Things I used to do

We are back to the “living in a mooring field” routine. We have just about decided, whenever Kintala runs out of water, to drop the mooring lines and head to the dock. It doesn’t take any more time than repeated runs in the Ding hauling water jugs, is easier on the back, warms up the oil in the Beast, and wakes all the accessory gear out of its slumber to make sure it all still works. It is also some practice for one part of running a boat where I could use some practice, getting on and off a dock. Not serious practice since the fuel dock here is really easy, an open face dock that sits parallel to the current flow. The only trick is to wait for something other than peak for that current, and not go in on a weekend. I’m pretty shy about the current, it can peak out at near two knots here, and I don’t want to push my luck.

It didn’t used to be that way.

Once upon a long, long time ago Deb and I owned a little Cessna 150 airplane. It was equipped with an engine having 50% more horsepower than the original, and modified wings. All which added up to impressive short take off and landing capabilities. (STOL in pilot speak.) It could also fly at very low indicated airspeeds. (And do a pretty decent loop and barrel roll, though don’t tell anyone I told you that.) One day I didn’t have much to do and the wind at the airport where we based was howling directly down the runway at something like 40 knots. So I went out to fly, doing repeated take offs and landings just for fun. (Touch and goes in pilot speak.)

Normally one flies a rectangle pattern around an airport. But that day launching into that wind was almost a vertical take off. Accelerating to near cruise speed while in a slight climb would bring the far end of the runway underneath.  Then the 150 could be slowed and flown at a low enough airspeed for it to drift backward down the runway at about 20 knots, still nose into the wind and under full control. When the approach end of the runway passed below, putting the nose down and accelerating would get the wheels over the runway, then, if the power was played just right, they would touch down and barely spin. I don’t recall having managed a perfect hover landing, but I got pretty close. It was a hoot. But now I can’t imagine what I was thinking or why I would try such a thing. And yes (for those who know a bit about little airplanes and big winds) taxiing to the runway and then back to the hanger was, by far, the most difficult part of the flight. Forty knots worth of wind is enough to put a 150 on its back if one taxis without paying attention.

These days I would not even try to bring Kintala to a dock in a 3 knot current, even with a clear approach path. It should work. Drive up close at a shallow angle, use the Beast just enough to equal the boat speed to the current, and hand a line over without comment. But back in my Cessna 150 days I was too young to know better, too sure of myself to think of all the things that could have gone wrong, and was a far better airplane driver (then) than I am boat pilot (now).

We’ll wait to near slack current to go fill the water tanks.

Tales from the refugee road…

Life would be a whole lot easier if hurricanes would make up their minds earlier, then let all the social media outlets know what’s going on. Our little family caravan has been in three different hotels the last three nights, scooting along hither and yon based on where the latest guess of where Florence will dump the huge load of water she has dragged across the Atlantic these last couple of weeks. We didn’t have a reservation at the first hotel we stopped at in Augusta, GA; having left a half day early to be on the leading edge of the refugee wave. We know what it's like to worry about the gas gauge nudging empty, crawling along with thousands of others on bumper to bumper four-lane highways, short tempers and crazy people in the driver’s seats. Once in a lifetime was enough.

The decision to leave early was a good call, and we landed in a nice hotel after an easy drive. But it cost well over $100 / night. The next night we moved to the hotel where we had reservations for a week, one where the cost was modest. Unfortunately, the accommodations were far more modest than the price suggested, and when the forecast put Augusta well within the flooding and tropical force winds it didn’t seem a good place to stay. There was no inside hallway so the door faced the outdoors. Even closed air, sunlight, and insects had easy access around the edges. Rain would surely just pour into the room when the weather folded, and the families would either be jammed into one small area for the duration or isolated from each other with no inside access. The windows were paper thin and not well mounted. It wasn’t hard to imagine a wind gust driving them right across the room. We decided to bail and head further inland.

The new destination was Chattanooga, about a 4 hour drive away. But the youngest member of the crew, the 8-month-old, went into full volume protest the minute we left the parking lot. She has no clue what is going on; all she knows is that her routine is upset so, so is she. She didn’t settle down even after nearly two hours on the road, Mom and baby both needed to stop. The next exit was Madison, and that’s where we landed.

This hotel has inside access, it also has a toilet that runs continuously, the phone is broken, there is no elevator to our second floor, the ice machines don’t work, there was no toilet paper on the roll or in the room, and the advertised internet connection isn’t. All ours for just shy of $100 / night after taxes and fees. Normally I would bail on such a place, but the little ones don’t really care about any of those things and they are just not up to making four moves in four days. So we will ride out the storm here.

How long that will be is still an open question. It looks like the brunt of the impact will be north and west of Beaufort, SC. There seems a pretty good chance that the boats will come through, so we will have homes when we return. Power, flooding, and road access will determine when we head back. Until then we will settle in here and make the best of it.

I was an airplane driver for decades, and put about a quarter of a million miles on motorcycles while wondering around the country. I have spent more than my share of time in hotels. There have been good ones, bad ones, and average ones uncounted. But it seems to me that, on the whole, “average” has dropped several notches in the hotel industry, while the price of “average” has gone way, way up. I would love to list names and addresses' of the hotels in question with the idea that if no one complains nothing gets fixed. But I don't have that much faith in the "customer service" side of America's economic system any more. I would love to believe that companies have some commitment to providing the best service they can at a fair price. But what I know is that their main, perhaps only, concern is how much profit they can make. I fear the cost of fixing things, if they were fixed at all, would fall on the people who work here instead. Costs to fix the facility would be found by reducing the workforce, cutting pay, cutting benefits (assuming there are any), while increasing the work load. That was my experience even in the high end world of aviation operations. I can't imagine hotel workers are fairing any better.

All and all I would much rather be on the boat. I just wish the hurricanes would cooperate a little more.

Internal Calendar

One of the things I stumble over when sitting for a long time is forgetting just how special it is to live on the water like we do. When moving, my internal calendar logs days of resting at anchor after a day’s travel, watching the sun set over a new horizon. There are days of exploring new places and other days of visiting favorite places not seen for a while. We will have flown sails, gotten on and off of docks never seen, worked navigation details, fussed over the weather, and been enchanted by the antics of wildlife. All things that are special to this life.

It is different when sitting. The internal calendar logs days we ran out of water, that we needed to provision, that the Ding needed its bottom scrubbed, and that diver came to clean the bottom of Kintala. We do all these things while underway of course, but they pass mostly noticed, just part of the traveling. When sitting they become the major event of the day.

Days sitting also amplify the feeling being vulnerable. I doubt that we are any less vulnerable sitting secure on a mooring ball than when out wandering. When out wandering it feels like we are, at least, a moving target rather than sitting ducks. It is hard to cling to the illusion that one is the “Captain of one’s fate” when one’s boat is collecting barnacles on the bottom far faster than miles in the log.

It doesn’t help that the hurricane train in the Atlantic is starting to crank up. Nothing kicks up that vulnerable feeling like having an ocean full of storms.  Hurricane Florence which, until this morning, was expected to struggle to just make hurricane status, is now a major hurricane. Even more fun? The National Hurricane Center has all but admitted they have no clue what this storm is going to do next. I extrapolated a course based on its actual (rather than forecast ) course from the last few days. Should it decide to just keep going the way it is going, which is supposedly highly unlikely, it will show up on our door step in about 10 days. There is at least one spaghetti track floating around that shows it doing exactly that. By the end of next week there looks to be a good chance there will be three named storms out there dancing around. The end of hurricane season suddenly seems like a long, long way off.

For all of that, come every evening after the sun goes down the cockpit calls. The air is warm bordering on comfortable, insect assaults are infrequent and easily ignored, dolphins often puff and snort, cavorting around the mooring field, and all is well in our watery world. That makes for a pretty good day to log on that internal calendar.

Motionless blues

It seems likely Kintala will ride out the rest of the hurricane season in Beaufort, SC. It isn’t really a plan, just the way life seems to be unfolding at the moment. There are days when I get restless to the point of distraction, but there is much to be said for being here. Blowin' In The Wind remains on the next ball over. Good friends Paul and Deb stopped by for a visit on the way to time with their own grandkids. Having just of few of the people you love most in the world nearby is far better than having none, though you are constantly reminded of those still far away. We are slowly getting around to boat projects that really need done, and there are writing projects in the works. Writing, for Deb and I, is a craft; something we do for the shear joy of word-smithing. Occasionally, we manage a project that other people appreciate, which still amazes me. On the rare occasion where the appreciation is expressed with a few shekels coming our way, well, that's okay too. Sitting leaves some time for writing.

When one is motionless like this, there is much good to be said about being tied to a dock. For the most part, the boat is as safe as it can be while still sitting in the water. Shore power is available so air conditioning is an option. Not only does it make for better sleeping at night, dry air in the boat helps in keeping an upper hand on the war of the mold. Keeping the water tanks full is easy and quick. There is often a long, hot shower just steps away, greatly easing the burden on the water tanks. And, most convenient, getting on and off the boat is almost as easy as walking through the front door of a dirt dwelling. But docks are expensive. Unlike our stays in the Tampa area, the money flow here is all one direction, out.

So we are in the mooring field. It is often just on the far side of being comfortable with the sun, heat, and humidity. Battle with the mold is, at best, a stalemate. Filling the water tanks will consume much of a day’s effort. And getting on and off the boat requires the Ding.

I don’t know much about horses and have certainly never relied on one as the primary mode of transportation. But it seems the Ding and a horse have a lot in common. The Ding needs constant care. To get going in the morning the fuel needs checked, the night’s rainfall needs pumped out, and some air will likely need pumped in. It has to be tied up whenever left to its own devices, otherwise it will wander off. Sadly, unlike a horse, it will never find its way back to the barn all by itself.

The Ding’s little motor is, at best, temperamental. I swear the thing has the equivalent of moods; best described as manic / depressive. Sometimes it starts on the first or second pull. Sometimes it doesn’t start until the last pull before you give up and start taking it apart. Sometimes it idles too fast to shift, requiring momentary use of the cut-off / safety switch to get into gear without a damage inducing “thud”. (Some really old airplanes used ignition interruption instead of a throttle, which is where the idea came from.) Sometimes it will not idle at all. And sometimes it will putter away as if it was the most well behaved engine human kind ever invented. (Okay, that doesn’t happen very often.) And when the Ding and motor need cleaned it is a smelly, dirty job.

The worst it's ever been - Stuart, FL  in 2015

In barely a month, the menagerie of critters, creatures, and botany that lurks in these waters will accumulate to where the little motor struggles, the Ding wallowing through the water like a small horse carrying a Sumo wrestler up a steep  hill. Worse, the critters are literally disassembling the Ding from below. They worm their way past the cement seams of repair and reinforcement patches, peeling them back so water leaks in and air leaks out.

I have serious concerns about the dingy davits on a lot of boats. But having them just to keep the little boat out of the water when one is on an extended stay is now on my list of “good things to have.” Kintala’s stern is far to narrow and crowded for such things. Once upon a time we tried to come up with a way to lift the Ding on a halyard every night, more out of deference to thieves than to critters. But we couldn’t come up with a system that worked very well, relying on a stout cable and hefty lock instead. We are going to give it another try lest the Ding be utterly destroyed before it is time to leave this place.

That doesn’t happen when one is on the move. The Ding stays in the water for a week or less at a time. Each time it comes up on deck in preparation for the next departure, what few critters and little slime has accumulated get wiped away, often in less than an hour. There is no damage done and we are on our way. Sometimes when we stop for a day or three, anchored in some remote place or waiting out some weather, the Ding never gets wet. Instead it is hoisted up like a breeze catcher, high enough to open the v-berth hatch while keeping the foredeck in the shade.

The Ding on its better days

Occasionally, when on the move, stops coincide with docks. For a night or two the boat will be plugged in. The water tanks will get filled regardless, the holding tank usually emptied as well. Getting off the boat is an easy step. A long, hot shower may be just steps away.

And the Ding stays safe on the deck.

Plans, and the lack thereof...

Kintala is well into her second month of riding to the same mooring ball in Beaufort, SC. This wasn’t really part of the plan when we left Tampa Bay. Then again, the only real plan we had when we left Tampa Bay was to rendezvous with Blowin’ In The Wind and keep going north. It took longer than anticipated to meet up and we didn’t really manage that until we got here, already a good bit north of where we started. And, from here, we had a plan to visit St. Louis for a couple of weeks. It was a great trip full of fun and laughter, including a day spent in a climbing gym belaying grand kids up and down a 50 foot climbing wall. How cool is that? Deb and I even made a couple of our own climbs, belaying each other. The people who run the gym went out of their way to make it a good day.

When we left Tampa Bay I had thoughts of aiming for the Chesapeake Bay.  It has been a while since we cruised those waters and I like the place. And though not perfectly safe from hurricanes, it is still far less likely to get blasted than places further south. I used to think, compared to places south, that it was cooler up there as well, And it is, for part of the year anyway. Right now spot checks of the weather suggest this summer in Baltimore has not been appreciably more bearable in the heat department than Beaufort. In fact the rumors are that the Chesapeake is a bit of a rough go at the moment. Constant rainfall, a flood of debris, and a bumper crop of biting insects have taken some of the fun out of living on the water there.

It is impossible to say what the hurricane season will turn out to be like. So far the Atlantic has been quiet. The Pacific, on the other hand, appears to running a hurricane production line at full speed. I can’t decide if that is a good omen for this coast, or a bad one. But Beaufort, SC might not be a bad place to be either way. We are miles up the river from the sound and more than 10 miles inland from the coast. We asked the people at the marina where the locals take their boats when a hurricane comes. We were told they bring them here, to this marina. Apparently they have never lost a boat off of one of the mooring balls or at the dock. Our hurricane plan might consist of nothing more than stripping the boats, adding multiple lines to secure them to the balls come what may, and getting inland another 50 miles or so. Better, perhaps, than we could do if caught flat-footed at the mouth of the Chesapeake.

Blowin' in the Wind on the ball to our stern

So maybe this is a far north as we are going to get this year. The weather is bearable and, on some days, down right pleasant. The thunderstorms have been far less threatening than those in Biscayne Bay and often come late in the afternoon. Giant air conditioning systems that cool the boats and the air, hide the sun for the worst part of the afternoon, and offer up a good night’s sleep. Surprisingly, though there are marshes all around, insects have been a non issue on the boat. Expect to get nibbled on a bit if in the park as the sun goes down, but that is about it.

One downside to this place is just how fast stuff grows on anything that sits in the water. The Ding really needs cleaned about every two weeks. I cringe at the thought of laying to an anchor and 100 feet of chain. What a mess that would be to get on board when it comes time to move on. The cost of the mooring ball is (almost) worth not having to deal with that. The good news is that the dive service that works the marina and mooring field is a first rate operation. They charge by the hour which sounds a bit scary at first. But they are honest about the time it takes to do the job right. The charge is less for those on the dock. (There is a long waiting list for a full time dock.)

Another downside is the current that flows though here, first one way, then the other, for most of the day. New and Full moon tidal ranges are impressive. If yours is a rowing dink, expect a good workout. Blowin’ In The Wind has a sailing dink. The other day Grandson Eldest and I took it out in light winds and full current. At first we made couple of hundred feet of headway against the flow. The winds eased just a bit and the best we could do was hold station. The winds eased a bit more and we needed to call the Mother Ship to tow us away from the marina docks. The Merc had its little, 3.5 horsepower hands full, pulling both boats home.\



For now we are less cruisers and more live-a-boards…again. That will likely change…again. We just don’t have a plan for when.

Does Size Matter? (Five Year Review Post #1)

Ed Note: As we complete our fifth year of full-time cruising/living aboard, we've been taking stock of a lot of things and evaluating the life. We will be doing a series of posts about it called The Five Year Review. They will be tagged as such and can be found in a sidebar list on the right.

When you first begin to consider the life of full-time cruising, the first thing you're likely to hear espoused is, "Go small, go now!" It has its merits, as many a dreamer has waited to go cruising in a bigger boat only to discover that either they or their traveling companion have developed health issues and they can't go at all. There's also the younger couple wishing to travel on a year sabbatical before kids, or the solo sailor taking a gap year before college who would benefit going small, cheap, and soon. Its success, in my opinion, depends largely on having a short-term designated cruising period in the plan. You can endure many less levels of comfort if you know that you're going to return to your landed, comfortable life in a year or two. When we decided to go cruising, we went all in. We sold everything and moved onto the boat with an indefinite and unspecified cruising plan. We don't fit into any of the short-term categories and, after five years of cruising and after a good cruising friend began struggling with the topic, I wanted to address this issue of "Go small, go now" for any of you who might be thinking of taking the plunge.

First of all, I realize that the phrase has become the Holy Grail of cruising circles. Its authors are well-respected in the cruising community and we benefited from their knowledge as we prepared to leave. I'm grateful for their contribution to the knowledge base but, as with any generalization, this one falls short of applying to all who desire to live on the water and ply its depths. Their mantra does apply to a very large percentage of those wanna-be cruisers, but the retiring couple who wants to coastal cruise is probably not one of them.

First, let's take a look at the typical coastal-cruising retired couple. Usually (again there are exceptions) the East Coast coastal-cruising couple travels north along the coast during the warm summer months to avoid the heat and hurricanes. The trip south is made in the fall and may involve a long stay somewhere in Florida or a trip to the Bahamas over the winter, ergo the moniker "Snow Birds." Again, there are many who do not fit any mold, but the vast majority of the retired coastal cruising couples we run into fall into three categories:

1. Those that have a home paid for that they keep as a destination for when they quit cruising. The home is rented or is lived in by family members who care for it until the couple quits cruising and returns to the home. Large amounts of possessions are either stored in the home or in a rented storage facility.
2. Those that are "commuter cruisers" like our friends Dave and Jan Irons on  Winterlude. They live on the boat for 6 or 7 months out of the year and live in their home the rest of the year. This group also includes folks like our friends Paul and Deb on Kelly Nichole who cruise eight or nine months of the year and spend the other months in rented apartments near their girls and grandkids. Some others like our friends Bonnie and Craig on Odin the Wanderer cruise six or seven months a year and tour the country in their RV the rest. A variation of this are our friends Robert and Rhonda of Life on the Hook who cruise during the fall/winter/spring and then take their boat back to Pensacola to a marina for the hurricane season. 
3. Those that sell everything and move permanently onto the boat, traveling to different lattitudes throughout the year in order to dodge hurricanes and to find a comfortable temperature in which to live. That would be us.

So here's the kicker: the determining factor as to which group you may fall into is almost always decided by one thing: money.

It's an ugly fact of life (one we like to ignore) that money does in fact buy happiness to some extent, at least when it comes to full time cruising on a sailboat. Living on a severely restricted budget adds a level of stress to what can already be a stressful lifestyle change. There are many out there who say they can live comfortably on less than  $1,000 per month while cruising on a sailboat, but we are just not them. We have a very modest boat, we rarely eat out, and we rarely visit tourist attractions that cost money. We're not independently wealthy, having been forced out of our jobs in the aviation industry about two years before we had adequate funds to sustain our cruising indefinitely. As a result, we've had to stop to work along the way to replenish the cruising kitty.

Before we left in 2013 we knew that we would have to stop to work, but hoped that it would be short stints at something we really enjoyed. We had a goal to make it through to Social Security age, at which point those benefits would fund the majority of our budget and our investments would fund the balance. After a few years of cruising along with a couple unexpected medical bills and boat maintenance issues, it became painfully clear that our budget was much higher than we had estimated and that the benefits we would receive through Social Security at age 62 would not fund our life aboard. We were, in fact, going to have to wait until nearing 67 before claiming benefits. As a result, seventeen months of the five years have been spent on the dock working full time in a boat yard in Florida in the summer heat. Not exactly what we envisioned when thinking about Living the Dream.

In order to try to curb the work time, we began to look at trying to curb expenses to fit the available funds. Spending is a very personal matter, and only you can determine what you are able and willing to live with. In a sidebar of the blog we have listed links to a group of cruisers who are willing to share their cruising expenses (including ours although I'm behind on updating them) but they are merely guidelines to help you plan.

Behind our budget is the base issue that we have lived in poverty and have absolutely no desire to do so again willingly. When we first got married we were living on $1.74 an hour that I made working at a mall pet store. Our early years of marriage were a string of shared housing with friends (because none of us had enough money to afford rent by ourselves,) shared vehicles (because none of us had enough money to keep more than one of them running at any time,) and our entertainment was sitting around the one floor heater drinking hot chocolate and telling stories. Sound romantic to you? Not so much. Laying on frozen ground under a VW bus trying to get it running for work the next morning, all the while peeling tools from your frozen fingers is not something any soul on earth would volunteer for willingly. We have had an intimate relationship with poverty and simply do not wish to spend our remaining years reliving that experience. Trying to cruise on $1,000 per month feels way too close to that life.

So how does one define their personal level of comfort when preparing a budget for full-time cruising? While everyone's comfort level is different, at some point comfort greatly effects the fun to suck ratio. Too little comfort and the ratio tilts heavily to the suck side. Here are some things to think about in trying to define your comfort level. The list is in no order and is not inclusive.

1. Food: Do you cook? Are you willing to prepare most meals onboard? Do the areas you want to cruise in  have inexpensive food that you like? If you eat out a lot, how much do you typically spend? Do the areas you want to cruise in have restaurant prices that will fit your budget?
2. Alcohol: Do you like to drink socially? If so, you can expect your alcohol bill to increase exponentially. Cruisers are known for drinking socially and unless you either plan to curb your intake or budget for it, this area can sink you (pun intended.) Drinks in bars in a lot of cruising destinations are much more expensive than those in the US and definitely more than buying ingredients in a store and preparing them yourself. I once read a budget post on a blog where they stated that certain things weren't included in the list. Alcohol was one of them and I immediately disregarded their budget because alcohol can easily become a significant part of your budget if you drink even moderately.
3. Communications: Phones, internet, satellite communicators...Can you do with one phone between you or do you plan on having two so you can communicate when one person goes ashore and the other remains on the boat? How much access to internet to you want? Access to free wifi, even with a booster, is a myth in many cruising locations. Passwords are often changed daily in restaurants and bars, requiring you to purchase something to get a new password (see #2.) Do you want a DeLorme InReach satellite communicator or even a sat phone so you can reach help when offshore? Do you want to be able to Skype with your grandkids on a weekly basis?
4. Health Insurance: Ours has almost tripled since we left and has less coverage and a bigger deductible. Can you afford out-of-network medical costs? Will you want an emergency evacuation insurance policy like DAN?
5. Boat Maintenance: Do you do all of your own work or do you hire it done? Will parts be easily available where you intend to cruise? An aside here - we do all of our own maintenance and I used to be an aviation parts manager so I know how to source parts at the best price. Still, the boat maintenance bill has been much higher than we expected. As an example, one thing we neglected to include in our estimate were bottom cleaning by a diver when we're in places that we can't do it ourselves, an average bill of $87 per month.
6. Dockage: If you choose to spend time on the dock, plan on it being more than 50% of your monthly budget. The average along the East Coast is $2.00 per foot per night but dockage can be found in the Bahamas for $.75 per foot per night and in Miami for $4.75 per foot per night so it varies wildly. Mooring balls are anywhere between $18 a night and $250 per month on the low end, to $45 per night and $600 per month on the high side. Agreed, this is one place where going small is an advantage.
7. Ice: If you're going to cruise in warmer climes, and you're not going to run your air conditioner on a dock, and you don't have an ice maker on board, you can either drink warm beverages or you buy ice. A lot of people don't need ice, but ice is one of the comfort items I choose not to live without. While living on a mooring ball this summer in Beaufort, SC, our ice bill is averaging $60 per month. Cold drinks are the only thing that are making it possible to endure the 105° temps.
8. Laundry: When we're in the Bahamas I have the luxury of time to do laundry by hand. I have a really wonderful hand-crank wringer and the sun and wind dry the clothes for free. In the States, I'm going to a laundromat for the most part, and even in the Bahamas I don't do sheets by hand so I'm using a laundromat there. On the low end it's $1.75 per wash and $1.75 per dry. On the high end, it's $5.00 each in the Bahamas.
9. Water: In the US it's usually free everywhere except for the Keys where it averages $.20 per gallon. In the Bahamas we have paid as much as a dollar a gallon. You can have a water maker for anywhere between $1500 and $5000 but fuel and maintenance (filters, pickling when not using, etc.) are not inexpensive.
10. Fuel: How much do you want to travel? Right now the fuel is still reasonable at an average of $3.25 a gallon for diesel but we've paid almost $5.00 per gallon in the five years we've traveled. Are you comfortable rowing a dinghy to and from an anchored boat or do you plan on having an outboard that requires gasoline?
11. Miscellaneous Supplies: One of our biggest categories. It includes the myriad of things that don't really fall into any other category: postage, shipping, printing, paper products, ziplocs, cleaners, toiletries, odd boat bits like tie wraps, tape, glues, flashlights and batteries, phone chargers, bungees, and on and on. It adds up incredibly fast. How much of it are you willing to do without?
12. Clothes/shoes: Can you live in the same shirt and shorts for five days or do you plan on changing every day? Can you make a pair of Keens last for a year (with multiple repairs) or do you need five pairs of shoes? Do you have good foul weather gear?
13. Safety: Will you have an EPIRB, PLB, a satellite communicator, an SSB radio, will you keep a liferaft and have it serviced every two years at $1,000-2000? Will you replace your lifejackets and activators as recommended? Will you be able to replace your flares and fire extinguishers as needed?
14. Power: Will you need to add solar or a portable generator? How much power will you need for refrigeration and charging on your chosen comfort level?
15. Sea sickness: Can you tolerate the additional motion of a smaller boat? Can you tolerate the slower cruising speed?
16. And lastly, Space: Are you willing and able to live 24/7 with your cruising partner in 250 sq ft? Will you need a place to go to be by yourself?

Determining your comfort level and trying to get the best estimate of its cost is the single most important thing you will do to determine the viability of your cruising plans. While some are content to row a mile each way to shore to buy groceries or walk their dog, it's not for me. The exercise would be great, but there would be many days that a trip to shore would be prohibited by the current or waves and my ability to counter them. And reliable internet access? It's the only means I have of maintaining communications with my grandkids. Without that access, our cruising lifestyle would be very short-lived.

Does size matter? We made the decision to look at boats in the 40-44 foot range because we wanted the stability and sea-kindly ride that a boat that size offers, but we see cruisers out there in 28 foot boats that are perfectly happy. Each end of the spectrum has its advantages, but whether you're on a 42 foot or a 28 foot, where size matters is very definitely in the savings account. While successful cruising is not guaranteed by a hefty savings account, it's our experience that it eases the way. "Go small, go now" might work for some, but if we had heeded that advice, we wouldn't still be cruising today.

0400 on a wind blown anchorage

Kintala motored into Boot Harbor Key two days later than planned which, for a sailboat, is right on time - even a bit early. Winds and waves kept us pinned in Rodriguez Key longer than anticipated, with the third night being a bit of a trial. That afternoon the winds had actually died away, though it was too late to try and make Boot Key. I started looking forward to a good night's sleep and an easy motor / motor sail the next day. But as the sun went down the winds came back, moaning through the rigging, stirring up the bay, setting the v-berth to pitching and rocking once again, and blowing away any chance of sleep for the third night in a row. By 0400 in the morning jumping overboard and swimming to shore started to sound like the best idea I had had in a while.

Sunrise leaving Rodriguez Key

Exhausted, sleep finely won out just as the sun came up. The wind was still hovering around 20 knots but it would be a near beam reach in a following sea. Deb went about doing the engine checks and prepping the inside of the boat, letting me sleep as long as she could. But around 0730 she had to roust me out, not an enviable task. Bleary eyed and fuzzy headed, I stumbled out to the still rocking and pitching deck to get the boat ready to make sail - a task repeated so many times over the last few years that I can, as the saying goes, “Do it in my sleep.” Getting the anchor up was a different song and dance, given we were riding hard against the snubber and pitching just short of putting the bow under water. Still, all fingers and toes were accounted for when the anchor was up, pinned, cabled and tied.



A few minutes later the bow swung to the south west, the point of sail being just forward of a beam reach. The big jib spun out cleanly, the Beast was given a break, and ye ol' Tartan slipped through the waves at better than 5 knots. Staying on board at 0400 started to seem like a good choice after all.

A couple of hours later the speed slipped with the winds finally starting to fade a little. The main sail went up, still with two reefs, enough to bring the speed back up as well. A little later the wind faded some more and we shook the reefs out of the main. A little later still, a little less wind, we added the staysail to the mix. For the first time in a while, Kintala was making way flying everything. It was grand; staying on board at 0400 was definitely the better choice.

Of course it couldn't last. About half way through the 50 mile run the white caps disappeared off the waves, the seas flattened out, the speed fell off, and the sails started to slat. As nice as the sail had been, it was equally as nice when the jib and staysail rolled in smooth and clean, nary a drama or a snag. We left the main up mostly for show, and motored along.

An hour or so before dark we raised the entry to Boot Key Harbor. The main sail dropped into the lazy jacks with a pretty good flake, making it 3 for 3 in sail management for the day. That sounds like a minor thing, but it offers some hope that our recent run of difficulties doing that thing most basic to sailing, i.e. putting up and taking down sails, may be in the past. Some hardware changes and using different techniques have, hopefully, put those things behind us. One of the projects for this summer will be to change some of the running rigging and modify the lazy jacks, with the intent of excising the last of our sail handling gremlins.

The moorings at Boot Key Harbor

Since we were planning to take a bus down to Key West for a day, and the winds are forecast to be in the 30s, we called the marina on the off chance they might have a mooring available. Amazingly enough they did, even one with an easy approach. We motored in and picked up the ball just like we knew what we were doing.

This is the first time we have been on a mooring in Boot Key, and the difference between being anchored out while here and now on a ball has been a bit of a surprise. With easy access to the marina being included in the fee, we head to shore every day. With all the boats around us also on a mooring ball, when the wind blows in the middle of the night we worry less about other boats getting free and running us down. Inside the harbor as we are, even with the winds howling, the ride is calm and sleep easy to find.

The cost isn't insignificant. In addition to the mooring fee itself, easy access to land means easy access to restaurants and ground transportation. We have spent nearly as much money “eating out” in the days we have been here as we did on food the entire time we were in the islands. For budget cruisers that is startling.

We have made some new friends who stopped by the boat because they saw “St. Louis, MO” on our stern. But the fact is, being on shore everyday, makes it so much easier to make connections to the tribe. Casual conversations are normally not so casual between boats that are anchored. There is a kind of perceived aura around an anchored boat, one that – often quite properly – suggests “strangers not welcome." Sitting in the cockpit and waving or nodding at those who pass by helps, but there is no getting around that deep in most cruiser souls is a streak of “loner”. We are different than those who live on land, and outnumbered millions and millions to one. We are loners almost by definition.

Yet, on the other hand, I have softened my inner, puritan voice, the one that whispers that true cruisers anchor out whenever they can. I don't know that I'll ever be of the group that goes from dock to dock, but that may be more an economic necessity than a choice of lifestyle. When I can spare the dollars, a mooring ball or occasional dock visit is a different kind of cruising, with pluses (and minuses) of its own.

One of which might be fewer times of thinking of jumping off the boat at 0400 on a windy morning.

 One of the anchorages in Key West

 A public beach in Key West

 A historical church in Key West on Duval Street

 Florida has some of the most amazing trees. Some of them are really wrinkly like this one.

 The southern most point in the US. The line was 3  blocks long to take

your picture there so we skipped that.

 The Strand theater opened in 1920 and now houses, unfortunately, a Walgreens store.

 Old friends Carolyn and Dave of Boat Galley fame and new friends Diana and John of S/V Joy

enjoying the good eats at Burdines in Boot Key Harbor

A perfect rainbow this morning

Zombie-fied

I am not a big fan of zombies, finding the whole idea a bit grim. I don't care for zombie movies, wouldn't want to meet one in person. Well, not the movie version of a zombie anyway. I suspect there are a lot of zombies in the world, only they wear normal clothes, don't have body parts rotting and falling off all over the place, and don't bite people. A couple might be running for President and, come to think of it, I wouldn't want to meet any of them either. But I am feeling a bit like a zombie today.

A cold front went though Vero last Friday morning. Before it came, we added a couple of mooring lines to the two already holding the boats, and were glad we did. (We are rafted two to a ball here in Vero.) The wind honked, the boats danced, and it rained hard enough to fill the Dink like a kiddie pool. Even as that front headed out to sea the gurus on the Deep Weather app started talking about the next one, due very early Sunday morning. All of this in the middle of January, in Florida.

Yesterday was Saturday, a break between the storms. The crew of Kintala took advantage of the nice weather, taking a long walk into town to find some ice cream. Back at the boat in the afternoon we started watching the weather as it got organized for its assault on Florida. At Deep Weather, the conversation grew animated. That was a pretty good trick since Deep Weather is a text discussion between science types, people who generally talk of lifted indexes, instability, pops, and percentages. In spite of the tech speak, the underlying tone was clear. Florida was in for a serious bit of weather.

As the evening wore on, Deb started getting restless. Deb doesn't get restless. To most people even a restless Deb would appear to be moving quietly through the world. But we have been together for a long time, and I noticed.

“I think we should check the mooring lines.”

Mind you, I am all for checking mooring lines. But it was now dark, quiet, and I was comfortable on the settee. We had added two lines barely a day before, and I had checked them after the first front had gone through. All was well with our world.

“I really think we should check the mooring lines.”

Okay then. Up off the settee, on with the jacket, flick on the deck light and, what was this? The mooring ball lay between the two bows. Two lines, though still attached, lay limp and sagging in the water. One line was taunt, holding both boats from running even further over the ball, pushed by the current. And the fourth line was looped under the mooring ball, a tangled mess with the other three. We had to launch the Dink to get it all straight. There were half dozen razor cuts on my right hand after working the jammed line out from under the mooring, courtesy of the little critters living on the ball. Under a wind load and getting worked, the line would have been shredded in minutes. Sure, there were three other lines, but the thought was disquieting.

The wind was forecast to reach 40 knots. Vero is well protected, but 40 knots is 40 knots. With the lines reset it seemed a good idea to take a look around the deck. What was this? The staysail was wrapped in but a single loop of sheet. The jib had a nice bit of canvas hanging out, just waiting to catch wind. Sheets still ran back to winches. Both sails got rolled up tight in several wraps of line, and the sheets were tied forward. When big winds are in the offering we normally add a few ties to the main sail and cover. Big winds were in the offering, and we were already out on deck.

The generator sat on the helm seat, its normal location when being used. But it would be hard to steer the boat with the gen in the way and, who knows? If everything turns to manure we might have to steer the boat. The little Honda was moved and the shore cable stowed. All in all nearly an hour passed before I got back to the settee.

At 0130 I did a final check of the radar and climbed into the v-berth. At 0530 lightning woke me up and I climbed back out. The radar was ugly. A thick, deep maroon python snaked across Florida, heading our way at a reported 60 knots. There were hook echos in there as well. Somewhere people were getting hurt, property destroyed, and lives upended.

I got dressed to go on deck, prepared to do whatever might need to be done. I was thinking of the things that could go bad, what to do in response and, should the night fall completely apart, how to get off the boat in one piece. It is a mental thing, like getting ready for race...or a fight. There is a certain grimness about it.

I used to teach high altitude flying and weather at a university. At the beginning of the class we would talk about what it takes to have a long life in the sky. I told them, when things go to hell, sharing the cockpit with the person who got 100% on the tests or made the softest landings, would not matter. No, the person you wanted in the cockpit was the mean bastard who simply wouldn't accept dying that day, the one who would be working the controls and power levers even as the wings bent and Mother earth filled the windshield.

By 0630 radar showed us on the back edge of the rain. It had been a non-event in Vero. The storms had spent their energy to our west. I went back to the berth for a couple more hours.

Living on a boat is safe, or so they keep telling me.“They”, in this case, mostly being the boating industry whose main job is to sell more boats. But we live very close to the weather out here, and the weather seems to be copping an attitude. Sometimes, particularly in the dark with maroon pythons heading my way, I wonder if the day will come when choosing to live near the weather will mean choosing to live with an unacceptable level of risk. Four reinforced walls and a stout roof, all sitting on a stone foundation, will not protect one from everything. But it is a damn sight more secure than a plastic hull tied to a ball with a few ropes.

Such thoughts fade as the day dawns and the sky clears. It is sunny now, the air dry and cooling. By evening the winds should fade. It will be a nice night for sleeping. Good that. The last 18 hours have left me tired, sore, and sleep deprived. The older I get the longer it takes to shake off the “grim” of an uncertain night.

And though we didn't need them much, I am really glad we checked the mooring lines.  

Christmas video

The original non-plan was to do New Year's Day in the Keys but Christmas Eve in St. Augustine isn't bad. With Daughters 3 and Families far away this is a kind of non-Christmas to go with our non-plans. There will be some holiday Skyping going on for sure, but it isn't quite the same. This is a part of cruising that will probably never feel "okay" to me. On the other hand being on the boat means we have avoided a whole lot of the Christmas Time stuff that about drives me up a wall, endless commercialism, old movies that were never that good to start with, music that (let's face it) is sticky sweet enough to make one's teeth hurt, and the constant claim that I should be giving something to somebody or I'm not a good person. (I may or may not be a good person, but giving stuff or not has nothing to do with it.)

Another cold front rolled though last night. Being the first try at a mooring ball we had the lines set up in such a way as they creaked and groaned all night long ... loudly, very very loudly. We tried something different come morning and it seems to be better. The sun is shining now and the temps are near 70, but it will be a rolly Christmas Eve with the winds still gusting out of the north. Santa will have to be careful if he drops by any of the boats around here else Rudolf might get skewered on a swinging mast.

We are not sure what we are doing next. Ideally we would like to hang around until the next weather window and head offshore once again. But St. Augustine, for all of its good qualities, has pretty much filled up all the water around here with mooring balls that cost. Anchored in one of the few places left to anchor and parking one's dink to go into town costs the same as the mooring ball. All a bit of a scam if you ask me. Anyway, waiting on a weather window means paying the man. Heading down the ICW means anchoring for free. I'm not a big fan of the ICW, but paying the Man to park on Mother Earth's moving waters when my anchor works just fine and the Man isn't providing me with anything I need? Not much of a fan of that either.

But I am a big fan of Christmas video ...