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This Year.

Jan 1st, 2011
by Sara.
5 comments
The Wondertime Crew

Happy New Year from the crew of s/v Wondertime!

Michael and I woke up this New Year’s morning in our cozy bunk aboard Wondertime to bright winter sunshine streaming through the portholes. It was freezing cold outside our deep fluffy down comforter as we usually keep the heaters around 65°F as we sleep and it was a mere 18°F outside, but we had smiles on our faces anyway.

“We’re going cruising this year.” I told him with an excited grin.

“We sure are!” he replied.

I can’t remember ever waking up on a New Year’s morning with the distinct feeling that it was indeed a fresh, new year. With a sense of excitement and a butterfly in my belly at all that the year ahead held for us. Knowing that this is The Year we’ve been dreaming about for so long. And it’s arrived.

Almost eight years ago we unloaded our sweet Alberg 35 from the semi truck that had brought her back to Seattle from San Carlos after our year sailing to and around Mexico together. We hadn’t even got her back in the water and we knew that we absolutely had to get back out there again…someday. We figured another year or two of working and we’d have enough to spend another year cruising. Then Leah came along a few years later and we started making plans to leave when she was two, except that Holly was born that year. When Holly was three months old we decided that we’d leave when she was four…. But we couldn’t wait that long it turned out. We sold our house, bought Wondertime, and the decision was made to leave in two years, in 2011.

One year later we officially made Wondertime our home. Now, having lived onboard for nearly six months, we welcomed 2011 with joy aboard our cozy floating home. The girls drank sparking juice and Michael and I toasted with something a little kickier. It was a nice quiet New Year’s Eve at home with our small family.

And this morning we woke up to 2011, to six more months before we untie the docklines in Olympia for good, to sunshine, to a new year. To giddy excitement.

Although the sparkling cider we’d put out in the cockpit to chill last night is now frozen solid and the boat is nearly frozen into our slip, the clear blue sky we could see through the hatch above our bunk felt like Spring, even though it is still months away. We will have many more dark rainy days this season and there is still much work to do, but now our vision is no longer a dream. It’s our life.

May you also find your dream in 2011. And live it.

Revisiting The List

Dec 17th, 2010
by Sara.
3 comments

I was just kidding about not being able to find The List, aka Wondertime’s To Do List aka The List of Stuff We Must Get Done Before Leaving the Dock Next June. It was right there on Google Docs all the time. What we did need to find was an evening for both of us to sit down and go over it with a fine-toothed comb. Not only has it hit us that we only have six months left to knock out a good portion of this list, but also that we have a finite number of dollars left with which to do it. With a couple of glasses of $2.50 Buck Chuck (inflation is everywhere!) we did just that one night this week.

It seems in our society that there is a taboo on talking about money, as in how much you do or don’t have or how much things truly cost. (Note that I do not mean the appearance of having a lot or a little as [collectively] we have no problem with creating such an image, whether we actually have a little or a lot.) Perhaps everyone is afraid that everyone else will know how broke they really are. But when it comes to setting sail, the most often question is probably “how much does it cost?” Most people will just punt the question back with “as much as you have to spend,” which, I suppose, is fairly accurate. But a number of other sailing writers have taken the question seriously and have been publishing their monthly cruising expenses for all to see (see s/v Third Day and s/v Hotspur). We plan on doing the same to help answer the allusive cruising cost question as well as to help us to keep detailed records of our spending and stay on budget.

For now, if you take a look at Wondertime’s Current To-Do List you’ll see that we’ve included a column with estimated costs to complete each item (you’ll also notice that much of it is not filled out yet…like everything else about getting ready even our to-do list is a Work In Progress!) We’ve also switched around our prioritizing system a little bit. Where we had been labeling only safety items as #1s, we’ve now included those items that we feel are imperative to get done before we leave town in six months. #2s are things that we’ll probably tick off as we work our way south. 3s and 4s are things to get done as time and funds allow. At the bottom are (hallelujah!) completed projects.

As we sipped our Charles Shaw we examined each item on the list thinking long and hard about how much of a priority each really is. Our focus was those items that we truly felt we could not set off on our long-term cruise without completing. Most of these are the same safety-related to-dos but many are items we simply don’t feel right without doing, like painting the bottom and installing a halyard to hoist our Canadian courtesy flag. Some things we took off the list altogether (such as installing wind instruments) which was a relief.

As we added cost estimates to our #1 priority items and saw the total tallying up at the top of the spreadsheet it became clear to us that a number of items we’d placed as high priority were going to have to be demoted. Two of these included installing a watermaker and upgrading our refrigeration system. While both of these would be really really really nice to have, their sheer cost total (about $2-3K each!) made it clear to us that they are just not going to get done before we leave. With about $10K remaining in our outfitting budget the less expensive (and, admittedly, more critical) items have to take priority. Perhaps it is the influence the Pardey’s still have over our cruising style, being theirs were the first sailing books we read so many years ago, but strong lifelines, anchors and copious amounts of chain are at the top of our list over creature comforts. (Not that we would hesitate to install such systems if, ahem, a great deal was found….)

Just like sticking to a budget, now the difficult part is to stick to our list — or more specifically those #1 items on our list. It will be tempting to drift off course and want to get some easy “nice to haves” done but before we know it our outfitting funds will be depleted and it will be time to leave the dock for good. Money spent after that comes directly from the cruising kitty which means less time “out there.” And time out there is worth more than any item on our List.

Cracking down

Dec 12th, 2010
by Sara.
Comments are off for this post

FestiveSo far, December has consisted of mainly three activities:

  1. gearing up for the big Christmas holiday ahead
  2. staying dry
  3. cracking down.

On the staying dry front we have to say that we could not do it without our trusty old Kenmore dehumidifier. Now, this monstrosity, which lives balanced precariously on a battery box in our engine room is obnoxiously loud and creates so much heat that we don’t need to run our other space heaters. This is a good thing of course as it’s typically been 40 degrees outside. We also dump out a gallon and a half of water after a day of running it. This is water that is no longer free to drip steadily off our cold bronze ports and down the uninsulated parts of the hull inside of lockers soaking everything not in tupperware. Also a good thing. Our Shade Tree has also been performing marvelously as a Rain Tree and lets us leave and enter the boat in relative dryness.

With two weeks left until Christmas the girls are as excited as can be about Santa coming for a visit. Since having children, we have been given a whole new appreciation for all that our parents went through to give us the wonderful holidays of our childhood. Which is to say, this holiday is freaking stressful. We are aware that we are on a bit of a teeter-totter with this, our last Christmas in the U.S. for a while. We are happy to see our girls so excited about this holiday, but at the same time we don’t want to build it up too much, for fear that they’ll be disappointed when the next few Christmases are celebrated under palm trees and Santa is a little (lot) more stingy with gifts.

What Michael and I are most excited about this year is New Years; when the clock ticks over to 2011 we will be able to say that we are going cruising “this year.” Not five years from now, not in two years. THIS year. It’s fairly mind-blowing since we’ve been scheming this for so many years. But this also means that we’ll officially have six months left until the dock lines are permanently stored in the bilge. Which means that we need to find that List we’ve got buried around here somewhere and get cracking.

Which brings me back to our Christmas prep; all of this shopping has made me realize that it’s time to crack down on that too. While we’ve always been conscious of what we are spending each month, truthfully certain frivolous expenses have slipped through: a trip through the Starbucks drive-through (Starbucks for four=$ouch!), the random things that find their way into my Target cart, that great deal on a toy at the Goodwill I can’t pass up. We are not going crazy on gifts this year, both because I don’t want Christmas to be about the material stuff to the girls, but also because we’ve realized that our list of “stuff” we need to go cruising just continues to grow (and I’m talking about gear like good tethers and harnesses for all — not negotiable).

What the New Year will bring is a new intensity in our prep to leave next June; whether it’s time spent or something to be purchased, if it doesn’t get us one step closer to leaving then it’s got to be forgotten. This part is difficult, but with the reward actually in sight it’s pretty exciting and come January we’ll attack that List with renewed vigor.

In the meantime, we’ll sit back and watch the joy on the faces of our little girls as small gifts appear under our sparkling boat tree, holiday music cranked up so as to be heard over the humming dehumidifier and raindrops splashing on Wondertime’s decks.

Stuff it.

Jul 24th, 2010
by Sara.
1 comment

Day and night, for weeks on end we’ve been sorting, tossing, packing, stacking, moving, cleaning, selling, giving away, organizing, and analyzing each and every item we own. Well, maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration. Or maybe it’s not. It sure feels like that’s what we’ve been doing.

We have lived on land for three and a half years after living aboard for seven. You would not ever guess this, if you could see how much stuff we have accumulated in that relatively short time span. When we moved to our rental house from the house we sold a year ago we filled a 24′ Uhaul van with not an inch to spare. And that was after giving away a ton of stuff.

We ask ourselves: how did we get to this point where all this stuff seems to run our lives? We don’t even shop all that much (except “we” sure are weak at Costco and Target and ebay). But somehow it’s just come rolling through the door, cluttering our rooms and our lives and now we have taken on the task of getting rid of nearly all of it.

This is not easy to do in several ways. When I thought about this the other evening, collapsed into a heap of exhaustion after another day of sorting and packing, I realized that I have held nearly every item we own, and have had to decide: take to the boat? keep in storage? sell? give to the thrift shop? It hasn’t been physically taxing so much, although I’m sure I’ve walked at least 10 miles this week back and forth and across the house while sorting. Rather, it’s this mental decision-making process that has turned my brain to mush.

We are getting rid of nearly all of our furniture, except for a couple small things that have been in the family for a long time. Everything else has gone up on Craigslist. This can be delightfully quick and easy, like the young college student couple who came to our front door, handed us $150 for our dresser, popped it in their van and drove off. Or, it can be a time-wasting nightmare, like the guy we’ve emailed back and forth about the intimate details of our $20 computer chair for two days, then he was supposed to come by two nights ago at six, never showed, then promised to come the next night, never showed….

Which makes us want to do with everything what is really fun: sticking it out on the sidewalk and putting a free sign on it. When we were moving aboard for the first time 11 years ago, we were down to the last items in our apartment and just put them all on the sidewalk as we had to be out that day. An older  fellow of clearly modest means walked over and saw the microwave sitting there.

“Are you giving this away?” he asked us.

“Yes, please take it if you want it!” we replied.

His face beamed as he picked up the unit.

“Wow, thanks so much! I’ve never had one of these but have always wanted one.” and he carried his new prize down the street pleased as punch.

We’ve never forgot the joy this fellow felt at his free gift and have since much preferred just putting things out on the sidewalk with a big free sign on them. This time too, I’ve seen people walk away with lamps, dishes, toys, art, cds, books tucked under their arm, delighted with their new found treasure. And I grin too, much more satisfied than the dollar or two these things would garner at a yard sale.

As I type this, it’s Saturday. This will be our last night on land. Tomorrow, we’ll haul the most important items to Wondertime. It will only be a carload or two. Everything else — and I can’t even remember what now that it’s gone — will be out in the world maybe becoming someone else’s important thing instead of gathering dust in our closet. It does feel good to set this stuff free.

The List

Jun 24th, 2010
by Sara.
2 comments
The List

If you squint, you can just make out all 97 items.

Every cruiser-to-be has got one of these: the List. The list of things to get done on the boat. A copy of our list hangs next to the computer where we sit several times each day. Of course, in order to fit it on one printed page the font is 1.5 pt or something like that which renders it virtually unreadable. But if we squint we can remind ourselves of how close — or how far– we are to setting off in a year. And there is nothing more satisfying than taking a black pen and drawing a line through a finished to-do. Well, maybe except for drawing a squiggly line across it, which means it’s been scratched as a to-do entirely.

On our list, these items are given one of the following priorities:

1 – safety issues that must be done before takeoff
2 – high priority maintenance/improvements
3 – general maintenance/improvements
4 – would be nice.

Up at the top there we have items like “replace seals on windlass,” “purchase life raft,” and “install new non-skid on companionway ladders.” Our #2s are things like “replace wooden blocks” (charming, but heavy as bricks), “rebuild head,” and “sea water foot pump.” #3s are things like new canvas, and #4s are items such as “VSD water pump.”

Of course, these priorities change constantly; for example that VSD fresh water pump just got moved up to a #2 while we’ve been getting ready to live aboard. Our older water pump sounds like a jack jammer has been set loose in the bilge so we’ve decided it’s worth the extra $200 right now for nice silent fresh water delivery like we installed on Rivendell. And other items get moved around too like this.

Our goal when planning our projects for the month, also taking cash and time flow into consideration, is to tackle the jobs at the top — the #1s. For instance, we have “Install new 55lb Delta anchor” up at the top; but our 45 lb CQR is more than adequate for our easy NW summer cruising we’ll be doing this year so this one will wait until next year. Next up in line is to haul all our chain onto the dock and use florescent paint to mark it into 50′ sections (we have been just guessing how much is out by checking how much is left in the chain locker but this probably isn’t a great long term solution).  “Install netting on lifelines” is likely the next to get checked off as this will offer up more security for our two very mobile and active girls.

That’s the plan anyway. The two projects currently underway are replacing a bit of rot on the under side of our bowsprit with West Systems epoxy and installing a new holding tank for living aboard. Michael had discovered some rotten wood underneath the bow roller which got top priority as replacing the whole 8 foot sprit didn’t sound appealing if we ignored it. And the marina wasn’t on board with our “removable” holding tank (i.e. the 5-gallon gas can the head drains into) that some creative former owner thought of. So these two projects got pushed to the top.

The problem, as seems to happen with every to-do list I’ve ever had, is that these two items weren’t actually on the list.

So, when we sat down to review our boat to-dos last night, joyously checking off a few items that had been completed last month, we really didn’t want to add these items and actually bring the list to page number two.

The answer was simple: “install pencil holder” got squigglied.

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