s/v Field Trip

This is a sort of follow up post to my Dinghy Dilemma experience. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, right? So, here’s the latest in our adventure. Mark is captain and cruise director this week as we have some guests aboard. We wanted to give them the full experience of a vacation, so the kids and I left the boat and are staying at a condo. Let me just say that this is NOT a sacrifice, and it has been quite a treat for each of us. Elizabeth and Michael have loved playing in the chlorinated pool with other kids and watching a few shows on TV. I have liked the washer/dryer combo (an ongoing theme in my posts, I know), long showers, and the fast internet connection. The other night, I indulged in watching the finale of The Bachelor live, rather than intermittently streaming on a spotty connection. Bliss. Needless to say, we are not suffering. However, the place is a bit removed from town. It is at least 2 miles in either direction to a grocery store and the main town of Ge...

Love it or hate it, George Town is the primary cruising stop heading south in the Exumas. Our experience has been mixed. Some call George Town ‘Chicken Harbor’ as most boats heading this far south decide to turn around and go north vs. heading to the Caribbean. We of course, are heading to the Caribbean. Here is my ‘Love it’ and ‘Hate it’ summary. Love it Provisioning . We’ve found most of what we need in George Town at ‘reasonable for the Bahamas’ prices. Yes, it is more expensive than the US, but in some cases a lot less expensive than other islands down the Exuma chain.  Definitely a good place to stock up before heading south. Central . George Town is a good location to jump off and see other islands. The best areas so far have been the Ragged Islands. We can hop down to the islands in just over a day, and be worlds away from the chaos in the harbor. Worlds away with buddy boat s/v Sea Mysty - Ragged Islands Kid Boats. This is a good place to meet ot...

11,000 nautical miles, 14 months after taking possession of Field Trip – how are things really going? We’ve essentially been aboard full time since Buenos Aires, Argentina. It’s less about sailing, and more about family & community. Having the boat provides the catalyst for us to be together. Of course there is the romantic side of sorts – wide open sea, sunsets and sundowners – but that can’t be the primary reason for tossing off the dock lines. If it is, you’ll be back in the harbor faster than expected. I’ve put into categories our experiences so far, and thoughts about the future. Small Spaces Small really isn’t that small when you get adjusted to less. As Americans, we’re generally used to having more. More space. More food. More toys. More cars. More of generally everything compared to most other countries. It’s just a fact. We’ve adjusted, and adjusted well. It wasn’t easy at first, but now we have a hard time imagining going back to the chaos of ‘More’. The ki...

By Michael & Elizabeth Did you know that in 1978 a bad guy crashed an airplane into the water? A pilot was trying out a flying trick and crashed. The airplane carried drugs to Florida and Georgia. It crashed in shallow water by Norman Cay in the Exumas. We went to go see it. Elizabeth jumping in water Plane wreck Elizabeth standing on propeller The 'Bad Guys' of Norman Cay  The length was about 2 or 3 dinghies long, or 24-36 feet. From the top of the water it looked broken. The whole entire airplane was covered with algae. It was shallow enough to stand on the wing. There was a lot of coral growing in the cockpit. On one side of the propeller fell of on the other side the propeller was on. I could touch the one that was on with my fin. I saw a nurse shark, gigantic stingray and a blue tang chasing a fish out of its way so he can eat coral. There were lots of colored reef fish. It was cool to see the airplane in Normans Cay. On Beach after pl...

Lately, we’ve been spending our days in ways that I only imagined when we first decided to venture into The Bahamas. We have been doing the perverbial “island hopping” along the Exumas, a chain of island running north to south just east of Nassau. All of us were ready to leave the hustle and bustle of the big city and get to quieter places. So, we provisioned and followed the wind east. The Exumas were exactly what we’d imagined The Bahamas to look like – clear turquoise waters, lone palm trees in mere spits of sand, and bright white beaches stretching between rocky shores. Ahhhh. Time to get back on island time, don the snorkel gear, and explore. The first cay (pronounced “key” for you landlubbers) near which we anchored was Allen Cay. In our charts and guidebooks, it boasted a huge population of Rock Iguanas, a species of iguana with a partially functioning third eye in the middle of the other two. Scientists are still not sure why this phenomenon has occurred, and it w...

We have officially been living aboard for a year now.  My, how time flies!  It was last Christmas Eve when we hauled all of our belongings out of a storage unit in Argentina, down the docks in San Fernando, and aboard Field Trip for the first time.  I remember being amazed at how much stuff we had and being overwhelmed at trying to find some semblance of order among the chaos.  Since then, we have reorganized, de-cluttered, and rethought our use of storage over and over again.   It is an ever-evolving process as we transverse various environments and kid stages.  Toys and clothes have been given away as the kids grow out of them, and new ones take their place.  Our family rule is for every new item (clothing, kitchen gadget, toy, book, etc) that is brought on board, one item needs to leave to make room for it!  We don’t follow it all the time, but we can quickly tell when the rule needs to be reinstated!!  Christ...

We all grow up.  Some faster than others.  That was the sentiment from our recent fishing/diving trip.  Three of my Tau Kappa Epsilon pledge brothers joined Field Trip in Nassau Bahamas.  Times change when 20+ years fly by.  Marriage.  Careers.  Kids.  All very good.  What doesn't change is our fraternal friendship, memories and ability to laugh at each other and everything around us. It's very hard to find a time and place to get together.  Even harder when it involves a sailboat in a foreign country coupled with everyone's busy schedules.  A special thanks to our families for letting us have some guy time on the water.  It was fantastic. Everyone arrived late New Year's day in Nassau.  Early the next morning, we got up, provisioned the boat and left the marina.  It was a fast pace, but we wanted to get away from the city, and head to the remote islands of the Exumas. It was the first time sailing on a large...