Working on our iridium go and making sure everything is working before our Boston run. Hopefully there’s a picture attached.
testing our iridium go sat connection
spot gen3 vs delorme inreach tracker
We love the fact that our family and friends can track us when we’re sailing and through Spotwalla we can put a map up on our blog (see our tracker page). We used the Spot Gen3 tracker when we were in States, Bahamas, Caribbean, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. We now have Delorme inReach onboard and have used it so far in the States.trip Ft. Lauderdale FL to Wilmington NC
We left Ft. Lauderdale Florida around 3 in the afternoon and arrived in Wilmington North Carolina at noon three nights later. We picked up Alex (above) from the airport in Florida and left as soon as he got on the boat. He put a shout out to Hank with Offshore Passage Opportunities to see if anyone was interested in coming with us on short notice. Glad we did! Alex is great with kids and a fast learner even if he is a chatter box. This way I got skip night watches so I was fresh to deal with the kids during the day.
meeting amazing people
A couple of days ago we got a message from a couple to come look them up if we were in Fajardo Puerto Rico. What the heck it wasn’t far out of our way and it broke our trip up. This is when we met the amazing couple on Fata Morgana – Maya, Evo and Mira. They write the blog The Life Nomadik.
These guys are true adventures after a simpler life. We were invited over for a drink and hung out for about an hour, as much as we can when the sun is setting and we have 3 hungry kids ready to go into a nuclear meltdown. The next morning we invited them over to our boat for a looky-loo. Later they helped us detangle our anchor from some sort of underwater cable – more than likely a power line. This is one of those families that you could know all your life and still be enthralled with their stories. I know we are destined to meet up with them again. If you see them in your travels make sure you go say hi and tell them that the Salty gang thinks they are the most awesome family out there!! They are heading south so keep a keen eye out. They don’t have a dingy and kayak everywhere – crazy buggers!
>>> so we hooked a cable of some sort. Total bummer, I had no clue what we were going to do. But Evo and Carl knew exactly how to fix the problem. Tie a line around the anchor, attach the line to our secondary windlass and pull it up. And hey presto, the anchor was free. Good work fellas.
We had thought this would be our last foul of the day. Sailing to the Dominican Republic was going to take roughly 36 hours and half way there we noticed the water pump kept turning on. Oh-no, we were out of water. Strange thing, we had just made water the day before. We are pretty free willy when it comes to water but there’s no way we could have gone through it that fast. Turns out one of our sail lines caught a water spigot and emptied our tank right onto the deck. We were enjoying the sail that much we didn’t even notice. Usually we put a stopper on the spigot before doing passages but because this one was so short we didn’t bother. Lesson learned, pay attention. For the next 2 hours all I heard was “mummy I”m thirsty, we have no water, I might die” – oh really, drama, drama, drama.
see you later BVI
Yesterday marked the first day in our great journey north. We’ve been in the BVI / USVI area for 3 months now and we’re ready to move on. We decided to sail all the way down to the Caribbean to give us all a chance to sweat and swim in warm water, once north we’ll be in colder temperatures for over a year. But there is only so much time you can cruise the BVI, the beaches just became another beach but it was nice to meet a bunch of great people. I think that’s what I find the hardest about living and moving around on a boat. We make these great friendships but they are only temporary. Typically everyone we meet are drifters like us, you quickly make a strong bond but then it’s time to leave. The girls were having a tough time with it at the start but now they know that they’ll meet other kids along the way. I can see now why it’s harder to live this lifestyle with older kids needing those long term friendships. I hope that when the kids get older they can make good friends along the way and keep in touch via emails and skype. Having 3 kids is tough but I know they will all be best friends forever. There’s barely any boredom onboard, they keep each other entertained.
But as I said we are now on our trip north. We’ll be making slow progress through the Puerto Rico, DR and Bahamas. We hope to hit North Carolina in about a month for some canvas and welding work – there’s some great people in Wilmington NC. From there up to Plymouth MA maybe via Savannah – I love Savannah GA.
The sail from Christmas Cove, USVI to Culebra (island off of Puerto Rico) was a little lumpy. Once our course was set it smoothed out to be a great downwind sail at 8 knots. As we got closer to the island the seas got larger and confused and I found myself laying on the saloon floor clutching my water and ginger tablets. Of course this is the time I get taken advantage of, I had the girls brushing my hair and the baby trying to touch my teeth through my nose. Yes little fingers can get fairly far up my nose. If we were a usual sailing couple I would have been in the cockpit most of the time and probably would never have gotten sick but with kids and a rolling boat I had to be in the cabin to make sure everyone was ok and that the baby didn’t hurt himself getting around. Once in past the reefs all was well, we got off the boat and chased some lizards.
It feels soo refreshing to be moving again and exciting for what lies ahead. Between here and the States there’s a lot of lists to be written, people to contact and plans to be made. I feel like we’re the team that builds those surprise dream houses in a month, it’s all about the prep before you get to the jobsite.
So stay turned for our progress north. Our Spot tracker plan ran out and we won’t be getting another tracker until we get an Iridium Satellite phone. I’ll be updating regularly so you know where we are. Also check our facebook site for updates.
sailing pictures
Big thanks to Jody from SV Mary Christine – where the coconuts grow blog.
On our way to the Bitter End she shot these great pictures for us. Great afternoon of sailing.
Here are some other shots I took on the same day.
We had a crazy amount of pelicans, more than pictured, surrounding our boat before we left the anchorage. We think we have some funk Newfoundland growth on the bottom that attracts fish. We looked like a stinky fishing trawler.
The girls enjoyed some tub races underway, one of the advantages of a monohull over a cat.
one down ____ to go
1021 hours underway, that’s just over 42 days
Averaged 6.7 knots
6872 nautical miles
So we have been living aboard and cruising for just over a year now and loving it. When we started we weren’t really sure if this was going to be the life for us. But like with everything we sold all our possessions and jumped in head first. The first month was challenging for us. The girls took their time to adjust while we did projects on the boat readying her to sail to the Bahamas from North Carolina.
Once we got going there was no turning back. It was tough sailing at the beginning, after all I was 6 months pregnant and we had a 2 and 3 year old running around. But boy did we make the best of it and packed a lot into our first year.
We bought a boat, readied her to sail, sailed to the Bahamas, had our 3rd baby, sailed up to Massachusetts to visit family for a breather. From there we sailed further north to Nova Scotia and circumnavigated Newfoundland. We found icebergs, we ate icebergs. Back down to Maine. We found lobster pots, we snagged lobster pots, we cursed those F*#KEN AS!HOLE lobster pots. Had another breather in Massachusetts. Set sail for the Caribbean and that’s where we are now. Wow it was a lot to cram into a year.
Here are some other fun highlights:
-
Did my first crash jibe and bent our boom
-
Experienced a natural birth in the Bahamas – drugs next time please, not that there will be a next time!
-
Saw our first killer whales in Newfoundland
-
Found out that whip lash is possible when hitting rocks at 5 knots – gotta love a steel boat
-
After countless swim lessons and bribery Pri finally learnt how to swim from an 8 year old in 30 minutes at a pool
-
Keeping a container of hermit crabs onboard with no lid is never a good idea
-
Don’t leave garbage on deck in the States, raccoons will board you
-
Never sail when pregnant, severe seasickness is inevitable.
-
Sailing with kids is 100 times harder than without
We are still waiting on the evening that we can actually sit in the cockpit, cocktail in hand and watch the sunset. Every day seems like a marathon with kids onboard, but every month that goes by it gets easier.
So have we learnt anything? Yeah probably a bit. Carl is definitely a better sailor than me and I’m better at teaching the girls. It has been tough on our relationship but I believe we are stronger for it. So how long are we going to do this for? I really don’t know, put it this way we’ve been travelling for a year and feel like we’ve barely scratched the surface.
Plans for next year…
Things are pretty up in the air at the moment. We’ve been trying to stick close to the States due to some unfortunate family illness’s. But we are bold enough to want to plan on doing the Northwest Passage this summer? Maybe.
So has cruising changed our marriage? In a way yes, Carl now forces me to read every sailing book ever written and happy hour now begins at 5pm, maybe a smidge before. We spend 24/7 with each other and the kids. What does this mean? This means going to the bathroom while still in conversation, waking up to kids in the bed and not realizing how they got there. Lots of beer, lots of rum and mostly good times.
2013
October – Wilmington, North Carolina 
November – Wilmington, North Carolina
December – Wilmington, North Carolina
2014
January – Bahamas
February – Nassau, Bahamas
March – Nassau Bahamas (Crew’s Birthday)
April – Bahamas (Easter)
May – Massachusetts
June – Massachusetts
July – Nova Scotia
July – Newfoundland
August – Newfoundland
September – Nova Scotia, Maine, Massachusetts
October – Massachusetts 
November – BVI’s, Caribbean
- 1
- 2
- 3
- …
- 5
- Next Page »
