February 1999 - The Beginning
We're still not sure when the dream began to buy a sailboat and sail around the world. We know it took root sometime during the period early in 1999 when we decided that we hated working and were done with it. We were tired of working for bossy bosses, of commuting in the ever-thickening Seattle traffic, the long hours in the office. We wanted to see the world, to taste new food, smell new odors. We were tired of the endless rain. We were ready for retirement.
At the beginning, the only thing we knew was that we were going to go mad if we didn't get out of the grind we were in day in and day out. We knew that together we could do anything we wanted. One evening, we joked about selling everything, packing all our few remaining possessions in a couple of backpacks, taking the train down to Mexico and simply travel where ever we wanted. If we liked a place, we would stay a while, work with the Mexican people. Teach English or business skills, perhaps. The whole idea instilled in us an amazing sense of freedom. We could do this! Suddenly, it became more real and the research started.
Somewhere amongst our many conversations, maybe while daydreaming of being in the Mexican sun, maybe while Michael was telling one of his stories of his time spent on "Seafever" (an Amazon 37 sailboat) as a teenager cruising with his parents, one of us simply said: "maybe we should buy a sailboat to go down to Mexico with...."
And we knew at once that was the answer.
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