Personally, I was always drawn to boats, and in the early days when I was in school I made a Dinghy when most others made picture frames and stuff like that. The dinghy was nice, and I actually fiberglassed it. Out of school when most got an apartment, I bought a powerboat and found it was great to live on! It was 40? wooden and old, but it was mine. The first few years was learning the maintenance, and especially learning how to keep warm in the winter. The boat stayed in the water year round, but came out of the water once a year for bottom painting. I ended up living on boats for 10 1/2 years. Loved every minute of it, going everywhere!
I moved ashore reluctantly, but within a year I was on the water again...but this time in a sailboat! I started racing sailing with some clubs and not only won trophies, but enjoying the sails to the starting lines. Some of the starting lines were a day or more away. I enjoyed my boat, crew and the run to the starting line. I found I enjoyed the long distance sailing most. All the same maintenance in a powerboat is on the sailboat with a few variations. Good maintenance meant not having trouble while cruising Offshore...like to Bermuda! Still things do happen, but using common sense always prevailed.
With 30,000 miles Offshore you're bound to run into stuff...like bad weather, I mean Really bad weather...to tranquil runs Offshore that you would hope never end. I've been Offshore Sailing when the bilge auto switch decided to cease working, (found alot of water in the bilge) and had to reroute myself into Beaufort, NC inlet to get another one...I was a bit Offshore to say the least. I've done plenty of single handing up and down the coast and have been a Captain, certified scuba for quite some time.
So I'll be bringing in some stories and "moments" where sanity was hard to find...to maintenance subjects and simple upgrades for being safe...
Sea Ya soon ~~~_/) ~~~
Tags: boat, boats, cruising offshore, dinghy, offshore sailing, powerboats, sailboats, sailing
