My Journey towards full time liveaboard.

[patagoniadave]

Exactly!

[patagoniadave]

View from the boat tonight

[SoundOfSilence]

Beautyful picture! Please continue writing 🙂

[chris mac]

You are doing great, and I enjoy reading your progress. Please keep it up.
As for your sail cover, watch some videos from sailrite. They show how to make the stackpack. I did one on our first boat and it was pretty easy, and not too expensive. You may be able to find some used sunbrella locally as well.

[JPA Cate]

I really don't know, here, but think the Sunbrella may have to come down from the States in a suitcase, or similar, unless there's a dodger making business in San Carlos. Still, doable. There's lots of cross the border traffic, folks coming south from Arizona. There are also buses.

Ann

[rkymtnsailor]

For your ghost rider noise check the outer shrouds tension - if they're loose you might get a noise like that...


To measure tension on the rig, check out Loos at https://loosnaples.com/how-tos/tension-gauges/

[Messing About]

Where’s Dave?
It’s been over a month since the thread was updated. Like many others, I’ve also enjoyed reading.
I’m planning my own retirement on a sailboat.
Have had 4 powerboats from a 16’ Mako Flats fishing boat to a 34’ SeaRay Cruiser.

I’m leaning toward an Island Packet, something around 38’, suitable for single handing.

Mentally and financially, I’m ready buy and go but I’ve got to continue seeing my wife thru her cancer. Hard to say how long she has left. She completed all the treatments and is down to 70 pounds. She still gets around on her own two feet but is now suffering some significant cognitive decline. Doesn’t help that she still smokes and drinks every day. Myself, I quit smoking 16 years ago and quit drinking 141 days ago, not long after our daughter died of a sudden heart attack. I figured stopping drinking was one change I could make to hopefully lengthen my own life. Won’t hurt my liveaboard budget either.

Like Dave, I will have two dogs aboard. And also like Dave, I have prepared them for the boat life by years of RV life. They are just 4.5 and 2.5 year old sibling, so they should be with me for at least 10-12 more years. They love anything that involves me being along.

Hope Dave and dogs are okay and we hear from him again soon.

[patagoniadave]

Originally Posted by Messing About

Where’s Dave?
It’s been over a month since the thread was updated. Like many others, I’ve also enjoyed reading.
I’m planning my own retirement on a sailboat.
Have had 4 powerboats from a 16’ Mako Flats fishing boat to a 34’ SeaRay Cruiser.

I’m leaning toward an Island Packet, something around 38’, suitable for single handing.

Mentally and financially, I’m ready buy and go but I’ve got to continue seeing my wife thru her cancer. Hard to say how long she has left. She completed all the treatments and is down to 70 pounds. She still gets around on her own two feet but is now suffering some significant cognitive decline. Doesn’t help that she still smokes and drinks every day. Myself, I quit smoking 16 years ago and quit drinking 141 days ago, not long after our daughter died of a sudden heart attack. I figured stopping drinking was one change I could make to hopefully lengthen my own life. Won’t hurt my liveaboard budget either.

Like Dave, I will have two dogs aboard. And also like Dave, I have prepared them for the boat life by years of RV life. They are just 4.5 and 2.5 year old sibling, so they should be with me for at least 10-12 more years. They love anything that involves me being along.

Hope Dave and dogs are okay and we hear from him again soon.

Hey, thanks for checking in. We are doing awesome! There is a toxic culture of communication on the internet, and especially on this site. While I know that is the norm, I am not wired to react well to it these days, so I took some advice and stopped following the forum, while sailing more. Maybe someday my skin will thicken again, but it is not there yet. I am pathologically conflict avoidant, and have an overdeveloped fight or flight response in my nervous system. This is what I need help with, not OCD for wanting a clean bilge.

Anyway, I cannot remember exactly where I left off. I have been sailing solo to remote coves on the weekend, sleeping on the boat, and coming back on Sunday. I have changed my work hours to 4-9's and one 4, so that I can leave midday Friday and have all of Saturday in the cove. Other than the first trip, the last 6 or so weekends have been to San Pedro cove about 17.5 miles sailing a straight shot, 30 to 40 on headwind days.

The trips have been amazing, none two the same. Pretty sure I almost died on the first one. I came around a land point, almost a Cape. Almost no wind, to an intense gale off shore that tried to push my boat over. I floundered around with the unexpected newness of it. Boat heeled over in the water, then spinning around in circles. I eventually was able to furl the jib, and fire up the motor to head into the wind to drop the mainsail. Of course there were cliffs and rocks, and seals laughing at me, and the halyard caught, but I survived, and learned, and motored the rest of the way. My friend in a Trimaran, about a half an hour behind me, said he got 9 knots coming around the same point.

I have had some other wind overpowering sails experiences, but I learn from them, and now reef ahead if there is a chance of strong wind. It is easier solo to raise the main in week winds, then to drop it in strong. I eventually want to lead all the main sheets and lines to the cockpit so I don't have to crawl out to the mast. I am strapped in, but no need to test it.

The subsequent trips have been great. I have had slow wing on wing drifts down wind where I have to tie off the boom because it swings with gravity climbing swells, to heavily reefed close hauls smashing through waves and drenching me at the helm. Everything in between but I seem to sail close haul more often than not, it is what my boat likes in Sea of Cortez.

All kinds of idyllic vistas and experiences. Sunsets, mountains, dolphins swimming with the boat, sharks cruising by giving me an eye as I am heeled half over staring at him. Mantas jumping and splashing. Dogs and I howling at Sea Lions (they call them wolves down here), and coyotes. Running around naked on a beach because there is no one even within radio range of the cove. Snorkeling, spear fishing, hiking into the hills looking for pirate treasure. Watching ospreys hunt, and fishing birds dive, sea turtles laying eggs.

I am building amazing community in the sailing world. I let people in town for sailing business use my condo, but the real fun is my anchorage neighbors. It's a tight little community, and we all look out for each other. We are also all certifiably weird, and love it. The marina folk have derogatory names for us, but we embrace our uniqueness. We do projects, buddy boat, congregate for drinks and dinner on someone's deck. Maybe explore a little romance, then we all retreat to our individual spaces.

I still sleep on the boat every night, and kayak to work. I started using the davits to haul the kayak, it works better. Dogs are old salts, they can almost levitate up the sea ladder with no help. They love the freedom of the remote beaches to tear around, and are exhausted after a weekend. I think there is a possibility that this could be more of a long term boat than I intended. There is debate as to it's "bluewater" worthiness, but I am anywhere from a year to 3 to testing that, so it is fine. I have a plan to convert the dining table space to my office. One pole of the table support will host a captains chair / office chair, the other will anchor one half of the desk. monitors will be attached to the walls in the corner. That will start a cascade of other projects. upgraded solar, watermaker, starlink, etc, but I can see easily being full time on this boat.

Projects are always interesting. Some silly easy (like figuring out that the helm RAM mike was not plugged in at the back of the radio), others more complicated. I have a frozen thru hole valve that was missed on inspection that I am softly trying to convince to at least close (abandoned macerator pump egress). I found it as I was trying to find a place to run my bilge be dry lines. I just work on whatever project seems most important, and make mental notes about future ones.

I love my life, and my plan forward. I am mentally and emotionally healthy, and have not been in this good of physical shape since my 20's. Muscle I thought I lost is coming back from kayaking 1.5 miles a day, and hauling 100' of anchor chain by hand at least twice a week. Callouses too. I am deeply tan, almost bronzed, and my hair has sun bleached blond. I have stopped social media, television. movies, video games, and bars. I imagine I will start reading fiction again, after I make it through my sailbaot library. There is N+1 infinite things for me to learn for this life, and I am enjoying them all. Sailing, navigation, maintenance, knots, cruising, fishing, weather, it takes all my time, and will for the next 10 years at least.

[Messing About]

Great check-in, Dave.
Wow, what a difference the last few weeks have brought for you. Sounds like a great time and some good lessons learned.
Keep these updates coming, as time allows.

Fair winds & safe seas.