Life Under the Bubble

Random Guy at the Bar: So you live aboard in the winter? in Maine?
Jill/Tim: Yup. Full Time. We're under the shrinkwrap.
Guy: Are you crazy?
J/T: Yup!

Life under the "bubble", as we lovingly refer to our shrink wrapped boat, is going well, we're 2+ months in. When we first started researching life aboard in New England in winter we read a lot about shrinkwrapping. The white vs. the clear, the pros and cons, the cost. It seemed most liveaboards use the clear shrinkwrap because it allows for more light, sun (i.e. warmth) and you don't feel quite so claustrophobic. The funny thing is it's not totally clear so you can't really see out. You can tell when it's gray or sunny but you can't see a boat going by or when your boat neighbor calls to you, you can't tell who it is. It's a rather an amusing and bizarre experience - life in a foggy bubble world. 

The marina we're at typically only installs white shrinkwrap but this year all of us who were spending the winter there requested clear. The marina guy said he "doesn't guarantee clear" but he'd do it to make his customers happy. So clear it was. Right after Thanksgiving the guy came to build the wooden frame.

After the frame was up we went to Habitat for Humanity to buy us a front door. Tim built a threshold over the toe rail of the boat and framed out the door. 

Inside our front door.

Then came the team with the shrinkwrap...

The roll of shrinkwrap wrapping up Zephyr. 

Once they wrap her they use a propane heater blow torch to warm up the plastic so it'll shrink around the boat

Balancing on the seat of a little boat to work on her port side- risky business! 

For Christmas we even had a wreath on our front door. 

Christmas Card 2012 featuring our bubble door 

Another Christmas Card Outtake, not a bad backyard! 

 This winter has been particularly windy, exceptionally so, life under the bubble helps us keep out of the wind. It's nice when you come in our front door on a windy night and all of a sudden it's quiet and calm. The Bubble also helps with condensation issues and on sunny Saturdays it's about 80 degrees under there. 

Not a bad vantage point for reading a book on a sunny day

Just last week we suffered a bubble blow out, on a wicked windy day - not to be compared with a flip-flop blowout. One of the seams burst and then the wind got up under the bubble and caused it to rip open. 

We shouldn't see the sky through the bubble, that's a blow out

The Bubble blow out around the where the boom meets the mast

Tim's temporary fix - DUCT TAPE! How's the saying go - "if you can't duct it -- "

 This Friday we're expecting A LOT of snow, some forecasts are calling for well over a foot, hooray (said very sarcastically). And though we do trust duct tape's strength we know it probably won't hold up to a foot+ of snow. So, lucky for us the marina guy is coming over this afternoon to properly patch our bubble blowout using the proper materials and tools and HOPEFULLY she'll hold until we happily hatch from our bubble in late March. 

Our Marina Swans who visit daily love swimming amongst the "bubble people"

Life inside a bubble can make anyone long for the outside world :)

A Week Ashore

We are back aboard after a week house sitting for some friends in New Castle, our old 'hood. This was first time since we moved aboard in September that we'd spent longer than an overnight off the boat. Jill was just coming off of some the most stressful, busy weeks at work she's ever had and Tim had just finished a BIG project deadline so needless to say it was a welcome respite. Not to mention over the course of the week we both got colds and were sick so having a big couch, a pellet stove and a big TV was nice. We also had 6 chickens to tend to, homemade egg nog to shake and a fish to feed. We decided we would blog about what it is we missed about land life and also what it is we missed about boat life while on shore. 

What we missed about Land Life:

• Toast/Having a Toaster: on the boat a toaster is just too much counter space and eventually when we're cruising or on anchor it will also be too much power. So we do without. But it sure was nice to have a toasted English Muffin or slice of bread on the way out the door in the morning. 
• A shower in the next room: it was quite nice to be able to fall out of our bed and stumble into the next room for a shower. At the marina we choose to use the showers up at the marina building to conserve water aboard and to keep the moisture introduced in the boat to a minimum to reduce condensation. So it was nice to be able to shower in the next room rather than get all dressed in clothes, jackets and hats and trudge up the dock. 
• A full kitchen: The boat's galley is small, it's workable, but it is small, including the oven. It was nice to have a full sized oven to roast a chicken in. We liked the front loading fridge with french doors, rather than the 'bottomless pit' fridge we have aboard. It was nice to have counters to put things on and a dishwasher! That was a real treat! 
• A couch: It was nice to have full sized, wide couch to lay out across, especially being sick. The boat's main salon has 2 benches or 'settees' and they are OK. They are meant to serve as 'couches' and as 'berths' while at sea. The current set up is something that is on our list to fix because the cushions are really stiff and the general flow of the salon is overall cramped. Tim's woodworking brain is scheming all the time for our plans. 

We want to push back the couch to flush up against the shelf to allow wider sit space. 

And though these few things seem so trivial, we love that life aboard a boat has allowed us to appreciate these trivial things and to be grateful for them. That's probably the best part of this whole experiment - it reminds us daily to appreciate life and most of all to be thankful for it.

What we missed about Being on the Boat:

This is mid-tide, the ramp is sort of steep

• Rocking to sleep: Our aft cabin bed is so cozy and the gentle rocking of the boat in the water with the sound lapping against the hull is so soothing it lulls you right to sleep. 
• Knowing what the tides are doing: Every time we come home to the boat you can't help but notice what phase the tide is at. The ramp that leads from the shore to the docks is either flat when it's high tide or STEEP when it's low tide or somewhere in between. We didn't even realize what the tide was when we were ashore and we missed that. 
• Knowing what the weather is doing all the time: Same as the tides, we live in the weather, from the sound of rain on the hatch, to wind wooshing through the stays, to ice crystals coating the deck in the morning - we always know what the weather is up to. In the house we often found ourselves hardly ever looking outside to see what the weather was doing. We truly missed being connected to the environment around us. 
•  Being surrounded by our dreams: The boat is the physical manifestation of our shared dreams of travel, adventure and freedom. We love sitting aboard and thinking about the places we'll go, the things we'll see, the projects we'll do to get ready. Living aboard the boat intimately connects us to our dreams and never allows us to lose sight of them. Being in the house we were disconnected, we felt less inspired, less excited. 
• Living a life less ordinary: Though the boat comes with it's fair share of challenges (as I type this Tim's struggling with a drinking water faucet installation that is testing his perseverance and patience - another blog will have more detail, minus the expletives) we (almost) always love the challenges, we love the feeling of conquering the challenges, whether its learning how to cook dinner or how to stop a coolant leak, and in turn learning something new. While most folks write Christmas lists full of stuff, we can't. We don't have space for stuff. Our lists are full of the practical, the utilitarian, and experiences, rather than stuff. 

We don't doubt that some day maybe we'll move back ashore and be land dwellers once again but we'll have a  new sense of gratitude and until then we love living out a life less ordinary out here in the Piscataqua River. 

The chickens were a constant source of entertainment for Toby 

"You'll Learn"

I'd love to say the reason we haven't written in a while is because we've been too busy sailing the high seas but the reality is life has been VERY busy! Work commitments, family commitments, friends visits and a 32nd birthday for Jill have all been taking up our time. Not to mention life aboard as the temperature is dropping and the fall rainy season commences has been QUITE the learning lesson. The marina is thinning out around us, every day there's less and less boats and people. This past weekend was full of folks off loading their boats gear for winter storage - long faces of folks who are sad to see the season over. 

For us, it's just beginning. With the arrival of fall means the arrival of the need for heat aboard and with heat comes the dreaded word that is the bane of every liveaboard's existence - condensation. You may remember this concept from high school physics - when the air temperature outside is colder than the air temperature inside and heat rises and creates moisture it will create condensation also known as rain inside the cabin! Boiling water for pasta, moisture in the bilge, even Toby panting (which he does a lot since he's rather nervous when the boat sways) can add to the problem substantially. 

Now we'd been dealing with the dripping windows above our bed for a few weeks now (nothing like waking up to a cold drip on your face at 4am), naively thinking it was just wet at night and then it would dry out in the day once we opened up hatches - silly us! Because what does condensation cause when allowed to fester in closed spaces? MILDEW! This weekend as we were preparing the boat to go sailing on a GORGEOUSLY warm sunny Saturday we lifted our aft cabin mattress to find horrendous mildew stains, Jill's bottom pillow was 50% black with mildew, the walls around the window hatches had spores of mildew...it had attacked us! Granted it had rained for 6 days straight, we'd been forced to keep hatches closed and we were heating at night causing warm air AKA condensation. But still it wasn't good. We quickly realized this had to be dealt with and fast. Jill's allergies + a dank smell + just plain nasty = a Saturday spent bleaching, airing out, sunning, bleaching some more.

The contents of our bed laying out in the sun drying

These now appear in every corner of our boat

This is when we realized the rub of being liveaboards as opposed to just owning a recreational boat. If we had a house to go home to then upon realizing we had a mildew problem we'd say, "Well, let's go out for a sail and we'll deal with it later." And then happily we'd go sailing, come back in, work on it some then go home to our non-mildew bed and come back the next day and work on it some more. BUT as a liveaboard we don't have another 'non-mildew' bed to sleep on, we don't have a 'non-mildew' kitchen to cook in, what we have is all we got - a stinky, wet boat that has to be dried out and bleached. We must have spent $50 in quarters at the marina laundry washing and bleaching all the covers from the cushions and another who knows how much in buying "Damp Rid" buckets and bleach. 

We have been posting and reading the volume of opinions and tips on the message boards - as I said this is the bane of every live aboard's existence. The options range from completely gutting the boat to install insulation between the hull and the inside walls to setting off a "mold bomb" and vacating the vessel for days. 

What we have realized is that it is an intricate combination of insulation, moisture prevention AND ventilation. The boat needs to breathe! And like it or not it truly is a constant battle. Quick fixes like opening the companionway hatch when we cook and lifting up the mattress off the bed when we get up in the morning to more involved (read: expensive) things like installing a dehumidifier and mattress mats are now in the works. 

Bought this book today

Our mantra the last month (it was 1 month ago today that we arrived home to New Castle in our new home) has been, "You'll learn". We say it to each other as we rub the new egg on our head from bumping the passage way ceiling, neighbors say it us as we practice docking, we say it to Toby as he struggles up the companionway ladder. It truly has been our mantra. And this experience with the dreaded M-word is no different - we will learn! 

But there's something great about that - it seems like in modern adult life it's often rare that we are learning something new ALL THE TIME. Or rather we don't give ourselves the chance to do it, we don't allow ourselves the vulnerability to try something new, something we're not good at, something that we struggle at, something we could risk failing at. We are trained to master everything - our positions at work, our skills at home, our abilities in life. We don't often open ourselves up to failure but it's in inviting that vulnerability that we end up succeeding far more than if we hadn't. So Tim and I have really opened ourselves up here, we are very much living life with the "trial by error" mentality and hoping it doesn't result in disaster or frostbite! 

Any condensation tips? We are sponges right now - both literally & figuratively! 

Reasons Why Wednesday: Purging

Reason Why #4: To Embrace the Art & Beauty of Purging 

So recently a team of anthropologists from UCLA published a book called "Life at Home in the Twenty-First Century" it looks like a coffee-table book with big, glossy photos of the living rooms, garages and bedrooms of 32 middle-class Los Angeles families. However, the book has a deeper story line, one that totally sums up why Tim and I are buying a boat and moving aboard and hope to one day raise our children aboard -- American families are being buried by and stressed out over our "stuff". 

The researchers called their findings "disheartening" and "troubling". The book shows garages so full of bulk boxes of fruit snacks and 500 oz. bottles of laundry detergent and skis and float toys and old baskets and storage boxes that the cars have to stay in the driveway. There's photos of shower stalls full of laundry because there is so much clutter everywhere there's nowhere else to put it. They talk of these fantastic backyard 'oases' with the best furniture the outside living section at Target had to offer and yet 50 of the 64 parents studied never stepped foot outside and less than a quarter of the kids did. The family dining table was covered with mail and books and toys and the families never sat together for dinner - Mom in one room on the phone, Dad in another on the computer, the kids watching TV or playing video games. And then there's the toy obsession for kids -  America has 3.1% of the world's kids and 40% of the world's toys. The children were DROWNING in their toys and yet all they wanted to do during this study was watch TV to see more commercials of more toys they want. The consumerist culture we seem to embrace has resulted in a clutter-filled and very stressful life for our society and our next generation isn't showing signs of slowing their constant need for material possessions either. 

OK, off my soapbox and back to our Reason Why. We are just as guilty as anyone else of having "too much stuff". Our little 2 bedroom duplex is full - every closet full to the top, every dresser full, 2-3 junk drawers, stuff under the back porch and in the basement.This lifestyle choice we are making to move aboard a boat with approximately 250 sq.ft. of living space is causing us to embark upon the very cathartic, emotional, at times overwhelming experience of purging. A famous Farrell family saying is, "Everything must go." There's a long story behind that but it couldn't ring more true for us these days. Our friend who's living on his boat told us we will have to "ween" and all the books and blogs we consult also say there is this "weening" process that one goes through with their stuff where you move aboard more than you'll ever need and slowly you'll realize all you need is some warm clothes, good beer and a good mug. Isn't amazing that we liken the process of a baby maturing off of breast milk to the process of giving up our material possessions? 

We did the first round of purging this weekend - the upstairs storage closet. There was one particular bin that I've moved with me the last 3 times we've moved and never actually opened it because I knew the process of purging the contents would be emotional. There were old notes that were passed between my best friend Tierney and I in math class in high school. There was a middle school "slow dance diary" of every song I'd slow danced to with a boy. There were countless concert ticket stubs, festival maps, a "Welcome to Aussie Land" banner made by my amazing Australian friends when my parents arrived in Brisbane. There was poems written about road trips I'd taken from NOLA to Chicago and a "100 things to love about college" list that was added to for 4 years. There were palanka notes from college retreats and even the beer festival program from the day Tim and I met (I didn't purge that!). These things recalled fantastic memories of amazing people that may or may not still be in my life and though that thought is bittersweet the memory of these people and those times is still as poignant as ever. I don't need to hang on to some crumbly, half faded note to remember the care package my mom mailed me my first week in college, I can still taste the brownies. Or the lab report from my 7th grade Science Fair. I can still feel the pride from the moment I heard my name called. They are just material representations of life stories and the reality is I will never sit with my granddaughter and go through that bin of old things. I'll tell stories, show photos and sure, the details will fade or embellish with time but that's the beauty of life -- it's living the moment, making the memory, telling the story, not holding onto the things. 

This life path we are embarking upon will provide such amazing stories and moments of inexplicable challenge and beauty that no material thing could ever represent. The constraints of life aboard will challenge us to fulfill our lives with moments and experiences rather than gadgets and toys. When we buy something new, something old must go. Our future children will learn to love a strange piece of driftwood on shore as much as some plastic playmobil toy. Our living space won't be surrounded by our stuff but instead will be surrounded by the ocean, the wind, the damp dew in the mornings, the cold frost at night, the cozy teak interior. Our time won't be spent using our newest gadgets or things but instead we'll spend our time learning to fix a faulty cooling line or charting a course to a new anchorage. We will have no choice but to eat together at the table every night. And we'll spend every single day experiencing the outdoors in some meaningful way whether it be shoveling off the deck, walking up the dock with Toby or sipping coffee in the cockpit. 

So for us the "clutter culture" of American society is stopping now. We are taking a path less traveled and trusting that life experiences will provide far more happiness for us than things. 

"I believe we would be happier to have a personal revolution in our individual lives and go back to simpler living and more direct thinking. It is the simple things of life that make living worthwhile, the sweet fundamental things such as love and duty, work and rest and living close to nature." -- Laura Ingalls Wilder

Reasons Why Wednesday "Life is Short - Do it Now"

Reasons Why #3: Life is Short, Do it Now!

Sorry to be so quiet here in Blogger Land but summertime (or as Tim says, "SUMMAH TIME!") in New England means less time indoors at the computer and A LOT more time outdoors with family, friends and fun! There is so much to update on but for now I'll stick to our "Reasons Why Wednesday Theme". 

We just got home last night from 5 days down at the Scahill Family Compound on Cape Cod (definitely just as luxurious and expansive as the Kennedys - HA!). The weekend was extra special because it was a Scahill Family Reunion. Jill's Dad's side of the family gathered together. There were so many amazing moments amongst the 31 folks that gathered. Saturday evening was spent on the beach with a bonfire and pizzas. The older relatives got such joy from watching the younger ones dance in the waves, the younger kids got such joy from catching a "giantous" crab and a flounder and then releasing them. The view was priceless. The pizza never tasted as good as it does with your feet dug in the sand. Fireworks were going off on both sides of us and heat lightening - nature's fireworks - was exploding over the ocean - It was the stuff of movies. Somebody made the comment, "This is why we work all the time, for moments like this." It set my mind reeling...

Sunday was an all-day classic New England Clambake. Cousins, siblings, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews from near and far (as far as India!) gathered together to hug, laugh, hear stories, tell stories and be together. For the older folks there was a lot more reminiscing about past reunions and missing relatives who have passed on. For younger folks it was more about everyone's jobs, houses, kids, travels, projects, plans and general life 'busy-ness' and boy are people busy these days! 

Dad & his Sister Aunt Jed - the lifetime of photos
hanging on the line behind them

Surrounding the entire patio was photos of past family adventures - there were photos of foggy sailing trips, my dad and uncle in matching green pants with Manhattan cocktails in hand, weddings, trips to Florida, Europe, Nantucket, the mountains, there were smiling faces of those who have passed on and baby faces of those who are 25 now. Looking along the line of photos you can't help but realize, even though it's cliche, life is short. While you're in it and living it you don't tend to notice time moving along and you are wrapped up in the difficulty of making ends meet, of making the big decisions of house buying or child rearing, or job seeking. It's not till you stand in front of 75 years of photos or sit with your dad and uncle who are looking at 80 years on this earth that you realize that life is short and the latter part of it isn't as easy as the early or middle part. 

Tim and I are in our early 30's, we've got no kids, no mortgages, minimal debt, we don't own companies or have an investment portfolio, we don't have daycare bills or life insurance premiums, we don't have a leaky house or a need a new water heater, we are able bodied with no achy knees or sore backs. We will undoubtedly, one day, have all of these things plus MANY more, but for now, we don't. We spent a lot of time this weekend talking to family in different stages of their life - some with young kids, some with older kids, some with grandkids and every single person said to us about our boat plans - "DO IT NOW!" Complications and reason's why not to do it come quickly and before you know it you've got a 30-year mortgage or a you've got a kid who's sick, or you need a new car or the furnace blows out. 

As I looked at those photos this weekend, at the adventures my mom, dad, grandparents, uncles and aunts had, I thought - I hope someday my kids stand in front of photos of Tim and I and think what I thought, "what a life! how much fun they had, how many places they saw, how much adventure they sought! They lived it up!"

So, today's reasons why Wednesday comes from all the family we spent this weekend with and those who looked upon us from above. LIFE IS SHORT, LIVE IT TO ITS FULLEST, DO IT NOW! 

The Family, Summer of 1980 (that's Jill, the tiny baby on Larry's Lap) 

The Family, Summer 1992 (Note Jill's Joey McIntyre NKOTB t-shirt) 

The Family, 2012 - A lot bigger! The Orange Bus was a BIG hit!

VW Buses = Happiness for All Ages & Critters

This weekend was OJ's first big trip of the Summer 2012 season and she was a rockstar!  We headed south to our home turf, about 30 miles south of Boston for some family time. 

Toby LOVES riding in the bus & his mohawk is rocking! See that smile?

Tim's family was Saturday and Uncle Tim and Aunty Jill's bus has taken on quite the reputation with two of our older nieces. This past summer I told one that when she saves up $4,000 she could buy it from us, she was 7 at the time but I am worried because she's WAY into this bus and she's the daughter of a CPA! Never make a promise to a kid smarter and more motivated than you are! 


About 20 minutes after we got there in the bus the, "Can we go in the bus?!?" pestering began. We held it off till after dessert - chocolate fountain and cake. Perhaps not the best idea to let a gaggle of sugar crazed children take over your 37 year old bus. But it was AWESOME! The kids just love the thing! They climb up in the 'upstairs bed' in the pop top, they dance on the main floor, they play make believe house for hours, they get their stuffed animals to show them the bus. We took them for a ride and it was better than Disney - the screams every time Tim took a corner, the giggles, the laughs...I'm not sure there is much that could make us smile bigger. 

The bus ride! 

"Upstairs" in the Pop Top 

The littler ones even got into it

Look at those smiles!  There's something about VW buses & Happiness 

Uncle Andrew, Tim's Brother commented while taking a cruise, "I love this car, I love its smell, I love it's sound, I love everything about this car." 




Sunday we went for an early Mother's Day brunch with Jill's side of the family. Jill's Mom Peggy and Dad Larry are the reason the bus is still rolling today. Back in September 2009 the bus broke down upon arrival at the Willie Nelson Concert in Mansfield, Mass. We like to think she had arrived "home" and gave up life. We were told her engine had seized and that she'd need a whole new engine - think $$$$ that with Jill starting grad school we didn't have. We towed the dead bus around the Seacoast every time we moved including one exceptionally illegal move down Route 33 in Greenland with friends and a "Car in Tow" sign hanging on her. We talked numerous times of selling her, we wrote Craigslist listings but chickened out on posting them, we cursed her and had basically lost all hope. THEN Peggy & Larry gave us the best wedding gift EVER -- they brought the bus back to life. They said, "Get her fixed, get her rolling and then do what you will with her but at east get her running and we'll foot the bill". So we brought her to European Auto in Rye and Kevin, the bus's guardian angel, saved her. She didn't need a new engine at all. Kevin filled her cylinders with oil, put her in 3rd gear and every day for a month he put his shoulder into her and gave her a good shove. By leaving it in gear he used the weight of the car, combined with the oil penetrating into the cylinder to free up the engine. He also did some extensive exhaust work that she desperately needed replacing both heater boxes and she's run like a dream ever since. Someday when our own little ones are screaming with excitement in the bus we'll tell them that their Gramma & Grampa saved this bus for them to have adventures in. 


Peggy is a phenomenal human being. She's 75, looks 45 and acts 35. She's kicking breast cancer's ass and is a daily reminder to all of us to live life to the fullest. Peggy LOVES to ride in the bus so on the way to Mother's Day Brunch Peggy took shotgun. As we're wandering around Jerusalem Road in Cohasset Peggy said, "The world looks different, better when you're riding in the bus." We decided it had to do with the big bay window windshield and the fact that you're sitting on top of the front tires with no hood (bus engines are in the back) so the road and the scenery is all around you. A spring Sunday rambling along the coast in the bus, doesn't get much better.


Riding in the bus is a treat and an experience, you feel like you're always in a 4th of July parade with the waves and honks and peace signs flashed. You don't get anywhere fast, you have to accept that right lane travel (or "the hippie lane" as Tim likes to call it) is the only mode of travel you will ever be doing on the highways, but you wouldn't believe how much more you see on the sides of the highways when you're going 50 mph. And when there's alternatives to the highway you take those, the scenery is better and the old girl's 4 gear engine likes it more. The bus is a change in lifestyle, it's a shift from the typical day to day of modern society. It's not about being fast to get to your destination it's about the journey. Right now the bus has no radio so we just talked for the whole 3 hour ride south from NH. When do you get a chance to chat for 3 straight hours with your partner? There's no A/C so windows down with the air and the smells of the landscape are your cooling mechanism.  You arrive places late, smelling a bit like gasoline with your hair blown back and a 3 mile smile.

Ned, Shoally, Tim, Toby & Jill - all smiles! 

Kyle, Catta & our old best bud Jack heading camping!

The bus reminds us all, young, old and canine that there's nothing better than getting out of the ordinary rush of life, computers, Cancer, school, parents, highways and schedules and slowing down, taking in the sights, smelling the air and rambling along surrounded by groovy orange plaid. 


"Slow down, you move too fast.
You got to make the morning last.
Just kicking down the cobble stones.
Looking for fun and feelin' groovy.
Hello lamppost,
What cha knowing?
I've come to watch your flowers growing.
Ain't cha got no rhymes for me?
Doot-in' doo-doo,
Feelin' groovy.

Got no deeds to do,
No promises to keep.
I'm dappled and drowsy and ready to sleep.
Let the morning time drop all its petals on me.

Meggie D, Seth & Jill headed north to Dolly Copp for some camping!

Life, I love you,
All is groovy." 


- Paul Simon's "The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feeling Groovy)" From Simon & Garfunkel's 1966 Parsley Sage Rosemary & Thyme

Reasons Why Wednesday: Segmenting Citrus

We know that as this plan and dream begins to really take shape we are going to face the inevitable question - "Why are you doing this?" Now there are a plethora of reasons why, some philosophical and illuminating others pragmatic and logical and others down right funny. So we thought we'd start "Reasons Why Wednesdays" where we list reasons why we are on this plan to live an unexpected life and break away from the norm. Things arise every single day that we look at one another and say, "This is why we're taking off on a sailboat!" So we thought we'd start to record those things. 

Reason #1 - Tim learned how to "Section Citrus Fruit" 

Please note the magazine this from - Yes, Tim learned to do this. 

We don't want to be the type of people who know how to section citrus fruit - we want to be the type of people who know how to fix corroded chainplates or replace teak and holly soles. We don't want to worry about our citrus salsa marinade having membranes in it we want to worry about if the weather will hold out long enough for us to make a passage between islands or if our anchor is set with an offshore current in a crowded anchorage.  

This life choice we're endeavoring on isn't for everyone and there's nothing wrong with worrying about sectioning citrus fruit, for some that's what their into - to each their own. As this plan moves along it's going to get harder and harder for us to turn away from the lifestyle and expectations of modern society but that's the thing with turning your dreams into your reality, it takes sacrifice, it takes determination, it takes faith and yes, it takes a whole lot of courage. 

Courage to be OK with giving up all our 'stuff' and knowing we are making the right decision  

Faith in each other and faith that we won't end up penniless, childless and homeless in 10 years.

Determination to overcome the numerous setbacks we'll face. 

Sacrificing the things of typical life in your 30's - vacations, new sofas, new cars, new babies, new homes...   

So the reasons why need to outweigh the reasons why not, but perhaps that's a reason unto itself - Why not?