s/v Field Trip

Have you ever felt like you were flailing between who you were and who you were becoming?  Like in junior high when you couldn't quite figure out where you fit in or where you wanted to fit in?    That's how I'm feeling today, stuck in limbo between my new cruising life and the one I knew for years in suburban Colorado. A few days ago, we finished the painstaking job of packing up the boat to protect it while it will be on land in a boatyard for the next six weeks.  We'd compiled a back-breaking spreadsheet of items we needed to check off before we could head to the airport on Thursday. And while crisp, cool Fall weather was creeping into Colorado, Grenada was blasting us with temperatures in the high 90's and full blown humidity.  We literally could have swabbed the deck with the constant stream of perspiration running down our backs!  Needless to say, it was a torturous couple of days.  Mark and I agreed that we'd do anything to avoid storing ...

We are tweaking our boat with lots of little items. None are essential, but most are further refining our live-a-board experience. Others are fixing mistakes made in hopes not to make them again! :-) We’ve not finalized our future plans just yet, but have a fairly good idea (plenty of back and forth) what we are doing beginning in December. Let’s just say it involves remote locations, no marinas or chandleries and limited access to most western ‘things’. This anticipation is driving our craze to get things done and tweak the boat ‘while we can’. I’ve broken up our tweaks in categories, with a brief explanation. Electrical The boat is wired beautifully. It’s easy to slam in wires. Antares has taken great care in making most of the wiring easy to follow and it is well labeled and organized. Wiring panel organization Anchor Light We added a sunlight sensor to the anchor light so it will turn ‘on’ automatically at dusk – when the anchor light is turned on at t...

Plunging into a break from school! Okay, not really forever, but definitely for a much-needed break. As I browse Facebook, I see friends posting pictures of their little ones donning freshly-pressed school uniforms and holding sweet signs that read “First Day of First Grade 2013”. Well, our school calendar doesn’t exactly match the conventional school calendar these days, and you know what our school uniforms consist of! First Day of School outfit when Elizabeth started Preschool! Uniforms on board When we started this Field Trip, I had visions of what school would be like – the kids crouched on the beach in their sun hats and swimsuits, holding a magnifying glass, examining seashells, sketching in nature logs. Or perhaps all of us leaning over a navigational chart, plotting our course, accounting for current and wind direction, then the kids helping take a watch. Ahhh, it would be educational bliss… But then reality set in. And here’s what we figured out… ...

We thought it would be fun to take our readers on a short 24 Hour trip from Dominica to Grenada. It’s our last overnight passage of the sailing season. To document this last trip, we fired up both video cameras, and created a short documentary. It's not as exciting as the TV series 24, but it was a lot of fun! One item I’ve been asked about, but never discussed on this blog is ‘how’ we create our videos. It’s safe to say they’ve evolved over the past 18 months. We’ve created over 23 videos. Some good, some average. It’s fun, but a lot of hard work. Generally, we use two video cameras (GoPro 3 & Canon HF G10 with boom mic) and a M-Audio Producer mic for voice-over work. Video is 50% visual and 50% audio. It’s CRITICAL to have better than average audio components. If you have average audio, your final video will be average – no matter how good your visual composure. For editing I use Final Cut Pro X (FCPX). There is nothing better in my opinion. I’ve used ...

“Where’s the best place to anchor in Grenada, boys?” I remember Chris deferring to his two active young boys to answer my question as we talked about hurricane season plans around the picnic table at Time Out Boat Yard in St. Martin. “OOoo, OOoo, you HAVE to go to Hog Island!” Finn answered in his adorable South African accent. And then he proceeded to rattle off the best place for chicken and chips on Thursday nights and pizza on Mondays! It was obvious that their three years anchored at Hog Island were some of their best. I quickly got out my phone and started typing notes, and my anticipation grew. When we first arrived in Grenada, we opted to anchor in Prickly Bay first, because it had easy access to local businesses and a whole slew of cruisers to meet. Like many anchorages that attract cruisers, Prickly Bay operates an informational and social “net” in the mornings on VHF channel 66. These radio nets are a fantastic way to get connected and gather information about...