The transition from living on land to living and cruising on a medium-sized sailboat is exciting and for the uninitiated it can be challenging. One day you are living in a house or apartment and the next day you transition to living in a space with scarcely 50 ft2 (5 m2) of standing space belowdecks!
The transition can be physical. If you are not familiar with the boat, you can get banged around a little until you build muscle memory and full awareness of the close surroundings. The transition to a very streamlined existence in terms of possessions can be challenging for some, or liberating for others. For us, less is definitely more. Moving onboard requires a very well laid-out storage plan as space is very limited. When packing Rosalind, sails, safety equipment, tools, and food took top priority. Clothing and all other personal possessions were at the very bottom of the list as they can occupy small spaces and can be shoehorned in around other items. In the aft cabin, we have clothing in three removable bins that nicely fit on the top port shelf and are held in place by the built-in fiddle. In the space below that, we also have clothes but this space is shared with the engine exhaust hose and heater duct. On the starboard side, the boat's only hanging locker has our foul weather gear, life preservers/harnesses and the 6 gal (24 l) hot water heater with its assorted plumbing as well as plumbing for the manual bilge pump. With hundreds of items onboard, a system of tracking what is where is essential. We have tools and spare parts distributed throughout Rosalind and the same holds for food storage. Our food pantry is in the aft cabin on the starboard side. We also have long-term food storage under the aft settee in the main cabin and a bin with snacks over the salon table.
What is in many ways more interesting is the mental transition, specifically how perspective changes. You go from a lifestyle where the car gets you around at 60 mph (100 km/h) to one where you sail at 5 mph (8 km/h) and walk to the grocery store. That change carries with it a different appreciation of distance and time. When coastal cruising, one has two primary options for overnighting: anchoring out or getting a slip or mooring in a marina. We prefer the tranquility of anchoring out when we have the choice. When we anchor out and need to get to shore, our dinghy becomes our car. While our dinghy is our "car," we cannot get in and have access to anything we want at any time (like on land).The dinghy will get us to shore but we also need a place to tie up the dinghy. Many towns, but not all, have dinghy landings. Annapolis has one in Ego Alley; Galesville and Saint Michaels have them too. But other places don't. In Solomons we landed at one of the private marinas and could leave our dinghy at their floating dock for a small fee. (Think of it as paying for parking downtown in a big city!) A dinghy landing can give you access to a grocery store, laundry facilities, trash disposal or a hardware store. If you are lucky, you can also find a nice little coffee shop with good wifi and some nice shade! To access these necessities (or treats) takes planning and this is part of the fun of cruising.
While cruising, we also have to fill our fresh water tanks on a regular basis. With 80 gallons (320 l) in our main tank and another 20 gallons (80 l) in our secondary tank, we find that topping our tanks is not a problem. On the US East Coast, fresh water can be had at just about every marina and we usually fill our water tank(s) when we buy diesel fuel.
Galesville, Maryland
The most interesting part of the transition from living in a house or apartment to cruising by sailboat is how in-tune you get with nature. Cruising on a boat is driven completely by weather. Where you go and when and how comfortably you get there are all driven by Mother Nature. You get to watch, pay attention, and learn. Getting weather forecasts and weather information is essential to comfortable and safe voyaging. Learning about what weather lies ahead keeps us both busy. We look at the forecasts, look at the raw data of the weather models, and look at the sky. From all that, we try to figure out what is likely to happen. We find weather forecasting both very complicated and also very interesting and we have a number of books onboard to help us along. While coastal cruising, getting weather information is straightforward. A smartphone gives us access to weather information. For offshore, you need more hardware/software and we will write about that soon.
Lastly, because we essentially live outdoors, we get to experience nature up close and personal. We feel the cold front arrive and the temperature drop, or see the squall approach and reduce sail. We anticipate the thunderstorm and watch as it hits to make sure the anchor is not dragging. Sometimes you have to stay up until the early morning hours because of a storm, and sometimes it gets hot even with all the fans onboard running. (Rosalind has no air conditioning.) But the rewards are many. We try to watch every sunrise and every sunset (that's how we get so many pictures of them!), and even the storms, while awe-inspiring, are amazing to watch. We have both observed firsthand that there is a strong camaraderie among cruisers and that makes this lifestyle very unique because of the strong interaction amongst the community. Meeting fellow voyagers is one of the highlights of voyaging by sailboat and it is great fun for us to share sea stories and compare cruising notes with fellow cruisers.
So what does it take to voyage on a medium-sized sailboat? In addition to buying the boat, you should have the skills and wherewithal to keep her in ship shape. Physical fitness, seamanship skills, and lots of time for maintenance and repairs are all necessary. Beyond that, you need to able to let go of your shore-based comforts and routines, and be willing to, at least temporarily, say au revoir to friends and family.
All in all, the transition from living on land to cruising enables you to slow down, pay attention to your surroundings, and travel at a pace seldom experienced in modern Western society. It may seem anachronistic and an almost irrational way to travel; however, if you truly want to see nature, explore places near and far, and meet interesting people, voyaging on a sailboat is hard to beat. On a sailboat, the destination is not the goal; being on the water is what it is all about.
Thank you for joining us. We hope you enjoy the pictures and artwork. Please let us know if there is a specific topic you would like us to cover on the blog. We look forward to your comments.
Alex and Cheryl
Sky, Galesville, Maryland
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