by Dan | May 16, 2012 | Preparation Stage
It turns out Kyle is as crazy as we are.
I’ve talked about my brother Kyle previously when discussing various sailing adventures as well as my SCUBA progress… What I haven’t talked about are his and Becca’s (his wife) plans and dreams. I’m not going to try and articulate their dreams… no one could except them. Suffice it to say that they are planning on joining us in casting off and following our cruising dream. On their own boat, of course.
Kyle was the first person other than Michele that I discussed my crazy idea with. We were extremely excited about our newly hatched plans… almost giddy. Each time we researched cruising we became more convinced. We needed an outside opinion (We’ve since met with our friends Scott and Brittany from Windtraveler for one). Before approaching Kyle, I expected to meet resistance and a multitude of reasons why following my dream was impossible. Amazingly, I found nothing but support. Well… support and mutual interest. He began to express many of the same sentiments that Michele and I have about materialism, time freedom, and life in general.
I am not going to talk about the whys, the hows, whens, etc of Kyle and Becca’s plans… their story is their own. They have become part of Michele and I’s story in some ways, however. It is a huge comfort to know that we will be sailing with people we can implicitly, and without hesitation, trust. Not only will we have double the amount of spare parts, dinghies, tools, etc but we will have partners to experience the wonders of cruising with. I am sure there will be times when we wonder “What are we doing here?” Thankfully, we will have Kyle and Becca nearby for support. One of the things I am most looking forward to is meeting new people and new cruising buddies while we are on our adventures, but I am extremely lucky to have a brother that shares the passion and dream of cruising.
by Dan | May 9, 2012 | Preparation Stage
My favorite kind of school
I just took the last final exam of my college career. What does this have to do with cruising? Why would I waste my time going to college if I’m going to move onto a boat in the near future? Most immigration systems follow a “points” system. For each desirable attribute a potential immigrant has, points are added. Once you reach a certain threshold of points, you’re in. It really is that simple. Know English? 15 points! Have a college degree? 30 points! You get the picture.
Michele and I aren’t planning on emigrating from the US while we are cruising… but who knows? Perhaps we will get to New Zealand and decide we want to stay. I was four classes away so I figured the “points” gained were worth it. I absolutely hate school, however. With a passion. Don’t get me wrong… I love learning. I just hate school. It sucks the life out of me. You know what my classes remaining were for a computer science degree? English 1, English 2, Speech, and Java Programming. Really? Worthless is an understatement.
In the end, my classes didn’t teach me anything. I’m glad that I got the degree, however. I’ll hopefully never stop learning, but I dearly hope I have stopped schooling.
Follow your dreams. Follow the Horizon.
This will be our last NaBloPoMo post. We know that it isn’t the end of the month yet. We feel like we are posting just to post, instead of for the right reasons. We don’t want to clog your inboxes and feed readers unless it is worth reading. We will be returning to our normal Wednesday and Saturday post schedule… see you Saturday!
by Dan | May 3, 2012 | Preparation Stage
Good bye awesome car
Yesterday was a sad day in the life of my car ownership… I just sold the best car that I will ever own (previously of My Car and I went Diving fame). Car ownership and cruising don’t exactly go hand in hand, do they? Let me say that I like cars. I like driving, I like racing (not NASCAR, that doesn’t make sense to me), etc… I had a Saab 9-3 Aero with a 6 speed manual transmission. The engine was V6 Turbo Charged. That’s 276 screaming horse power in a sedan. I actually never lost a race, even against BMWs, Mercedes, Porches, Corvettes, and other less worthy challengers.
Hello future
It just wasn’t to be, however. Finance guru Michele figured out that we could save an additional $13,000 before our cast off if we traded my car for a cheaper one that we paid cash for. That $13,000 is around a year’s worth of expenses while cruising. Needless to say a year cruising the ocean beats a year cruising my 9-3 Aero to work any day… but it was still hard to drive off the lot leaving it behind. It is one thing to know and understand that following our dreams will require us to get rid of pretty much everything we own, but its another thing altogether to put those words into action. It’s bittersweet. I feel awesome that Michele was able to figure out how to save an additional year’s worth of expenses without needing to wait any longer before we cast off.
We now have one major To-Do List item checked off: pay off one of our car loans. We plan on doing the same with our other Saab 9-3 (yes, we used to own two…) in the future, but paying cash for our new GMC Jimmy kind of knocked our savings down temporarily. We will probably get nearly all of what we paid for the GMC back when we sell it, but we don’t have the cash to buy another car immediately. One car payment down, one to go, and a future to look forward to. Follow your dreams. Follow the Horizon.
by Dan | Apr 25, 2012 | Preparation Stage
After our second time sailing on the MacGregor, Michele and I decided to invite my youngest brother Alex, his girlfriend Stephanie, and my parents along for the ride. It was a bad idea. I guess after our second voyage I was pretty confident and felt that while I had not mastered sailing (if one can even “master” sailing) but I had at least established a foundation upon which to build. The wind was a steady 10-15 knots and gusting above 20… again a bad idea for trip number three. We had learned from our previous experiences when the river drops enough to lower the keel, when it was best to raise the main, etc. All in around 5-10 knots of wind. Not 10-15.
We raised the main too early. By “too early” I mean we weren’t yet in the channel and we couldn’t yet fully lower the keel… again a bad idea. This left us with two choices #1 sail with the keel not lowered far enough or sail with the keel dragging. We decided on not lowered far enough. This allowed us to at least move the boat into the channel at which point we would be able to lower the keel and point to wind. However, perhaps a little to leery of repeating my first sailing adventure, I did not want to go with the wind past the marina as we did in the first voyage. Again, a bad idea. Forcing the boat into the wind with the keel not in the correct position caused the high (for me) wind to push the boat down wind even though we were pointed around 60 degrees off wind. So at this point I have my parents, younger brother and girlfriend, wife, and baby on a boat that is pointed one way yet going another. Enough is enough, I am not too prideful to admit that I am not yet experienced enough to attempt the current circumstances. I decided to cut my losses and return to the marina.
We lower the mainsail and begin (electric) motoring back to the marina. At this point the wind begins blowing at a steady 20 knots. At least I made the decision prior to the wind picking up, right? Now all I have to deal with is a light boat that drafts 11 inches bobbing in 3 feet of water (can’t lower the keel) that is broadside to 20 knots of wind. With a trolling motor. Needless to say direction the bow was pointed had much less to do with the direction of travel than the force of the wind on the side of the boat. Even though we were motoring significantly windward of the marina entrance we ended up 500 or so feet down wind of the entrance. The little motor, while perfect once we are in the marina, was not capable of making headway against the wind. Dismayed, I turned the boat down wind and stopped at the free city boat launches about a quarter mile down river from our marina. The free boat launch lacks most things you would think are necessary at a boat launch… like a dock to stop at so you can disembark and retrieve the trailer. It fell to myself to jump in the water and walk the boat to a safe spot while I walked back to the marina. While I was moving the boat to a safe spot I kicked an underwater rock and broke a toe on my left foot. So let me recap my situation at this point for you, just in case you have lost track of the dismal events… I am standing in three feet of cold, murky water with only a coat, life preserver, and boxer shorts on pulling a boat that is being pushed by the wind, and just broke my toe with my family watching on. Extremely embarrassing. And now I am sharing this story with you… also embarrassing.
This pretty much sums up how I was feeling
I do not share this simply to embarrass myself. I share this story because it truly reminded me how different the cruising life will be from what I am used to. A more experienced sailor would have had no problems whatsoever in 10-15 knots of wind. Matter of fact we saw three other similarly sized boats sailing around. At the low point of the voyage (standing in the muck in my boxers) I couldn’t help but have a moment of introspection… What the hell was I doing?
No one but Michele and I are going to make our dream of cruising become a reality for us. I am acutely aware that there will be times when things won’t work out the way we expect, people will (and already do) think we are crazy, but we are following our dream. The purpose of buying a sailboat now was to learn to sail… and that’s what we’re doing. It’s not always going to be easy.
by Dan | Apr 7, 2012 | Preparation Stage
Kayaks are one of the early purchases
Michele and I have been wondering, “What should we buy now for cruising later?,” as well as its reciprocal, “What should we hold off on buying for cruising later?” These questions are more complicated and nuanced than at first thought.
The cruising community is great! There are so many cruising families willing to share their hard earned wisdom with us. One of these is the family of the S/V Totem. Behan of S/V Totem is detailing what people in the planning stage can buy early that will help later when they start cruising. Perfect for Michele and I!
So far Behan has covered books, personal gear, and water stuff (she calls it games… scuba is more than a game for me!). I really took note of part three of her series when she talks about scuba gear. I had incorrectly assumed the gear would be cheaper in the tropics due to so many more people being involved in scuba versus Illinois. I just bought a SCUBA set that I will use to become an instructor as well as while we are cruising. Before reading her post, I had assumed SCUBA gear would be cheaper in the tropics.
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| Taken during our recent trip to Shedd Aquarium. Can you ID it? |
As a scuba diver I would also recommend fish identification books. One of the best is Reef Fish Identification: Florida, Caribbean, Bahamas which is obviously for Florida, Caribbean, and Bahamas. Paul Humann has many other books as well for the different regions of the world. Fish identification books will be great as Carter begins to explore the colorful depths with us… the ocean will be our classroom.
Behan’s list will help Michele and I as we canvas garage sales and clearance aisles between now and cast-off. Having lists like hers lets us know what is OK to buy when we see a great deal and what is best to wait to purchase.
We are normal (well ok, not so normal) people that have a dream to see the world and live life as it was meant to be. We both have successful careers in the healthcare industry, even in this terrible economy. We want to break free of the current cycle of trading time for dollars and dollars for more and more things we don't need. So, we have decided to forego the fruits of our economic success and "retire" well before we are 30 and set out to see what is over the Horizon.