Mid-life Crisis? Nawww! =;)

[Jay Jennings]

Just an update to what I had talked about...

The Milwaukee job didn't pan out so we're still in Alaska, but just sold the house and are temporarily living in a 1-bedroom basement apartment -- size-wise it's the closest thing to a sailboat yet, for us. =;)

My wife and I have had a few chats this week about my dreams and it looks like it's boiling down to...

...if I can show how it's going to work financially, she's willing to take the leap and see how being liveaboards will work.

Woohoo! =:)

That's a BIG change from the "I don't want to talk about it" vibe I'd been getting for the last couple months, so I'm pretty happy. (Last fall I think she figured I'd kind of forget about it -- as I didn't, she got more stressed about the idea.)

Okay, I still have to ramp my business up to the point where we can buy a boat that's big enough, but I'm pretty close to being set with our monthly needs as far as being able to work on it every few days from a wi-fi connection.

I "just" need to come up with a way to generate $100K in one chunk to buy a (used) boat (we're not ever going to buy a home on time again).

That's for a monohull. We really want a catamaran so if I can get a $200K windfall we'll go for that. So that's what I'm working on right now.

I'm also lining up some ASA courses for my wife and I and son to take this summer -- so far the leading candidate is a place in San Diego where you live aboard a sailboat for a week while you take the classes. (San Diego Boat Rentals-Seaforth Boat Rentals -- anyone know anything about it?)

My hope is that by this time next year we'll be living aboard, or at least shopping for our home -- in a much warmer climate than here in Alaska. It's been below zero F for the last few days and I've been OD'ing on pictures of the Caribbean. =;)

Jay Jennings

[johneri1]

Welcome Jay,
I recently purchased a boat in Newport Oregon after living in Pocatello Idaho for eighteen years--not quite as cold as Alaska, but close. I have RVed for years: space can be a problem for some people (my wife for one). But I now spend more time on the coast than in Idaho. My two cents worth is this: do it, and don't look back. If you don't you'll be as old as I am and wondering how it would have been. Best of luck to you. . .oh yeah, luck has precious little to do with it. It is up to you to make it happen. Welcome again.

[Jay Jennings]

Brief update -- the four of us are now living in a 26' travel trailer for the next X months while we save for a sailboat.

We're in Post Falls, ID (had to stay here a week to upgrade our truck) and leaving tomorrow for Seaside, Oregon for a few days. Then down into California for probably a month and we'll hit Texas sometime in December. When it starts getting warm we'll head for Michigan and when it starts getting cold, we'll head for Florida.

And at that point we'll sell the truck and trailer and add that to whatever we've been able to save and buy a sailboat.

We've only been traveling a couple weeks but when people hear our plans they almost always ask if they can come along. Then they often make some remark about how we must be pretty well off to be able to do something like this.

Pffft! At this time we're living paycheck-to-paycheck just like most everybody else. We just decided instead of apartment rent we'd pay RV space rent in different campgrounds.

Instead of driving to an office everyday, we'll spend our average 1,000 miles driven per month to hit a few different states.

We're not on a boat yet, but this step was kind of necessary for us -- and we're finally headed there!

Jay Jennings

[Talbot]

I hope you continue these updates as you progress , as this is a part of the dream that is rarely documented.

I wish you all the luck, and look forward to your success.

[malovich]

As a plus, living in a 24' travel railer is about comparable to living on a 30-35' mono storage-wise and space-wise. Weight may be an issue, camping i'm sure you have cast-iron cookware which is really heavy for a boat, stuff like that will need swapped for lighter stuff. I wish you luck on your way to a liveaboard!

[NW Craig]

Jay,

Sounds like the dream is starting to become closer to reality. Not sure what you do for a living, but with this economy it's one of those good news/bad news times. If you can get the windfall you mention, I've got a feeling there's going to be a lot of boats for sale - I'm seeing it in the ads here in the Seattle area. Be sure to check things out closely (i.e. a good survey) if you find something in Texas after Ike's visit.

keep the faith and all the best,
craig

[Jay Jennings]

I just read back through all the posts in this thread...

...over two years since I started it and just about a year since the last post.

And we're still not on a sailboat! =:(

We ended up going back to Alaska for the summer and then kind of "got caught" up here as winter hit hard so we decided to hunker down. We're still in 208 square feet with electric and no running water, so we're sailboat-sized, at least.

As the snow piles up outside I flip through sailboat magazines, listen to Jimmy Buffett, Kenny Chesney, Eric Stone, etc., and try to figure out the "trick" to making it work.

I'm on a deadline. My son turns 16 in February and if I don't get us onto a sailboat before he's 18 and gone it'll just suck -- a lot. And my business, which took a nosedive in 2006, seems to have finally bottomed out but it doesn't seem to want to head back up again.

So while I'm not panicking today, I can see it down the road a little bit waiting for me.

I don't mean this post to be a downer, just updating where we're at.

The only plan I have at this point is to make it through the winter, spend summer up here (because we manage a county park and get free RV camping) and in early September head SOUTH! I do NOT want to get caught up here again. =:)

Meanwhile I keep cranking away on new products and hope to come up with one that creates the needed moolah to do what we want. I know, as a "plan" it's a little think on detail, but it's the only one I have today.

Tomorrow, who knows? =;)

Jay Jennings