Recovering Boat Addict

I am a recovering boat addict. While many of you may laugh when you hear that, boat addiction is a serious condition. If left untreated, boat addiction can have the following consequences:

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Lose your money (boat maintenance is expensive)

Lose your friends and family (your crew does not like to be yelled at)

Lose your house (you decide to be a liveaboard)

Lose your job (you decide to sail around the world)

Lose your life (you could no longer afford the boat maintenance and your boat sinks with you on it)

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The winter in the Pacific Northwest is the season of boat shows. For many years we would go to these shows and look at all of the really expensive boat parts, and expensive boats, and expensive boatyards advertising their expensive services (see a pattern here?) and we would feel overwhelmed with all of the money it would take to make a cruising boat seaworthy and comfortable. But we were committed (addicted) to the cruising lifestyle and were set on doing whatever it would take to go cruising. At that time it seemed to be the only logical way to travel around the world as a family and be self-reliant.

With the dream of sailing off into the sunset, our boat addicted lives continued long after the boat shows. When the West Marine catalogs arrived in the mail I would browse through them and note the expensive parts we needed for our current boat and also note the parts we would need to equip our future cruising boat. Like most boat owners (addicts), we slowly gave in to the never-ending sound of money being sucked from our wallets.

But after our dismasting, we started experiencing a new sound.  The sound of money being sucked from our credit card (money we did not have). Enough was enough, and we are happy to say that we are now boat free (kayaks don’t count, do they?) and much happier.

What does this have to do with us planning for our round the world trip? I have been reading a lot of other blogs recently about people getting ready to head off on their own round the world trip. They whine and moan about how hard it is to get ready. Hah! It does not get any easier than packing one bag and just leaving. After living the cruiser wannabe life, traveling with a single bag for each of us is going to be a cakewalk. No longer will we need to worry about having enough spare parts for when something breaks, knowing how to rebuild an engine or marine head (toilet), or be concerned about how to cram a month’s supply of food into a small cruising boat. Planning our itinerary? Head east! Weather? Who cares! Pirates? Great movie! Life has been so much easier since we decided on our new method of travel. So easy, in fact, it almost feels boring. But, the closer we get to our departure date, the more stressful it will become.   But there is no way it can be any more stressful than getting ready to go cruising. If you want to experience real stress and poverty, decide on the cruising lifestyle!