Roy and Leslie's Sea Adventure
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People are always asking how we decided to make this move to a boat. Well, here's the short version:
I came home from visiting my friend Cate in January of 2004 with a revelation: if you wanted to do something crazy like buy and live on a boat, it didn't mean that you had to sell your house and all your stuff to do so, but you could minimize your expenses on the "land" end, borrow the money to buy the boat, and transfer your expenses to a new venue. Then, when you're finished with the boat, you sell it and pay off the loan and you still have a house to come home to. I guess this isn't rocket science, but this was the first time my mind had wrapped around the concept.
I popped the idea to Roy, who I know has always sort of dreamed of the idea of living on a boat, and his face split wide with a grin. We talked about it in sort of nebulous terms with regard to when, etc., but the idea was out there. I mentioned it to my friends at work, and they were enthusiastic as well. It was just a dream that I could imagine turning into a reality some day.
One day not so long after that, I was accessing my American Express account on the internet, and I clicked on the completed web address that appeared in the browser when I began typing. What came up on the screen was not the Amex site, but a picture of a beautiful boat called an American Tug. (I had apparently clicked on the wrong address…)
So, I realized that Roy had been running with this idea, and doing some research on his own!
Now we began to talk about the idea in earnest, and to look at boats on the web and think about money and the possibility of making this dream a reality. In the meantime, I got a note from my boss saying, basically, "You only live once, and if there's something you want to do, you should do it if you can. Don't wait for some unspecified time in the future. Remember, this is not a dress rehearsal!" With this encouragement, we decided that we could be ready to leave Atlanta for a new adventure in the early summer of 2005. I felt that I wanted to have one more year with my St. Bart's choir and Schola, and we had plenty of training and work to do before we would be ready, anyway.
We had several categories of issues that we felt we needed to resolve before we made a final decision. Roy, in his inimitable fashion, drew up a "Plan" on the computer that listed the various components that would make up our final decision, and the path we'd take in each area to get there. Some of the components were: Which boat? Training? Money? Can we live together in that small space? Do we like it?
We agreed that we'd begin to explore these areas, and that if, at any time, either one of us felt that this was not something he or she wanted to do, that we'd cease and desist and not do it. No harm, no foul.
The "which boat" issue was settled pretty quickly. We tried to keep an open mind, but couldn't find another boat that came close to the American Tug in terms of safety and seaworthiness, comfort for living aboard, and quality of design. We finally had a chance to see one in person at the Bay Bridge Boat Show, outside Annapolis, in late April. By this time we had been doing a lot of looking and dreaming on the internet, and had been trying to keep an open mind, but it was really hard. We were really excited to step aboard and see if the American Tug lived up to its write-ups and photos on the web.
We were not disappointed. The boat is beautifully crafted and thoughtfully built with the boat owner in mind. Everything is accessible and well thought out in design, and it's very comfortable for a couple. The living spaces are roomy, and important things, like the galley and the head, are more like what you'd find in a house than what you'd expect to find on a boat. The pilothouse has great visibility, and there are innumerable thoughtful touches throughout the boat, like the shades that have two "settings" - one for a translucent window covering and one for an opaque covering. The engine is totally accessible, and the engine room is well lit. We couldn't find anything to complain about, and it was no contest with any other boat.
So, although we still weren't committed, and were trying to keep an open mind for another possibility, we were pretty much sold on the American Tug from the start! We began taking some Coast Guard training classes: Boating Skills and Seamanship, and the more advanced class of the same name. Although I grew up around sailboats in the summers, I knew very little about power boats, and maritime regulations, and the host of other topics covered in these classes. It was encouraging to find out that I can still learn!
We made lists of current expenses and anticipated expenses in our "new life" and which "old" expenses would disappear in our "new life" and did a lot of number crunching. Roy is particularly good at this. According to our best estimates, the numbers worked out to about equal in the two columns, which is to say that our new expenses would be about the same as our old expenses, including any old expenses that we'd have to maintain. The good news about that is that we currently live with a nice cushion, so that if our estimates are imperfect there's plenty of room for error. We agreed that we couldn't be comfortable doing this any other way; that we didn't want to embark on this new adventure stretched to the limit financially. Fortunately, it looked as though this would not be a problem.
The other biggest hurdle for us to figure out was: is this something that we are both going to enjoy? Roy found a charter/training operation on the web called Blue Goose Charters out of Baltimore. We decided to charter the Bitsy Goose, a 32' trawler, for a week of training and cruising in August. We felt that this would at least give us a chance to experience living together in the small space of a boat and to see if we enjoyed the life aboard and living in those close quarters.
We had the opportunity to see another American Tug in Rhode Island when we were there in June for our future daughter-in-law's graduation from a master's program there. As it happened, there was a boat show in Newport the same weekend as the graduation, so we had the fun of taking our son and future in-laws to see the boat. Our son, Danny, owns a dive operation in the Cayman Islands, has his captain's license, and often does boat deliveries between Florida and Grand Cayman, so he has lots of experience on different boats. We were happy that his and the in-laws opinions were all the same as ours with regard to the quality of the American Tug, and especially in comparison with other boats in the same class.
It was about this time that I realized that I didn't want to wait for summer 2005, that I felt that we were moving forward with some momentum, and that, if everything felt right and the numbers still looked right, we could go anytime after Christmas, 2004. This timing would have the advantage of allowing us to start in Florida, on the Gulf coast, and have six months before hurricane season to get comfortable with the boat and improve our skills. I would also feel that I could give my respective singing groups plenty of "notice" and fulfill my commitment through Christmas. The same for my work.
We started looking for used boats, although we agreed that we were on "hold" until after our week on the Chesapeake in August. This would really be the acid test, and the final decision-maker for us. We identified a couple of used boats that we just sort of watched until we were in a position to do more.
The tale of our adventures and experiences on the Bitsy Goose is another story, and can be found elsewhere on this site.
The questions we get asked most often about this adventure are: