Anybody around in their late 20's, saving hard for their dreams ?

[JPA Cate]

Bob, good on ya!

If there is any way you can get out on the water, start doing it. It could be a 20 yr. old Laser, but every minute on the water you spend is teaching you about being on the water, and it would be great if your water-learning keeps pace with your dreams. I'm not trying to be mystical, but now, while you're still at your physical peak, is a good time to begin learning how to interface with the sea.

Ann

[Jim Cate]

Bob, where in Tassie do you hang out? We usually spend the so called summer down there, so wake crossing is easy to imagine and to arrange for next season.

Jim

[Bob Morane]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Bob, where in Tassie do you hang out? We usually spend the so called summer down there, so wake crossing is easy to imagine and to arrange for next season.

Jim

I live in Dover down south. Working for the good ol' tassie salmon farms.
Tassie is beautiful in summer and I've enjoyed the waters a lot.
Winters not so much

I'd be happy to meet up if you come anywhere on the east coast.
I got heaps of diving gear so I can get a few crays and abalones if you're keen.
Like I said, I'll be there for another 2 years !

[laika]

Originally Posted by Bob Morane

Good morning ladies and gents.

I am well aware that cruising safely and boats in general cost a lot of money, making it a more likely lifestyle for "end of career", retirees or very successful people.

It is pretty obvious that the biggest demographic on the forum are over 40 years old.

I was just curious if there are other people on the forum who share these traits:

- Late 20's
- Absolutely obsessed by boats and the sea
- Saving and working hard, most likely at the price of a lot of other things

I would love to hear a few of your stories of determination and patience to distract me through the 40% / 2 years saving I have left to do, regardless of if you are doing it now or did it in the past.

I am not talking about day-dreaming and giving up the next week, but dedication, sacrifices and commitment stories.

Cheers from an impatient sea lover, diving everyday through winter to make it happen.

Fun reading the responses here. This one's a long one but I hope it helps you deal a bit.

I was there 7 years ago, now 35. I jumped aboard a ship with a couple buddies at 25, sailing the Hudson River and eventually the US east coast down to Key West FL. When we got there 2 of us wanted to keep going but 3 wanted to turn around, so we turned back, eventually arriving back in New York about a year later with some stories to tell. Myself and some of that crew shortly after came upon some land and a chance to try our hand at farming, so we moved off the boat. But I couldnt shake the idea of continuing on, not after putting so much work into the boat and making it so far, only to turnaround at the very moment when all that work was beginning to pay off. But it wasn't my boat and it wasn't my choice to make.

On the farm I started thinking how I might make the cruising lifestyle more sustainable on the second take, so I took the chance to start working a remote-based computer gig, and 18 months later after squirreling everything away I had the budget for my boat saved up. Ended up buying a Vancouver 27. Moved back aboard, this time with a young farm dog named Vladimir and the unrealized dream to sail to the Caribbean and beyond. We spent the first 2 years onboard not moving far, cruising a little ways north, coming back a little south, migrating with the seasons, but spending most of my time working, saving money and fiddling with the boat.

Around this time, Vlady began having epileptic seizures. They started happening more regularly and became increasingly tough to deal with. We decided to haul out. We came and went from the boat for 18 months, with an eye to getting Vlad's epilepsy under wraps while also spending time on a refit. During that time I upgraded with some things I reckoned I needed and learned most of the boat's systems from the bottom up. I also wasted some time making changes to the boat which belied an apprehension and anxiety about really making the jump into the full time cruising lifestyle.. Doing things like a complete bottom job and reinforcing the leading edge of the boat with kevlar.. Or waxing the boat hull to a deep fine shimmer.. Things which I dont necessarily regret, but looking back on it, didn't at all make up for the sweat and time lost not being out on the water. I was just lost and wasting time. I watched people come and go from the boatyard. Regulars who had been there for ages. Girls whom I might have sailed away with. Other folks hopelessly stuck in dreams that would never materialize for whatever reason. There were big chunks of time where I felt totally stuck, like I was growing old alone in a dirty boatyard, with only the abstract notion of the boat eventually being back in the water to keep me going.

But all those months later we finally launched, a captain who had discovered and accounted for every square inch of his boat and a dog who's seizures were marginally under control. We slowly made our way down south along the coast, moving ahead of the summer afternoon squalls, occasionally getting caught out in tstorms that would turn even narrow stretches of the ICW instantly into raging rapids. Through it all, it slowly dawned on me that singlehanded cruising with my epileptic wolfdog was probably just not gonna be practical in the long run.

So after arriving in Florida and spending the fall months hanging out and prepping for the bahamas, I sucked it up and dropped Vlady off with my parents. I enlisted the help of a friend and we came back down to the boat and waited for a wx window to cross the gulf stream. Two weeks into the wait, we got impatient and went for it. We got our asses kicked, making slow enough progress and getting pushed so far to the north that we actually missed the bahamas entirely. But 36 hours later we eventually cleared the banks, and as we set anchor that next afternoon I was finally in the islands.. about 4 years after the initial turnaround in Key West on the first boat.. still learning lessons the hard way.

I spent the next year or so cruising the bahamas, occasionally flying back to the states to see family, friends and dog, and enlisting various friends and family to come cruise for stints. But there was a stretch in there where I was totally alone, cruising around a remote area where I didn't see another soul for 3 weeks. No boats, locals, fisherman. No one in VHF range. I ran hopelessly aground for a couple days in a remote cut between two distant islands and had to kedge myself slowly off. Learned some solid lessons about myself and felt myself becoming more self-sufficient than I had ever been before. Emerged from those 3 weeks slightly reborn and more ready than ever for distant shores.

I had a buddy come down shortly after and we decided that we'd cruise the ragged island chain of the bahamas down to cuba with an eye to eventually making it down to south america. About midway thru the ragged chain, tho, he started breaking out in pressure sores from the heat and humidity of the oncoming Bahamian summer. At first we thought it might be a bacterial infection.. the skin over his whole body just started falling off, eventually getting to the point where he couldn't sit down, wear clothing, get wet or be out in the sun. We paged through our onboard medical diagnostic book looking for answers. He was confined to being down below naked drinking rum while we sat in the furthest anchorage of the ragged chain, seemingly on the edge of the world, deciding if we should make the jump to cuba. We decided to turn back. He needed to catch the nearest flight out of dodge, or at least somehow get back to the states in a reasonable time frame for medical attention.

So we headed back to the states. But the difference this time on turning around was that, though part of me wanted to keep going, I also realized I had now proven myself to myself. I didn't need to keep going if I didn't want to. And a bit of island fever had begun to set in and I increasingly missed some of the things back home. So two weeks later, we crossed the gulf stream back to the states, my friend's skin already on the mend, having spent the prior two weeks racing back through the bahamas under some of the most exhilarating downwind sailing we'd ever done.

We got back to Florida, hauled the boat out a few days inland, packing everything up, and drove home.

The boat sat there for 18 months as I reestablished my life shoreside. I hadn't been fixed in a single location for almost a decade. I was happy to dry my feet off, was even happy to find myself sitting in traffic, surrounded by the sometimes bitter throngs of humanity, a twinkle in my eye. But I also missed the adventure, the autonomy, the spellbinding and sometimes terrifyingly drastic change between one day and the next. But I also met a girl and a few months into lubberly status began taking flying lessons. About a year in, she suggested we try our collective hand out at cruising. So we planned another trip, launched the boat and headed back out. Somehow, she liked it and we're currently cruising winters, trying to start a farm in the off-season and leap frogging to the boat wherever it ends up for the year.

Anyway, there it is. I'd just say there;s a lot of life to live, maybe some of it even away from boats, so god damn get to it man!

Cheers mate

Ryan

[sveinung]

I remember one Sailing La Vagabonde episode where Riley explains his regrets sailing was not to buy smaller, older but being able to go sooner. What I really like about the "old" Vagabonde and Sailing Uma is how they show people with a small budget, low or no experience, pick up and go. Uma in particular is a great example of tiny budget, taken them around the Caribbean for two years now.
Cruising doesn't have to happen on a 40' catamaran with all the bells and whistles, a $5000 boatyard find and some months of elbow grease will get you anchored next to the catamaran.

I bought my Pearson 303 ('87) at 31 and took it to Bahamas and back and met only a handful of young boats along the way. Most of these were remote workers, checking in on work for weeks at the time and picking their locations accordingly. If your cruising budget is $1000/month, you dont need to put in a lot of hours, but you might have to work for many months to put that aside to savings while paying rent, car etc.

[Rorzech]

Chasing Bubbles is a real tear jerker ! Great Video !

[picklesandjesse]

You don't need the boat that most older people have. Small boats go the furthest. I've had 28 boats and my best times ( at least in my mind ) was when I was broke and cruising on boats under 30ft with no engine, refrig, liferaft etc etc. It makes you into a better sailor too. With the amount of money that you sound like you'll have you can invest 80/90% and still buy a small seaworthy vessel that will be easy and cheap to maintain.

I don't think you need to overthink this. Just get the boat and go and see what happens. You will meet some like minded people along the way... they are still out there. A few years ago we met a couple of old Kiwi cruisers in Panama who were finishing their circumnavigation in a beaten up plywood daysailor about 25ft. They were doing it real cheap !!..... but also very happy, and more interesting to talk with than many who are out there. Go as soon as possible because you never know what lies ahead.

[Don C L]

Many years ago I read a little book called "Do What You Love and the Money Will Follow." I was skeptical. 30 years later here's what I'd say: seek out the best delivery skipper in the whole area. Do whatever it takes to crew for him or her. Get sea time. Boats on deliveries often seem to have, or generate, issues that need to be dealt with right away, in uncomfortable conditions. It's a priceless education. Then consider a commercial skipper's license. Maybe I am just looking at this through glasses of "I kinda wish I had done that sometimes" but for YOU, follow the dream where it leads you, and you may have to live with a bit of the loneliness of the fact that there are not too many folks like yourself following their dreams of life on the sea. I hope you find some locally there.
In my own case I was 19 or 20 when I got my mega-yacht, for $4000 (which was a lot back then,) a 24 footer. I didn't have great plans to sail the world, just the local islands. I worked in construction to feed my sailing habit and life was great, and very simple. 6 or 7 years later I wanted to do more with my experiences, eventually that morphed into taking high school kids on sailing trips and then later to pursuing my teaching credential and moving away from the coast.
YOu don't know where you'll always end up, but staying on whatever path your dreams dictate will be a good choice, IMO.

OK, on edit, re-reading the original post, I understand your feeling of urgency. I had the same fears and anxiety about the future in 1978. I might just add, in your case, to find a good boat... you might be surprised how much boat you can get...especially if the previous owner is very fond of it and really wants to see it go to a good sailor with big dreams.. and live aboard to help save more $.

[billgewater]

Darwin is where nearly all the circumnavigators pass through. I arrived there in 1980 and at mooring was surrounded by small yachts sailed by adventurous young people. Many living on a shoe string. Fruit picking, working bars etc anything.
Very few older folk.
Around Darwin harbour there were safe places to leave your tender and the mooring areas were not covered by "Pay to Use" buoys. Careening poles were freely available. You felt welcome and were part of the exciting dry season cosmopolitan lifestyle that Darwin is still famous for.
It is completely different now. Mainly retirees on large monohulls or monster catamarans. The local marinas are choc a bloc with them, but the total number seems to be well down on the 80's. Something has gone seriously wrong and I would include issues such as officialdom gone bezerkers, customs costs, marina fees, lift out fees and the short lifetime of expensive electronics. But maybe there are other economic forces at play.
I also recall sailors passing comment about being welcome guests at remote places whereas now they are afraid of the security and cost issues at such places.
There may also be a perception that these young folk don't throw money around like the larger boat owners are assumed to do and are seen as riff-raff. In some places sailors are even seen as "unfair" competition to local charter businesses.
The distractions of modern life and the relative lower cost of air travel probably also contribute.
Whatever the collection of reasons for the change in cruising age groups it does seem to be harder than before. I think it means that to have this incredible adventure you need more resilience and conviction than ever.

[Group9]

FIrst time I sailed a boat over to the Bahamas was in my twenties. I didn’t want to come back, but I had a job, a mortgage, car payment and student loans. I wanted to cry when I realized how bad I had screwed myself.

I didn’t go back on a sailboat for twenty five more years.

Stick with your dream. You can always make more money, but you can never make more time.

[thinwater]

I'm not in my 20s now, but I was and they were good times. That is when I really learned to sail. I still remember the lessons learned.

Save money, but don't obsess over a single dream. The money can fund what ever dream you find.




Buy a good dinghy or a beach cat and learn both sailing and the nature of wind and waves. This will be invaluable experience on a big boat when it blows; a small craft advisory is a dinghy sailor's gale. There are reasons the Olympics are about small boats. Don't overlook them. This is the time for that phase of learning. And it's bloody good fun!


Sail Delmarva: The Merits of Learning to Sail on a Small Boat

[Maka]

If you are saving for the DREAM, and are in this part of the world, I invite you to come Sail with me any time and get some experience under your PFD.
Once upon a Time I had those dreams too, now they are a reality.

[Pelagic]

Originally Posted by Bob Morane

- Late 20's
- Absolutely obsessed by boats and the sea
- Saving and working hard, most likely at the price of a lot of other things

I would love to hear a few of your stories of determination and patience to distract me through the 40% / 2 years saving I have left to do, regardless of if you are doing it now or did it in the past.

I am not talking about day-dreaming and giving up the next week, but dedication, sacrifices and commitment stories.
.

Hello Bob, you are speaking our language of commitment and dedication,.... but depending on your earning circumstances, there may be another way to skin that cat... which benefits you in many ways.

Like you, I got bit by the waterbug in my early 20's.

Finishing a Uni degree in marine biology, I realised I would forever be dependant on grants etc to do what I love (ie...play on and underneath the water) and saving for a boat meant missing out on a lot of travel adventures, which I love!

So I retasked my skills to become a watersports specialist and a professional mariner.
My thinking was....why not let someone else pay me to do what I love. Odds are, because I am in my element, I will be better than most and get paid more.

So from dive instructor, to sailing instructor, to delivery captain, to commercial captain, to Superyacht captain and Owners Representative, I had others pay me dearly for my education and proficiency.

All the time as captain, it really doesn't matter who actually owns the boat. Once you clear that breakwater.... Its Yours!

Just another way of looking at it...[emoji4]

[Bob Morane]

Thanks a lot everyone for your stories, it is quite inspiring and much appreciated.

I want to clarify that I am not in a burn-out or sick of my current situation, I love diving and being able to earn good money while doing something I love is a chance that I wish to everyone.
It's just that the idea of sailing a boat and having the freedom to explore whatever your heart desires is a crazy source of excitement that has driven me as far back as I can remember.
That might sounds silly as I am not old by any means but, just thinking about it, I feel like I'm a child again, absorbing the world with wide eyes and open to everything.

Originally Posted by Pelagic

Hello Bob, you are speaking our language of commitment and dedication,.... but depending on your earning circumstances, there may be another way to skin that cat... which benefits you in many ways.

Like you, I got bit by the waterbug in my early 20's.

All the time as captain, it really doesn't matter who actually owns the boat. Once you clear that breakwater.... Its Yours!

Just another way of looking at it...[emoji4]

At some point, I realized I could only make this "hard saving" lifestyle work and keep my sanity if I was doing something I love.
And somewhat similar to you, I went from a degree and job in IT to dive instructor, then to commercial diving, which now includes boat driving as well.
I might go the licenced captain route, although I think I love being in the water even more than on it.

I've read enough of the forum to know that you value underwater life and remote, pristine places a lot, so I might have a few questions I want to ask you. I'll do that via PM not to derail the post too much.

Originally Posted by Don C L

OK, on edit, re-reading the original post, I understand your feeling of urgency. I had the same fears and anxiety about the future in 1978. I might just add, in your case, to find a good boat... you might be surprised how much boat you can get...especially if the previous owner is very fond of it and really wants to see it go to a good sailor with big dreams.. and live aboard to help save more $.

Finding a good boat is an interesting and difficult task.
My conception of the boat for the job has evolved A LOT during my 3 years of lurking on this forum, in fact it went almost 180 degrees.

My current idea is a solid 32-35 footer with heaps of ground tackle and KISS equipment.
My only "wants" are a good set of batteries, enough solars and either big water tankage or a watermaker to be self sufficient.

[Sojourner]

Don't know if you use Facebook, but I just literally this morning found and joined a new group called Young Folks on Old Boats! We're relatively young, I'm 40, my wife is 33 and our partner is 34.... our three kittens are only 1 so that's at least a few years off my age (teenage cats, man, they keep you young!)

Check them out, they're a cool group....

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2068...43147/?fref=nf