Being Aware of Wares, Where, Wear and Tear, and just how Little I Wear….

After spending only a week on the mainland, we skipped along the southern coast of Puerto Rico to Vieques to meet up with my sister and our good friends Sean and Shea.  This was the first time anyone has come visit us on this trip, and the first time we've had anyone else on the boat aside from Ashley.  There's nothing like having visitors come and live with you, and inviting them into your world,  that makes you realize just how different your world has become.  I guess it never dawned on me just how much things have changed, how I have changed, because every time I go home, I'm transported back into my old life, my old world, and quickly re-adapt  One of the biggest things that has changed, is that I've become more aware.  Sounds a little silly, but living this lifestyle, you have to be hyperaware of everything.   Something as simple as being aware of a hatch being open, or even something left on deck.  Being in the hands of nature, you start to see that there is a direct consequence for everything that you do… or don't do.  You leave a hatch open, chances are you ruin anything under that hatch when the daily tropical rainstorm comes along.  You leave something unstrapped on deck, odds are in favor of you losing it when the wind picks up, or when the waves build and rock your boat.  Having guests over makes you realize just how much you subconsciously do to avoid these little "inconveniences."  (Hmmmm….ironically as I'm writing this post, I'm hearing a pan-pan from the coast guard on the vHf of someone's 51' sailboat being thrashed on the rocks on western Culebra because his mooring ball drug while he was having lunch down below, shit…)  

Explaining to your guests things that need to be done and fearing that you are sounding a bit like a neurotic control freak when you're telling them how to properly flush your Lavac toilet, not to throw toilet paper in the bowl, not to leave things on countertops in case it gets rolley, to put everything away from deck before going to bed, and to shut off fans when you leave the room to save power.   Keeping things neat and orderly has become a priority for us as there has been more than a night or two where we have been nearly  thrown out of bed at 3am because of a sudden onset of a violent squall with stuff we left out, like dirty dishes, flying all over the boat.  Realizing that we are now so much more subconsciously hyperaware, that we wake up at any unusual sound or movement, and tripping over our guests sleeping soundly as we get up instinctually to check for the source of the mystery sound.  It's funny, we are so much more in touch with nature now that we are even able to gauge the windspeed just from the sound of our wind generator with incredible accuracy.   We have routines in which we get up every morning, shut off the anchor light, check  our power consumption, go up on deck, look around and see our surroundings to see if we dragged, check on the dinghy…so on. Being responsible for all these little things as well taking ownership of your actions and inactions deeply changes your perspective and relation on things.  You start think about things more thoroughly, not just in terms of your living space, but you start to apply that notion to other parts of your life as well.  In a way, you simply take more direct responsibility over your life.  That's not to say that this is necessarily a good thing as it can just as well turn you into a paranoid, anxiety ridden nutcase. I suppose, just like everything else in life, there needs to be a moderate balance of awareness, as well as care-freeness.  Speaking of care-freeness, having guests on board also made me realize just how often I am naked without even realizing it.  Oops, haha.  I suppose that's just another side effect of living on a boat…

Aside from all that deep philosophical stuff, we had a great time with our friends and my sister.  Sean ended up staying for about 10 days, while Shea was only allowed a brief 4 day stay.  My sister was with us for close to 3 weeks.  In that time, we took Sean and my sister to Culebra as well as St Thomas, where Sean flew home from, and my sister stayed on an extra week, while we sailed back to Vieques to meet up with her boyfriend (now fiancé…he proposed on the trip :)  We took them on some dive adventures where they got to got see coral that they wouldn't have been to access without a dinghy.  We showed them what it was like to sail from island to island.  We did some spearfishing and found some conch.  It was awesome to see my sister  adapt to this life so quickly, and take to it.  She really loved the simplicity of our life as well as being surrounded by nature, and says that she already misses the boat.  I'm happy as that means that she will be wanting to join us again in the near future.  Yay!

Sailing to Vieques…

Shea and Sean

Sister sister...

Goofing off in St Thomas...

Island hopping

Diving under the pier in Vieques

My sister the mermaid

Uni

Freediving

First pic of Frank and I both spearfishing

Sean spearfishing

Octopus Frank speared and I cooked…(first time ever
preparing octopus!)

Culebra

A Shot in the Dark

For those of you who may be wondering if we’re frolicking in the turquoise waters of Bahamas, nope, we’re not.  We’re still in Miami.  Having missed our weather window last night, we’ve decided to stay until the next window pops up.  We’ve been anchored out here in Miami now for about a week, and aside from a few last minute chores, such as wiring up our last solar panel, some last minute mass provisioning, and awaiting to get our dinghy back, we’ve been taking it pretty easy.  We’ve been to shore only a handful of times since we’ve been here, and being anchored out has had its own set of highlights and pitfalls.  Being stuck on the boat isn’t as bad as most of you landlubbers may think.  It may seem mundane and boring, and at times it can be, but to be honest, it’s been quite a thought provoking and pensive time for me.  Days are filled with random little chores, and coming from a life where there was a set schedule, I’ve had to develop some semblance of structure for myself.   Creating to-do lists keeps you from getting lost in the vortex of being on anchor time.  There always seems to be something to do, whether it’s putting last night’s dishes away, checking our battery status, or diving to clean the bottom, it seems grains of time pass through the hourglass much quicker when you fill it when semi-productive tasks. 

We had a crazy night the night before we were originally planning to leave that swayed our decision.  Two days ago, we had rented a car to do some very last minute re-provisioning.  After seeing how much we were actually using, we had decided, surprisingly, that we needed to get some more stuff.  I know, what the hell right?  But after being aboard full time in the past two weeks, we realized that we were blowing through random things like toilet paper, rice, paper towels, and kool-aid ;) at a much quicker rate than we had originally anticipated. We had decided it was best to just get more so as to not have to worry about it in a foreign land.  So off we went driving around in awful Miami traffic, scurrying from West Marine, to Target, to Walmart, and lastly the Laundromat.  Time really got ahead of us. 

Not anticipating that the day’s errands were going take so long, we didn’t finish until well after sunset.    Well stupid us, since we hadn’t realized that it was literally going to take us all day, we didn’t think to turn on our anchor light.  Stupid, stupid mistake!  By the time we had even realized our dire situation, we were already well on our way with our dinghy packed full of groceries.  Since the draft of our boat kept us from anchoring anywhere close to the mooring field, where we had anchored was about a mile offshore.  So here we were with the dinghy packed to the brim with our clean clothes, grape soda, and other very important household items, with me in my sundress, groping around in the dark wondering where the heck Moitessier was.  We were about ½ a mile out before we started to get a little nervous.  We realized that the without our anchor light, there was no way in hell we were going to find Moitessier.  At night, things that would seem innocuous in daylight take on a more sinister edge.  The waves seem a little bigger, every shadow looks like the fin of a shark, and channel markers become much further away than they appear.  We had remembered that we had anchored just to the right outside the channel, but for some reason, in our tiny little dinghy, we couldn’t seem to gauge what the channel marker lights were versus every other light on shore.   After driving around in the dark for about an hour, we realized that the wind and current had set us much further than we had thought, so we started to head more to the north.  In my adrenaline fueled state, I didn’t even have time to panic as what was running through my head was some half drunk asshole that had plowed through the bay at break neck speeds, had hit Moitessier in the dark and she was now in the process of sinking, which was why we couldn’t see her.  It would be our own fault as well and we’d be  the ones liable if anyone got hurt.   

I called her name into the wind, much like one would do when they’ve lost their dog, roaming around in the streets hopelessly calling Fido in vain.  Shouting “Moitessier, where are you?”, as if somehow she’d hear me and cruise on by.  I know, fear had made me lose my mind.  Just as I was signing my last covenant to Allah, Buddha, Zeus, or whomever, vowing that if we were to find her, that I would never do something so reckless again, did she appear out of nowhere.  Just sitting peacefully, rocking back and forth, minding her own business.  I was never so relieved in my life.  Sounds a bit histrionic, but really it was like spotting a well in the desert.  As we approached her, I showered her with love.  Hell, I think I even frenched her.  As soon as I stepped aboard, all the composure I had kept throughout the ordeal completely drained out of me.  I started bawling.  Not tears of joy, no, nothing that graceful, it was more like a full on whaling.  Crying, stuttering, panting, boogers running down my face kind of crying.  Frank didn’t really know what to do with me because I’m normally pretty calm when things like that happen, but he just hugged me, told me it was over and that we were ok.  That seemed to calm me down a bit, though my heart was racing for the next hour.  Lesson for the day was, TURN THE DAMN ANCHOR LIGHT ON when you leave, especially if you don’t know when you’ll be back.  Another lesson learned was, when transporting groceries, bring a couple of garbage bags with you so that you can wrap them up and keep them dry. 

Drying out the goods

Dinghy full of stuff

So in light of what happened, we decided to just take it easy and not rush taking the passage.  That ordeal stressed us both out and we realized that there was no real reason for us to rush.  Especially since we hadn’t gotten our dinghy back yet, nor had we filled our fuel and water tanks, or had we gotten propane, as well as many other last minute things that we hadn’t thought to do.  Our instincts told us that being on a tight schedule, trying to beat the weather was going to lead to many more stupid mistakes.  And so here we are, sitting outside Hurricane Harbor, listening to the number of party boats blasting Reggaeton and Merengue, watching intoxicated jetskiers whiz by.  Perhaps it was foolish to put it off as it may mean a week’s delay, and our buddy boat is already celebrating in Bimini, but hey, I’d rather be safe than sorry. 

Our lovely lady anchored out

View of Miami from our butterfly hatches

Bienvenidos a Miami

I’ll spare the minute details of our trip from Titusville to Melbourne to Fort Pierce. It was like every other leg of the ICW journey, full days of just watching boat traffic and channel markers.  Entering Fort Pierce was pretty straightforward.  We had decided in Melbourne that we would leave for Fort Pierce super early in the morning so as not to have to fight for a spot in one of the few anchorages.  Frank was a little wary of that being the only anchorage around as he had issues finding a spot to anchor in the last time he was there as crew on another boat.  Getting there in the early afternoon, we were able to find a spot almost immediately.  We spent 2 nights during which time, we discussed some route planning options to Miami.  The options were to take the ICW for longer, or hop outside and head straight to Miami.  We ended up going with the latter as trips down the ICW have not only been boring, but also tiresome as well. 

So with that decision being made, we planned to leave sometime in the afternoon from Fort Pierce, and at the average rate of 5-6kts, we’d figure we’d be in within 22 hours, perfect timing to getting into Miami as it would get us there either late morning or early afternoon, with some daylight to spare.   We were both a little apprehensive about taking a night passage as neither on of us has had to do it with just the two of us.  We’ve both crewed on other boats where it wasn’t just Frank and I, and the idea of it just being him and I on watch for the first time was a little unnerving.  There is a first time for everything right?  

Going out the inlet was a complete shit show.  Since it was Sunday afternoon, everyone and their mothers were out.  There were john boats, powerboats, jetskis, kayaks, dinghies, SUPs and more john boats everywhere you turned.  And of course they were all coming in as we were going out.  That coupled with the inlet being extremely choppy due to the strong current and the ongoing removal of a wrecked tug, I was starting to feel that it was an omen for our passage to come. Luckily, it was not. 

It was originally predicted that we would be taking the passage  with 15-20kts of wind on our nose almost the entire. night  Not the most ideal conditions, but doable.  Luckily Poseidon was on our side and put us at 10-15kts at our nose for only the first half of the trip.  As this was the case, the first few hours were spent motoring down the coast.  As the night wore on, the wind died down to 10 kts  and changed to a near beam reach, and we were even able to get some sail up for most of the second half.  Frank and I took hour long watches as the other slept in the cockpit. For those of you who don’t know what being on “watch” entails, let me just side track a bit.  No, a watch does not mean you are looking out for pirates, preparing to shoot them with a spear gun and stealing their booty. Nor does it mean watching for whales or dolphins (of course if either one was spotted, that would be a treat).  The person on watch basically looks for other ships around and makes sure that we are not on a collision course with anyone (at one point our AIS reregistered 144 different boats!). That person makes sure that the sails are trimmed properly, and adjusts them according to the direction of the wind.  He/she also has to make sure, even with an auto-pilot, that you are not veering off course.  During this time, Frank decided to name our auto-pilot, Poppy, as that is what he called his grandfather.  We’d like to think that Poppy was there in spirit, steering the boat, and protecting us from come-what-may.  I must say Poppy did an amazing job and I’m so glad we had him there helping out. 

Nighttime Aboard

It was an easy trip, with small seas, and thousands of phosphorescence twinkling in our wake.  We got to Miami at around 1pm, and upon arrival, we realized that we’d have to traverse through some crazy traffic, with container ships, cruise ships, powerboats, and other extremely large intimidating vessels in the midst of it.   I offered to get us to our anchorage as I’m better at dealing with stressful situations like that than Frank is. Our planned stopping point was to be Dinner key. After incessantly calling the Dinner Key Mooring field, they had assured us that anchoring outside their mooring field would be the best thing for us to do as they did not have a mooring open that was large enough to accommodate us, and so we reluctantly followed their directions and dropped the hook.  We were meeting with our buddy boat after all and he was moored in that field, so we wanted to be close by.  The people in charge assured us that where we were never dropped below 7’ and so should be fine for us and our 6.5' draft.  Boy, were they wrong.  As the afternoon wore on with Frank taking a nap, and me anxiously checking if we were dragging, I had started to notice that the depths were slowly creeping into the 6s.  I woke Frank up to see if perhaps we should anchor some place else, but with his lack of sleep, he hadn’t even heard what I was telling him and muttered something about it being ok.  I kept going below to tell him, “hey our depth sounder is starting to read 6.5’…then 6.4’…then uh-oh 6.3’ ...”By the time I had finally gotten Sleeping Beauty out of bed, it was too late.  We were aground.  Dammit, 2 times in a week, shameful! So we waited for tides to change which seemed like hours, and eventually Frank saved the day and got us unstuck.  By this time, it was around 9:30pm; it was dark and very hard to read channel markers to see where else we could anchor.  With Frank at the bow flashlight in hand and me behind the wheel, we were able to get the boat safely through the channel, and find a less protected but deeper area to anchor.  It’s been a steep learning curve, and hopefully the next few posts you get won’t be about us running aground or breaking dinghy davits, and more about free diving, lobster hunting, snorkeling, and conch salad making. Until then, wish us luck on our crossing which we will be undertaking in a week to a week and a half or so from now.  

Heading into Governors Cut Miami

A  Mouse among Giants

Anchored out at the entrance to Dinner Key

Ode to St Augustine

Melbourne

Sitting here anchored out in Melbourne.  I guess it’s finally hit me that we are no longer in St Augustine.  Feeling a little tired, a little sad, and a little giddy that we’ve made it this far.  Nostalgia of a life I left a few days ago is washing over me.   What has only been a few days, feels like lifetime. I can’t believe we finally left St Augustine.  I’ll be honest, I miss my friends.  Constantly having to say goodbye to people you care about is one of the hardest things to do when you decide to embark on an adventure like this.  I could’ve easily fallen into the life I had in St Augustine.  A complacent life where you knew what the day had in store for you.  I wish I could feel satisfied with that lifestyle.  Seeing familiar faces, familiar places, and just sitting back and dreaming your dream instead of living it certainly has its merits.  The attachment to the familiar is not one to be underestimated.  The duality of wanting an exciting life and having a comfortable one is one that I find hard to balance.  They both carry with it its own pros and cons.  Living a traditional life where you can bond with people and develop deep interpersonal relationships is one that I wish I could just be satisfied with, but the person deep within me, the one that yearns for the unfamiliar, seeing new places, and trying new things is constantly nagging in the back of my mind.  Yu, you must live your life, she tells me.  Yu, hardship is what comes with building character, she says.  But there are times, in the silence of my mind, where I just long for being happy with the simplest things.  A smile from a friend that wants to go shopping with you.  Shelter from the wind and the sun.  Going to a movie.  These are the things that I long to feel satiated with.  It would be so much easier if it were that way.  I guess that’s just something I need to come to terms with.  The grass will always be greener, that is life…

♫ That's A-Mooring ♫

Well, we finally got the chance to take Moitessier out and spend the night on a mooring and it was incredible. After paying for night at St Augustine Marina and preparing the boat with supplies and food, we set out early Saturday morning.  It was a beautiful day, and we couldn't have asked for more from the weather. Bright and sunny, with a little bit of a breeze.  Picking up the mooring ball turned out to be easier than expected.  Truth be told, I had expected it to be a bit of a debacle somehow, with me dropping the boat hook or something, but it turned out perfectly.  I was able to grab the ball with the boat hook first shot.  

After securing the boat, we decided to take a swim.  The water was cool but the current out there was quite strong, so I floated along holding on to our dock lines.  We spent the day just swimming about relaxing, reading, napping, and enjoying a lunch of Caprese salad sandwiches in our cockpit.  The usual afternoon thunderstorm rolled through, which was nice as it afforded me a cold fresh water shower.  Watching the Schooner Freedom getting pummeled with the rain was quite funny too as it was full of tourists….I know, I'm bad for laughing about it.  As evening came around, and the sun was setting with the sky displaying its pinks and blues, we enjoyed a nice, romantic dinner in the cockpit.   I couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sense of happiness and calm.  We were finally seeing St Augustine from the cockpit of Moitessier, something we had been dreaming of for years.  After our dinner, we just sat and watched the moon for a while before deciding to take the dinghy up to the bathrooms and shower as if we were real life cruisers.  It was a perfect end to perfect day. And though it was uneventful, we both felt one baby step closer to our dream.  I couldn't have asked for more.  

Singing in the rain...

Schooner Freedom :P

On a side note, the most serendipitous thing happened when we went up to shower.  As we were approaching the corner to the bathrooms, we bumped into Stephanie and Brian on Rode Trip.  We had met them a few years ago through our friends Matt and Jess, who had traveled extensively with them.  They were on their way taking Rode Trip up north from Panama and had stopped in St Augustine for the night.  They had just finished doing their laundry and were just as surprised to see us.  We stopped and chatted for about an hour and they gave us advice on cruising the Bahamas and Cuba.  It is such a small world and it was crazy that we ran into them at 11pm just as they were about to get in their dinghy with their laundry.  They set sail the next day as we were waking up and we saw them take off from our cockpit. 

More Cushion for the…

Since we have last posted, we have been quite busy.  We have gotten emails from readers (thank you guys for caring) wondering if we've taken the boat out for another sail and whether we are still well and alive.  Yes to both… Lately we have been trying to get to know the boat a little more and learning to dock her better.  We spent a day with a captain just doing straight docking drills and getting pointers on our technique and mistakes.  Anyone who has had to back up a 40,000 lb double ender can tell you that docking is not a walk in the park.  Rick, who was the captain, taught us the importance of clear, concise, and LOUD communication, and quick line handling.  It has giving us more confidence to safely return after a day out on the water. Eventually Frank wants to teach me to drive the boat so that he could be the one handling the lines when docking.  

On a side note, one of the last times we went out sailing, we discovered that we had a stowaway on board Moitessier.  When we unfurled our Genoa, out flew a bat!  He looked just as surprised to see us as we were him, as I'm sure we awoke him from his slumber.  Being that we were a couple miles offshore, he really had no choice but to just return to Moitessier and hang out on deck with the rest of us.  Eventually, he grew intolerant of the paparazzi's incessant hounding, and sought solace in the one of the dark limber holes of our hatch cover.  

From the bow

Our batty friend soaking up some rays...

Bridge of Lions

Storm on the horizon upon our return

For those of you who think that the boat projects have ended now that we are on the water, I'd hate to burst your bubble.  It seems there is always something to do, and I have been a little lackadaisical in updating the blog with current projects.  I apologize for that.  One of the most recent projects and one that has been extremely rewarding as well, has been our cockpit cushions. After taking the boat out a few times, we realized how much more pleasurable hanging out in the cockpit would be with a set of plush cushions.  We hadn't even given it much thought before now and had always put it off as we figured it would be too expensive. After doing some research on the forums, we discovered that it does not have to be that expensive at all if you are willing to do the work yourself.  Using his internet resourcefulness, Frank was able to find 2" open cell dry fast foam from The Foam Factory Wholesale, which we later had discovered is the same company, with the same contact info as The Foam Factory that sells the same exact product at nearly double the price.  Crazy because we didn't need to provide a tax ID or anything to get the significant discount. With the foam in hand and using this awesome Sailrite video as a guideline, as well as Sailors Exchange for their surplus Sunbrella fabric and Phifertex (the mesh material usually used for the backs of cushions to allow drainage and breathability); we were able to sew our own set for a total of $140.  Pretty awesome considering you'd pay close to $1000 to have  them made through a canvas shop.  I started sewing the starboard side cushion and after I quickly became frustrated with sewing, Frank took over and impressively did a better job than I was doing. The thing he did differently was that after cutting out the pieces, he took the time to staple the patterns together, preventing any slippage between the 2 opposing fabrics, and allowing him to ensure that the pieces matched up before sewing it all together.  (Something I was too reluctant/lazy/prideful to do, resulting in me using the seam ripper far more often than I care to admit).  It's really nice having an extra area to hang out in without our bums getting sore from the hard teak.  It's also nice to be able to lay out at night in the cockpit and watch the lightning storms, that have been pretty frequent here in St Augustine lately.  

Phifertex bottom

Stapling before sewing...

Oohh...

Ahh….

:)