Single Women Living Aboard and Cruising... an honest look

[Scott Berg]

gamayun and others:

Yes, my wife is fine with any crew I'm comfortable with, female and male, and we've both (and me alone) sailed with both. She has entered her 8th decade and while we live aboard full time has lost the joy of passages of over a week. I'm a shade younger and still love the solitude of the sea but also enjoy company so having someone to hand the watch to works for me.

Oh, and keeping your friends and interests is one of the important components of a healthy relationship. Hoping we cross wakes someday!

[kmacdonald]

Originally Posted by Scott Berg

I've single handed about 20K nm and don't remember a long posting on why I was doing that????

Why did you do that?

[Scott Berg]

Originally Posted by kmacdonald

Why did you do that?

This sounds crazy but because I could; I had a boat, the time, and a great love of sailing. Didn't have a partner to go with me and didn't wait to find one. I suspect that's exactly why the 'single women living aboard an cruising did.' And I still don't know why gender is even a factor in this.

[kmacdonald]

Originally Posted by weavis

Actually, YOu can feel with electric winches too if you practice.

Yes, but that requires patience, endurance, thinking ahead, remembering the million things to do before leaving the dock, keeping fit, etc.

[boatman61]

And I still don't know why gender is even a factor in this.
__________________
Scott Berg
WAØLSS
SV CHARDONNAY

Because some young dude could not decide which was better for pulling hot chicks..
A 50ft project Cat or.. a flashy RV... and this is where we ended up..

[cyan]

Originally Posted by Scott Berg

And I still don't know why gender is even a factor in this.

Well, gender is simply a factor of the thread title. My fault.
The title was a take on another 2-year-old thread of the same name except that one had "men" in place of "women". Seemed only fair the other way around. However, the original purpose was much different here, than in the other one with the guy and the cat project vs box truck quandary...
Almost all single sailors I have ever met were men. I was curious as to why, and how the world of sailing is different for singles of the different genders. My own young-adult daughter shows interest in this type of adventure, thus actual experience from actual women who have done it made sense to me.

Eventually, conflict took over. Sadly, negative words can easily become louder than positive words on internet forums. This thread brought out some weird negative stuff. Underneath the noise, though, I think there were some very interesting points. Some reason showed up lately. We'll see how long it lasts.

[gamayun]

Originally Posted by Scott Berg

This sounds crazy but because I could; I had a boat, the time, and a great love of sailing. Didn't have a partner to go with me and didn't wait to find one. I suspect that's exactly why the 'single women living aboard an cruising did.' And I still don't know why gender is even a factor in this.

OMG!! Where have you been for the past 257 posts??? This.Is.The.Answer.

But really....

What fun would there have been in us getting to the answer so quickly? Enlightenment is soooo boring.

[kmacdonald]

One answer won't work for everyone. We are all individuals and as such each will have their own reasons and desires.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Exile.. the only female owner I have dealt with refused to seek information or advice from me about the L380 I had just sailed 2000nm to Gran Canaria, choosing instead to listen to a rookie couple and advice from other ARC entrants..
She was later.. from her own posts on here.. held to ransom by the couple and the Aussie skipper that she had contracted for the ARC.
I was a short notice replacement to get the boat across from Bari, Italy as the original skipper had bailed on her.
So one could say ignorance is not exclusive to men..

I hear ya, but maybe your stated preference for feeling more comfortable around women is influenced by having to deal with male owners in all but one of your deliveries. It would make sense I suppose. I've had a few very difficult male personalities crew with me and can certainly relate. I wouldn't allow them to crew with me again, even though a couple of them are good friends. But then there are a number of women I know that I wouldn't want on my boat either. Maybe it's something about the confined spaces, or the way personalities can change when things get stressful or even just uncomfortable. Then there's the whole "captain" thing, the sense of risk and responsibility, the insecurities . . . whew! Little wonder you often hear from delivery caps why they prefer the owners not to be onboard.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by sailorcherry

Maybe you can help me out here sailorcherry. Is your reply because (a) you don't believe this fairly recent trend over "white guilt" actually exists, (b) you disagree with the way Candace Owens critiques it, (c) you don't like the idea of a young black woman opining on why the mainstream notion of black victimization is so unhealthy, (d) you find that my saying I have a crush on a woman I've never met is ridiculous, (e) none of the above, or (f) all of the above.

I'd say (d) is the only answer that justifies the response on its own. The rest need a few more words to clarify.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by JPA Cate

I've been feeling badly that this thread has taken the direction it did, so I went back and found zeehag's post that was a turning post. I copied the last part of it, and I am going to re-format it here, after adding a colon, an asterisk, some numbers, and making #7 bold face:

"personally, i meet as many folks as possible, however, the truism is real.... the men out cruising solo are:
1) married
2) players--married or not
3) child molesters
4) stalkers
5) other criminals.
6) married and leaving wifee home .... many reasons for leaving wifee home.
7) there are some really good folks out here---many other types as well, one cannot ASSume the male cruiser is a decent person.
* i have met some really cool folks and some asshooligans.
no i wont date the men i meet cruising. i have yet to meet anyone worth my losing my lifestyle and boat for. this is always a concern for women cruisin"

It is only my sense of this, but I think it is unclear thinking to consider this a condemmnation of all men, just because what she did not insert "some" into the first phrase before the word "men".

I would like to comment further that most of us have things in our lives about which we harbor anger. I have certainly spent some time trying to forgive people for actions I didn't like during my life, but i would be silly to think I had totally rooted it out. Sometimes that anger comes out directly, but other times it kind of piggybacks on an issue, so you can relieve the internal pressure it makes without having to face up to what is really going on for you. We're all grownups here, it is up to each of us to take responsibility for our thoughts, words and deeds, and this includes the necessary introspection.

Ann

Despite your bolding, punctuation, asterisk, etc., along with Zee's own attempts to explain, I'm sure I'm not alone in still not understanding what was trying to be said. You enjoy a lot of admiration & respect here Ann, so it might be easier if you could simply explain what you believe it to mean. Weavis gave us his take on it, which frankly seems the most obvious one to me. But as discussed, how such comments are interpreted often comes down to the perspective of the reader. (Or we can just drop it, per Weav's request).

[kmacdonald]

Originally Posted by Exile

Despite your bolding, punctuation, asterisk, etc., along with Zee's own attempts to explain, I'm sure I'm not alone in still not understanding what was trying to be said. You enjoy a lot of admiration & respect here Ann, so it might be easier if you could simply explain what you believe it to mean. Weavis gave us his take on it, which frankly seems the most obvious one to me. But as discussed, how such comments are interpreted often comes down to the perspective of the reader. (Or we can just drop it, per Weav's request).

I'm sure what she said has a different meaning to a lot of us. Depends on our biases and personal agendas. Didn't bother me, but then again, I'm not a live aboard.

[gamayun]

Yeah, drop it guys. The drama's over. Move on....

[Exile]

Originally Posted by gamayun

Yeah, drop it guys. The drama's over. Move on....

I'm good with that, although I can't help thinking there wasn't such urging to move on when a number of guys in the last thread got jumped for describing some women as gold diggers, faux feminists, entitled, etc., and gave specific examples in support. As I recall, these concerns were marginalized as mostly the guys' fault for hooking up with such "insecure" females. But now we have a female poster, with no specifics in support, describing some (indecipherable) number of male sailors as players, pervs & child molesters. But we are urged to "drop it," and one of the mods has gone so far as to re-format the offending post.

Female gold diggers vs. male pervs. Female sense of entitlement vs. male child molesters. Is it just me or do I sense a rather obvious & transparent double-standard here?

[kmacdonald]

Originally Posted by Exile

Female gold diggers vs. male pervs. Female sense of entitlement vs. male child molesters. Is it just me or do I sense a rather obvious & transparent double-standard here?

It's not just you. We all see the double standard at play here. I guess I should say "I see it" so I just assumed everyone can. I don't know why they play that card but then again I haven't spent much time thinking about it. Whatever floats their boat is fine with me.