Is It 2020 Yet? Our Cruising Plan

Tickety Boo happy at anchor in the Bahamas

My friends, Matt and Lucy from The Larks of Independence, and I had been joking that, given our respective boat issues and projects, we'd see each other in the Bahamas in 2020. Scott and I certainly haven't been feeling like we'll ever make it out of Indiantown Marina this year before hurricane season starts up again. 2020 was starting to seem like a sadly realistic target.

But at least we were in good company. Matt and Lucy were stuck here in Florida too.

Then I saw on their Facebook page that they had broken free from the Sunshine State and made it to Bimini.

My first thought was:

"Yay! Way to go Matt and Lucy!"

My second thought was:

"I hate you guys. Why are we stuck in Florida and you're in the Bahamas?"

My third thought was:

"Ellen, you're a terrible person for thinking such things. You should be happy for them." 

Then I punished myself by not eating any chocolate for a full 20 minutes. Yes, I went without chocolate for 20 whole minutes. I know, hard to believe. But I deserved it.

After I had some chocolate, I felt much better about things. After all, we've only been working on boat projects for less than seven weeks. We've got friends that have been stuck here at Indiantown Marina for way longer than that working on their boats.

And we've actually ticked a number of things off of the list. Like new hatches.

We've also dealt with a number of things that weren't on the list. Like hydrolocking our engine.

All in all, we're not doing too bad. {She says frantically stuffing chocolate in her mouth in an effort to feel better about the rate of progress.}

The whole situation got me thinking about cruising plans. There's a saying among cruisers that plans are written in sand at low tide. When the tide comes in, your plans just wash away as though they never existed.

It was all a good reminder not to have too firm of plans and to just go with the flow. Easy to say, sometimes it's hard to do.

So while we do have a cruising plan of a sort, we're trying to keep it kind of vague because life has a way of keeping you on your toes. Sometimes, it seems like life is just getting in your way. Usually though, it's just presenting you with new opportunities that are cleverly disguised as boat projects.

If you are curious what our vague cruising plan is, it's to go to the Bahamas for the rest of this season, then bring the boat back to Indiantown where we'll haul out and work on some major boat projects. We'll probably head off to the Western Caribbean next season (November 2017) and putter around over there for a couple of years. After that who knows - although we are toying with the idea of crossing the Atlantic in a few years. But we'll see what life brings us.

What about you? What are your plans for the next few years?

Thanks for stopping by our blog - we love it when people come visit! We're also on Facebook - pop by and say hi!

Wordless Wednesday | The Panama Canal

Wordless Wednesday is supposed to be about posting a photo without any words. But, I'm a rule breaker, so here are a few words:

1 - I love the free table at our marina. You can score some really great stuff, like nautical charts.

2 - Big ships go through the Panama Canal. Little ships too. Maybe one day, we'll take our little ship through the canal and head back to New Zealand. Or, maybe not.

3 - It costs a lot of money to transit the canal. I wonder if you get a discount if you wear a Panama hat when you go through the canal?

4 - If you want to see some amazing pictures of a cruise ship transiting the canal, including aerial shots, check out Rhonda's blog post at Albom Adventures.

What words does this picture bring to your mind when you look at it?

Thanks for stopping by our blog - we love it when people come visit! We're also on Facebook - pop by and say hi! 

For more Wordless Wednesday fun, click here.

Cruising Daydreams | Colombia

Thanks to the Graphics Fairy for these awesome clock images!

While I'm sitting here in Indiantown Marina waiting out hurricane season and wishing Scott would get back from Scotland, I spend my time daydreaming of places we might go once we get back out on the water. Like I did for Cuba, I've been doing some research on the internet, checking out blogs from people who have been to Columbia, as well as other resources.

I use the term research loosely here. Research is one of those dreary words that reminds me of my days in graduate school sitting in the library leafing through dusty books on French colonialism in West Africa. That was a real slog, which wasn't helped at all by the fact that the librarians never let you eat chocolate chip cookies while you were studying. Nowadays, my idea of research is to lounge inside my air conditioned boat surrounded by various snack food items and goof around on the internet for hours. Some people might say that this kind of research is actually a form of procrastination from boat projects. {Or, should that read "procrastination of boat projects"? Grammar can be a real pain sometimes. Sometimes, it's hard to believe they let me in grad school given my issues with punctuation and prepositions.}

If you're looking to do a little research on Colombia or just want to do a bit of procrastination from {or of?} some horrible and tedious projects you have on your to do list, then check these links out below.

Cruising in Colombia Links

S/V Earthling - S/V Earthling is seriously one of the best boat names ever! Of course not as good as S/V Tickety Boo, but that goes without saying. The Earthling landed in Colombia in 2013 and Captain Reza describes the hassles and cost involved in clearing in on his blog. 

This American Girl - Normally an overland traveler, "this American girl" took a five day sailing excursion from Panama through the San Blas islands to Cartenga, Colombia. Turns out she picked the wrong boat - no showers, no fridge, no ice and plenty of seasickness. (Sounds a bit like the boat we had in New Zealand, minus the seasickness part.) The captain took drugs and forgot to collect everyone's passports. An interesting account of how not to sail to Colombia.

Caribbean Compass - An overview of cruising in Colombia written in 2011. Lots of useful information including the Spanish phrase, Hable despacio por favor, which I think means can you please speak slowly. Only one problem - I don't speak Spanish, so no matter how slowly they speak, I still won't understand.

More Joy Everywhere - Back when Scott was trying to convince me to chuck it all in, buy a sailboat and go cruising, he told me about this blog. It was the first sailing blog I had ever read. I think it was probably the first blog of any kind I had ever read. I loved it and started to think Scott might be onto something with this cruising notion of his. The crew of More Joy (who sadly aren't cruising anymore) spent many months in Colombia. They've got a whole slew of posts about their time there. Well worth a read.

Fortunes Afloat - Laura and and her husband first sailed to Mexico in their 20s. Now they're retired and back out on the water. They have a number of blog posts about their time in Colombia. I found the one on getting prescriptions filled at a drugstore in Cartanega particularly interesting. It always amazes me how much cheaper medical care and prescriptions are outside of the States.

Sundowner Sails Again - Tate and Dani recently cruised in Colombia on their Westsail 32 (they're currently in the San Blas Islands in Panama, another place we want to go). Their pictures of snorkeling at Providencia Island are amazing. Definitely on our to do list.

S/V Orion 1 - Deb and John are currently cruising in Colombia and have also explored parts of Colombia by land.

Noonsite - A great resource for all things cruising. It's reassuring to hear them report that patrols by the US Coast Guard on the Caribbean coast have made this area one of the safer places to cruise in the world. Having said that, there was an incident last month in Islas del Rossario where a Dutch boat was boarded and one person killed.

Do you have any Colombia travel resources to share? If so, leave details in the comments section, send us an email or connect with us on Facebook so I can add them to the list.

Thanks for stopping by our blog - we love it when people come visit! We're also on Facebook - pop by and say hi!

Cruising Daydreams | Cuba

When I'm not thinking about where I'm going to store all the dead bodies on our boat (more on that later this week), then I'm daydreaming about where we might go cruising once hurricane season is over. The extent of our plan so far is to point the boat south and head to the Caribbean. I know, the detail of our plan is overwhelming. It's just almost too much to absorb in one sitting.

Generally, we're not big planners when it comes to travel, but I'm thinking we need to do a little bit of research before we head off, especially as we won't always have ready access to the all seeing and all knowing internet. I find I feel less guilty about procrastinating boat projects when I'm asking Google about cruising destinations. In fact, I'm going to write down "cruising research" on my boat project list so that I can cross it off and feel virtuous. What's really more important - fixing the propane system in real feel temps of 110F/43C or sitting inside the air conditioned boat goofing off researching important stuff on the internet?

One of the places we want to go is to Cuba. Our boat, Tickety Boo, has already been there with her previous owners. She knows the way, she already has a courtesy flag on board and a copy of Nigel Calder's Cuba Cruising Guide. We've added Cuba onto our boat insurance and now that I've done a little online research, we're good to go! Of course neither of us speaks Spanish, so I might need to add learning Spanish onto our boat project list too.

So, if you thinking about traveling to Cuba whether by boat or plane, here's a few links to some of the sites I've found in my intensive research. I thought I'd share, just in case you have any projects that you just can't bear doing and need some procrastination inspiration. 

Cruising: Bound for Cuba - Interesting article in Sail Magazine about an American couple's trip to Cuba after Obama announced normalization of American relations with Cuba. I like the description of how, when they cleared into Cuba, a doctor wearing latex gloves came onboard with a big smile and a kiss for the missus.

Sailing in Cuba - Article in Cruising World about some folks who went to Cuba "almost legally" and uninsured (it can be difficult to get insurance for an American flagged boat). My big takeaway is that you'll make a lot of friends if you're up to date on the latest baseball news. And on that note, Scott would probably want me to mention that the Minnesota Twins are currently one game away from the playoffs. Go Twins.

Romping & Nguyening - I first came across Jean Nguyen's blog when we were traveling cross-country in our Scamp travel trailer. Jean and her partner also have a Scamp and did the US road trip thing too, so it was fun to read about their adventures. They recently traveled to Cuba (without their Scamp) and did a series of blog posts on their adventures. Jean's got an interesting perspective on Cuba - she talks about how Cubans reacted to her being an East Asian, all the scammers they encountered and how there were times they couldn't wait to get the heck out of Cuba. It's worth checking her blog out to get a take on land adventures in Cuba, however, be warned that she uses some "naughty" language so if that isn't your thing, then you might want to skip it.

MJ Sailing - I think Jessica's blog was the first account I had read of Americans cruising to Cuba. Matt and Jessica spent a week there in 2013 and Jessica has a series of amusing blog posts on their time there. My favorite one is when she describes the time their cat Georgie jumped overboard and dangled above the water in her leash and  harness. Now I don't feel so bad about the time Georgie unexpectedly jumped down through my companionway while I was trying to untangle her leash, dangled a foot above the floor and spun around in circles for what seemed like ages while I tried to get her free. 

Yacht Mollymawk - The crew of Mollymawk has a series of blog posts about their experiences cruising in Cuba in 2010.

Sailing & Cruising: Cuba Facebook Group - Run by Wally Moran, this is a great place to ask questions and get advice from folks who have cruised extensively in Cuba. 

The Sailing Podcast - One of the things I like to do when I'm working on indoor boat projects (yes, sometimes I actually do something) is to listen to podcasts. David Anderson did an interesting interview with Wally Moran where he talks about his experiences cruising in Cuba. While you're there, you can also check out a podcast I did with David a couple of years ago when Scott and I were getting ready to become full-time cruisers. 

Free Cruising Guide - You have to like anything that has "free" in its title. I've heard good things about Amaia Agirre & Frank Virgintino's cruising guide and now that I've managed to download it, I'm looking forward to checking it out. 

Noonsite - Great place to get recent updates from cruisers who have been there, done that in Cuba. On a semi-related note, Noonsite has a link to our blog post about Mediterranean fanworm in the New Zealand section. Nothing to do with Cuba, but it was kind of fun to see that we made Noonsite. If you're really in the mood to procrastinate, you'll definitely want to check it out. 

Sailing to Cuba -This article on the Spinsheet website talks about the red tape involved in traveling to Cuba for Americans.

Impetuous Too - An interesting blog post about the crew of Impetuous Too's visit to Cuba in 2014. They point out that none of their photos are edited. The colors you see are the colors they saw. It isn't too often you see unfiltered photos these days.

No Land in Sight - The crew from SV Bueller sailed from the Exumas to Cuba in 2015. 

Cruising in Cuba - The Barr family have sailed to Cuba every winter for the past 17 years and their website provides cruising notes, information about marinas and tips on traveling to Cuba by boat. Cheryl has also written a Cruising Guide to Cuba which you can buy. If anyone has a copy, I'd be curious to know what you think about it.  

Sundowner Sails Again - Dani and Tate visited Cuba in February 2015, sailing from Key West to Havana. Fascinating blog posts - I particularly liked the description of the old classic cars and suggestions for what to bring as gifts for Cubans. 

Trawler Beach House - Check out Chuck and Susan's blog posts about cruising along the southern coast of Cuba and the impact of changes in US-Cuba relations on boaters.

Voyages of Three Pennyopera - Pat and Addison have got a number of great blog posts from their travels to Cuba, including a fascinating one on what provisioning is like there. They've also written a great article in Cruising Outpost on how the forbidden fruit, that is Cuba, is ripening fast. 

Blue Water Sailing - Christine Myers spent a season exploring Cuba and has written a three part series on Blue Water Sailing on her explorations of the south side of Cuba. You can also find links to the articles on her personal website. 

Twelve Types of Procrastinators - If you're still reading this blog post, then I'm pretty sure you're procrastinating something that needs to be done. Want to procrastinate just a little bit longer? Check out this cartoon on different types of procrastinators. I can relate to pretty much all of them. What kind are you?

Do you have any Cuba travel resources to share? If so, leave details in the comments section, send us an email or connect with us on Facebook!

Thanks for stopping by our blog - we love it when people come visit! We're also on Facebook - pop by and say hi!