Month 7 Expenses & Costs of Cruising

[akprb]

What I enjoy about his posts are the rawness of the numbers. The desire to get into a marina from time to time, restaurants, etc. This idea of going cruising on 2 dollars a month always seemed so stifling. I've met those folks, wrote a piece on this topic, and scratch me head. Their whole "adventure" can become about not spending as opposed to doing. The ones who don't have the experience to truly live off the land and and simply scrounging as sad to watch and can be challenging at times to deal with-in addition dangerous to themselves and others when they actually do go offshore.

For example we had a family cruising on NOTHING who stuck to us at one point. Their daughters came by for dinner nightly, what do you do, they were hungry? (yes we talked to the parents, they laughed that they were teaching the girls to go around the restaurants late in the evenings by the back doors and ask for leftovers. This worked but only encouraged more of the same). One actually hid in the bushes by an outdoor restaurant when we were entertaining my parents who had come down. We noticed her there (she wanted to be noticed) and had her join us, you get the idea?

In NZ had another who had a wooden sloop and needed desperately to haul. Was going to stay with us at our house for "A" night or two then back on board and all good. That turned into two weeks and a lot of food, coffee and beer. He left to sail south and didn't have a jacket, we ended up giving him a northface which likely saved his life. That's another story.

All nice and well intentioned folks. My issue is their lack of planning and resources they shifted to others. Not cool.

Bit of a vent, no intention to ruffle any feathers and if you want to dig deeper into my thoughts on this topic check out "ultra budget" on the blog.

Keep posting Sailorboy!

[Sea Dreaming]

Originally Posted by akprb

What I enjoy about his posts are the rawness of the numbers. The desire to get into a marina from time to time, restaurants, etc. This idea of going cruising on 2 dollars a month always seemed so stifling. I've met those folks, wrote a piece on this topic, and scratch me head. Their whole "adventure" can become about not spending as opposed to doing. The ones who don't have the experience to truly live off the land and and simply scrounging as sad to watch and can be challenging at times to deal with-in addition dangerous to themselves and others when they actually do go offshore.

For example we had a family cruising on NOTHING who stuck to us at one point. Their daughters came by for dinner nightly, what do you do, they were hungry? (yes we talked to the parents, they laughed that they were teaching the girls to go around the restaurants late in the evenings by the back doors and ask for leftovers. This worked but only encouraged more of the same). One actually hid in the bushes by an outdoor restaurant when we were entertaining my parents who had come down. We noticed her there (she wanted to be noticed) and had her join us, you get the idea?

In NZ had another who had a wooden sloop and needed desperately to haul. Was going to stay with us at our house for "A" night or two then back on board and all good. That turned into two weeks and a lot of food, coffee and beer. He left to sail south and didn't have a jacket, we ended up giving him a northface which likely saved his life. That's another story.

All nice and well intentioned folks. My issue is their lack of planning and resources they shifted to others. Not cool.

Bit of a vent, no intention to ruffle any feathers and if you want to dig deeper into my thoughts on this topic check out "ultra budget" on the blog.

Keep posting Sailorboy!

The family teaching their kids to beg (my words), this is just plain neglect. I imagine cruisers come from all walks of life and each has different expectations, but the neglect you describe isn't about saving money. It's about laziness. I'm glad you were there for these kids for a little while. Perhaps they will remember your kindness, and your ethics, to inform them in the future that they may aspire to a different set of values than their parents.

Your solo sailor simply used you. You were too nice. Call it "paying it forward" and remind yourself that you have already made a decent deposit to that a count


.

[alansmith]

S.B., thanks for posting up your finances. I am always blown away at the cost of reality versus my dreamer illusions....smile.

Have a great time.

[sailorboy1]

Wait till I start posting my feeling of the reality of cruising as compared to the glorified wannabe picture! Then people can tell me how not only do we spend too much but we don't know how to have fun!

[hamburking]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

(you can cut $500/mo if you just eat beans and rice)

Beans AND rice...luxury!
The nice thing about beans is that they are food AND entertainment.

When I crossed the atlantic, the owner had bags of money. But poor planning and a lazy cook meant we lived on beans and baked potatoes for most of the trip. I lost 30 pounds. Although it was a miserable trip, I looked fantastic when I got home...slim and tanned.

FWIW, the rest of the crew lived mostly on whisky, beer and wine. It was a 4000 mile booze cruise and I was the designated driver.

[buzzstar]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

This past month we traveled from Glass Window Eleuthera Bahamas to George Town Exuma and back a little up to Emerald Bay Exuma (started heading North). We did spent one day at Cape Eleuthera Marina for fuel/water/laundry and the rest at anchor. We experienced at least 2 gales and have had to hide from weather a LOT!

We dined out a few times, once at a real restaurant and couple of times at beach type restaurant.

Entertainment expenses were for some Kindle books, and a couple weeks’ worth of Bahamas WiFi that didn’t work well at anchor in George Town (don’t understand the attraction people have for George Town).

We had two good stops for provisioning and did restocking at them (Black Sound and George Town).

I still use my credit card, but in Georgetown the bank ATM was easy to use so took a lot of cash out as the store adds 5% to your bill to use a credit card. Since people wanted to “fix” the cost of using my credit card last month this month I included the cash back I got from last month to this month’s credit card and ATM fees.

During one of the gales our head sail unrolled a little and it took me hours to “fix” due to the dark and conditions. This resulted in it beating itself and the rigging tearing out the stitching for the UV cover. That was much more sewing than we able to do so that was a sail repair at this little shack place in George Town.

I think water costs are low by $30 or so because the marina charged based on 100 gal instead of 1 gal, but it is what I paid

The total was $2,387.41 as follows:

Food, soda, alcohol, clothing, sundries - $ 1,158.10
Boat upgrades, repairs, maintenance - $ 220.00
Fuel (diesel, gas, propane) - $ 232.67
Dining out - $ 379.15
Entertainment - $ 58.96
Communication, storage, shipping - $ 183.28
Bank Fees - $ -1.09
Marina - $ 88.41
Medical - $ 22.27
Water - $ 39.66

Actually the information is interesting, and of potential use and benefit. While somewhat off topic, but not really in an odd sort of way. Has anyone ever counted the number of George Towns or Georgetowns in the Caribbean and its immediate environs such as the Bahamas?

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Wait till I start posting my feeling of the reality of cruising as compared to the glorified wannabe picture! Then people can tell me how not only do we spend too much but we don't know how to have fun!

So, give us a preview: ARE you having fun?

Hope so...

Jim

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

So, give us a preview: ARE you having fun?

Hope so...

Jim

Sometimes

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Sometimes

Good..!!! Beats the hell outa not at all..
Oh..!!! and with the progress your showing this time next year you'll qualify for the $500/mth Club..
Good on ya for the progress reports..

[Sea Dreaming]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Sometimes

Yikes "sometimes" is not a good return for your investment. You must do something about this!

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Sea Dreaming

Yikes "sometimes" is not a good return for your investment. You must do something about this!

Withdrawal Symptoms..

[sailorboy1]

Been a gale every week for the past 7 weeks

Sometimes is pretty good considering

[WRoss]

It's nice of you to have taken the time/effort to share your expenditure experiences with the budget details.

I worry a bit that others may take these figures as representative of what it may cost them to do something similar. Although your figures are certainly accurate and you have told others to not use them as a fixed guide I think it's worth mentioning the other 'hidden costs' that should also be included.

For example, most boats will require a haul out & bottom job every other year or so. This can be quite costly.

Then there all all the wear & tear items that you can count on to hit you with big bills every so often, new sails, new anchor chain, engine repair, etc.

Most cruisers also carry hull insurance and some form of health insurance.

Just something to consider when trying to get the 'big picture'.

[a64pilot]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Been a gale every week for the past 7 weeks

Sometimes is pretty good considering

Now we know how you saved so much

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

Now we know how you saved so much

It was why I had to get the sail repaired.