S/V Adventurer

Those of you who know me well, know that I love fishing; especially river fishing.   So as my first official act of retirement...I went fishing.  I can't remember the last time I had 5 days off in a row, not to mention being able to fish for 5 days in a row, so this was kind of a major event for me.  And since Brenda wasn't around, I could eat bacon for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  (If you read this Brenda, I only had bacon for breakfast and lunch...we had salmon for dinner....with a side of bacon). Its not really even the act of fishing that I love.  Its the whole process.  I enjoy the anticipation of going, the shopping for snacks to throw in the boat, even stopping by the fishing store to see what bait and lures are working.  Once we are on the river is when things get even more enjoyable.  The sound of the water under the boat, reading the water, deciding what path to take, and rowing like crazy in big water....

Our little floating home is a 1982 Cooper 416 pilot house sailboat.  The Boat is 42' long and 14' wide at her widest point.  She is a good boat.  We named her Adventurer.  She was made on Vancouver Island by a bunch of crazy Canadians back in the early 80's when apparently shag carpet was in style.  They put that shag on everything...the walls, the floors, they probably would have put it in the fridge if someone would have let them, just to keep the Molson's from clanging around. Our boat has 2 bedrooms and one bathroom (the brochure claims that it has a soaking tub, although you can only really soak your big toe), a little kitchen, a dining room, a navigation station complete with a place to drive from inside the boat when the weather is nasty, and even extra places to sleep if you are about 3 feet tall and able to contort into very uncomfortable shapes.  We have enough storage for Brenda's 22 pairs of shoe's...

I don't think that a lot of people understand what it is that we are trying to do.  I also don't think that a lot of people like their spouses, at least not enough to be stuck in a small space for a long time with them.  The most common statement I get when I talk to people about our upcoming adventurer is "I hope you like your wife!" (actually, that is statement number 2.  Statement number 1 is "watch out for pirates", but I digress).   The truth is, I do like my wife.  We are pretty great together.  We make a great team.  We both have an adventurous spirit and appreciate the thought of real freedom.  So this post is about the Team.  I like to refer to us as the "A" team.  Not the A-team from the 80's TV show that I used to love as a kid, but the A-team, as in first string, the all star team, the best, the team you want when the going gets rough...you get the picture.  (The A-team from the TV show isn'...

Only 4 weeks left....WOOOO HOOOO!!!!  Anyway, I have been getting tons and tons of questions about everything imaginable.  I am hoping this will help answer some of those questions.  They are in no particular order but some of these crack me up. So lets get started: Have you ever sailed before? Yes.  Quite a bit actually.  What about pirates? Pirates are real and scary and also pretty well documented on where they are at.  We are going to avoid the places with pirates.  Its a pretty simple plan.  What are you going to do for food?  Luckily for us, wherever people are at, there is generally food.  We can carry a few months worth of food on the boat when we are away from civilization and when we are anywhere with people, we will eat what the locals eat.  That's part of the adventure. What about drinking water? We have a water-maker on the boat which turns the sea water into crystal clear pure drinking water....

With only another 6 weeks to go, it is starting to get a little bit stressful and exciting all at once.  We are starting to feel the pinch of time closing in on us.  It seems that we have been planning this for such a long time so we should be ready to go...not the case! It turns out that there are a lot more things that need to be done.  Tons of little things that you wouldn't really think about until its almost too late.  Things like updating passports, getting vaccinations (which is a story in itself...think of a human pin-cushion...ouch!), and lots of little boat projects that have been lingering.  Since we leaving on an open ended trip, we are getting rid of all of our stuff as well.  When I mean all of our stuff, I mean ALL of our stuff.  We have lived aboard our boat for a long time so I always thought that we lived pretty minimalistic but it turns out that we have a lot of stuff to get rid of.  ...

I have been getting a lot of questions about where we are going to go and how long we are going to be gone so hopefully this will answer some of those questions. The plan at this point is to sail north through British Columbia towards Alaska for the summer.  We will come back at the end of the summer and store our boat for about 8 to 10 months while we travel around the states in our camper.  After the state side adventure we will head back out on the boat and start our around the world sailing trip.  We will follow the wind and weather patterns and make a pacific loop for our first leg of the trip.  This loop will take us down the coast through Mexico and Central America to Panama where we will turn right and head  to the Galapagos Islands.  After the Galapagos we will continue the loop out into the Pacific to the Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia, the Cook Islands and on to New Zealand.  We will probably ...

Only 10 weeks to go!