontario heading south via the Erie Canal and ICW and are currently in the Exumas.

What (if anything) do you wish someone had told you before you started cruising?
This is a bit of a funny question because only just recently, after making our way into what we think was a very sketchy entrance channel (Bimini) and anchoring in a crazy cay with a ton of current, we had someone tell us the next day how we need to be careful with both of those places. I jokingly said that she needed to be a bit more timely with her info.

The real answer to the question though is nothing. Prior to heading out, we researched the hell out of what we were getting ourselves involved with and because we were posting on our blog about this process almost daily, we received a ton of useful info, both from newbies like us and others who had already been there/done that. If that wasn't enough, we were "adopted" by a cruising couple now in Grenada and via email correspondence with them, have received a virtual university degree on the cruising lifestyle. Now of course, much like a university degree, everything we learned before heading out is just theory. Now we're getting the practical experience to go with it, but all of this help has, in our eyes, prepared us well.

In your first year of cruising, what transitions did you find the most difficult?
Leaving behind careers that involved daily sports and exercise (we owned and operated a martial arts gym), the hardest transition for us has been to not have that same physical outlet while on our boat. Although an issue for both of us, this has been a source of almost daily stress for Rebecca who was, in our land-based life, used to working out 3-4 hours per day. Being the self-motivated person that she is, she has really been working at finding a variety of alternatives to fulfill this need, while having fun at the same time. In fact, she has only just started blogging about this process to share with those who are interested in the subject. You can read about it on her site.

What mistakes did you make in your first year of cruising?
A better question would be "what mistakes didn't we make?" For example, not more than one hour ago, after being cooped up on our boat for a day and a half, riding out a strong weather front blowing through here, we got a bit stir crazy and decided to take our dinghy to shore to go for a walk. You know when the weather guys say that there is a "small craft advisory" in effect and that small vessels should stay in port, they mean dinghies too! We got totally blasted out there and we weren't even smart enough to have our PFDs on! Fifteen minutes later, we were back on our boat, soaking wet. That is just the most recent example. There are hundreds of others, I'm sure. Fortunately, none have been catastrophic or resulted in big injuries and/or super-expensive repairs. I honestly think this is just the process everyone needs to go through. Like my university example above, reading about something is one thing. You really need to fall on your face sometimes to drive the point home.

What do you enjoy about cruising that you didn't expect to enjoy?
This was a hard one to answer. I might get myself in trouble by saying this but in some cases, when troubleshooting a problem, building or repairing something, when it all comes together, there is a real satisfaction to it. This is not to say that before it comes together, I don't do my share of bitching and complaining, but standing over the finished work with a cold beer is really enjoyable. Of course, if we were to skip the work part and go straight to the beer, we might find that just as enjoyable too. Who knows?

What do you dislike about cruising that surprised you?
Having lived aboard our boat for a year before heading out, we were pretty much dialed into that aspect of the lifestyle. So because of this, I was already very aware of one of my pet peeves of boat living, that being the mess that is created every time a project needs to be done or some item needs to be dug out of a locker. This is just what happens when you have every object that you own stored in small lockers, one on top of another.

Since heading out cruising, although Rebecca appears immune, I have found that I get a bit seasick in rough weather. It has not been so bad that I have thrown up while underway (yet) but it does limit me from reading or doing much work down below. I'm not too pleased with that of course.

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you didn't find to be true?
This is no doubt due to the fact that we headed south very early in the season, quite a bit before most snowbirds would be on their way, but we had heard over and over how we would meet a ton of people while on the waterway. On the contrary, we met hardly anyone until after we made it into the Dismal Swamp portion of the ICW. Being very social people who enjoy hanging out with others, this was a bit disappointing for us. Now that the other cruisers have caught up to us though, that problem has disappeared.

What is something that you read or heard about cruising, that you found particularly accurate?
Let's start with these:
1. Weather reports (wind and wave estimates) are never right. Double them!
2. The wind is always on the nose. Always!
3. Stuff always breaks. Always!
4. You will spend lots of money dealing with number 3 above. LOTS!
5. Cruisers in general are very helpful and generous. VERY!

Is there something you wish you had bought or installed before starting cruising?
No, not really. We opted to wait to acquire/install a few things until we made it to the United States because we believed (accurately) that it would be cheaper to do so. For example, we wanted to acquire a Honda 2000 generator and arranged to have it waiting for us as soon as we crossed the border into the US. We also planned to install additional solar panels and waited until we were in Florida to do so.

What piece(s) of gear would you leave on the dock next time? Why?
The only thing we can thing of for this question is the PVC soft-bottomed dinghy and small outboard engine that we left Canada with. Although fine for coastal cruising in the lakes, etc, we decided that they wouldn't cut it in the Caribbean and we subsequently replaced both of them. We picked up a small used Hypalon RIB to replace the dinghy and days before leaving the US, purchased a new Yamaha 9.9 HP 2-stroke engine (that was our Christmas present to one another). The dinghy/outboard is a crucial piece of gear for cruisers. It is more than just your means of access to the shore (the family car). It is really a lifeline of sorts and having to rely upon a crappy or underpowered one is really a safety issue in our opinion.

As an adjunct to this question, what pieces of gear are we happy to have brought with us? At the top of the list is the upgraded ground tackle and windlass that we purchased. Our Rocna anchor and 100 feet of 5/16" chain allow us to anchor and sleep soundly virtually anywhere. We have never dragged (knock on wood) and the anchor sets instantly every time! Although we resisted installing an electric windlass, trying to keep our systems as simple as possible, we are now eternally grateful that we took the plunge and installed one (a Lewmar ProFish 1000). It makes deploying and retrieving that anchor and chain a non issue for us.

There are countless other things that make our boat work for us. The only way to really know what will work and what doesn't is to be out there on your boat, living and cruising on it.

What are your plans now? If they do not include cruising, tell us why.
To head south! Seriously, that has always been our answer. We barely know what we are going to do tomorrow so planning much beyond that doesn't work too well for us. Our longest term objective is that we plan to spend Hurricane season 2011 in Grenada. Where we go between here and there, we can't say. We do have some friends who will be heading south shortly from the US and it would be nice if they could catch up to us. For this reason, and the fact that we want to take the time to explore the areas we're sailing in as opposed to just rushing past them, we'll be taking our time moving on from here.

What question do you wish I would have asked you besides the ones I've asked you and how would you answer it?

Where did you get the idea that you wanted to go cruising?

You may have heard the warnings about drinking alcohol while sitting in a hot tub/jacuzzi. This is why. After one too many glasses of wine in our hot tub one night, Rebecca and I decided that we were just going to do it. "Doing it" entailed selling everything that we owned including our house and business and just heading off cruising. A big stumbling block to this plan was that neither of us had ever had any real sailing experience. This is where the name Zero To Cruising actually came from, Zero meaning zero experience. On that same night in question, we decided that it would be fun to document this process and came up with that name and registered the URL for the website. The rest is pretty much history, or at the least, published on the web for anyone to read. We suggest doing so with some wine in a hot tub. Just don't drop the laptop in the water. :)

Newly Salted

2011-01-13T13:25:00.000-08:00

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