Hello Blog World!
I’ve been hearing from readers that think 1) we sold the boat; 2) someone died; 3) I have given up writing. Au contraire! We’re on Red Rover and we’re cruising in Maine.
So why haven’t I written? Don’t I care for our readers anymore? Of course I do. But the answer is actually a bit more complex. First, Kevin and I spent 17 months living back in Seattle, while Red Rover lived on the east coast. She spent some time in Savannah, followed by a lovely visit to Lady’s Island, North Carolina (by Beaufort) and then she came to rest at Anchorage Marina in Baltimore for last year’s hurricane season. Red enjoyed her time there SO much that she begged us to stay. And how can we say no to Red Rover? As a thank you for her extended visit, she promised not to break any of her systems. Good girl, Red. We visited Red once a month, addressed maintenance items and took some short trips, but it didn’t seem like we did anything that warranted a blog post.
Silliness aside, if you’ve read my last two posts, you know that we were in Seattle as Darren, who runs Kevin’s company (Waypoint Sign Co) had colon cancer. Darren is cancer free! And he has recovered from the harsh treatment that comes with aggressive cancer. That is the best news of all.
If you also read my last post, you’ll know that while we were in Seattle, we re-fell in love with the mountains, hiking and camping. We converted a Honda Element (named Avocado Toast of course) into a camper and then when the cold weather came, we bought a Sprinter van (named Lola, because she was a show girl aka brick laying van in Los Angeles in her first life) and converted her to an adventure van!
But let’s get caught up now, shall we?
First, Lola. She started off as a project that was going to be “simple.” Just like when we decided to take Avocado Toast camping. That time we said that we weren’t going to go out and buy any camping gear beyond an air mattress, and that we’d just sleep in the Element, buy enough gear to make coffee and camp near restaurants. Right.
With Lola, the discussion was, it’s getting colder, if we had a Sprinter we could just put our mattress in it on the floor or something, move our little fridge and lithium battery over and be totally good to go. Right again.
I had been doing some work while we were in Seattle. Not boat work, but actual “work work.” I worked for my once-partners within the company that I founded 16 years ago, I did some projects for long-time clients and friends, I got all involved in a pickleball project (which was SO fun!) and I worked for my friends Barry, Heidi and Chasten who were awesome providing me with something interesting to do at their company! All this work provided some funding for not only a bi-coastal life, but to buy an older van, transform her and allow us to feed our souls by being out in nature. Thanks for always being there, friends!
Lola is a full-fledged adventure machine. We built her on the side of the road in front of our apartment building on Alki Beach in Seattle’s West Seattle neighborhood. We didn’t have any boat projects (well, we did, but the projects were 3,000 miles away) so why not build-out a van? In the rain, in the cold and on a public thoroughfare? Seemed like a good idea to us! Scouring Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace, we found parts, deals and unplanned components that we just couldn’t pass up. Lola was never intended to be an expensive, fancy van. The goal was instead an efficient and functional adventure tool at the lowest price possible. Lola is the result of Kevin’s amazing skills and our general stubbornness about not spending a bunch of money. During the process of bringing Lola to life, we realized that our 8 years of owning Red Rover, and the 8 years prior of owning our 4788 Bayliner, Island Dog, were GREAT training for building a van! If this whole cruising thing doesn’t work out, we could be van upfitters! Ha ha!
Lola is a cool girl. She has a bunch of new windows (yes, cut out with a jigsaw on the edge of the sidewalk), solar panels, a Starlink (we own two now – so bougie), a kick-ass electrical system that Kevin put together on our apartment floor, custom cabinetry, also shellacked on the same apartment floor, 35-gallons of water (vs 710 on Red Rover), a composting toilet and an outdoor shower. She’s adventure ready at any given moment. Our neighbors were curious, understanding and interested in watching this unusual sidewalk experiment take shape. As we finished, many of them came by to congratulate us, provide a rousing round of applause on the sidewalk (aka construction zone) and to cheer on our upcoming adventures. Here are some photos of the progression… I have about a million but this is a sampling!
Before we left Seattle to come home to Red Rover, we took Lola on a 16-day trip to Utah and the Grand Canyon. AH-mazing. We hiked, we bonfired, we grilled, we wandered, we kayaked, we took pictures and we hiked some more. We loved it. Max did too.
We loved every minute of it. Adventuring on land, we thought, was getting pretty close to the empowering, exciting and happy-soul feelings that adventuring on the water always brings us. That was an interesting bit of self-awareness.
To document that moment of insight, I wrote this snippet in my collection of writings that may one day become a book: “There’s something about adventure that just sets my heart on fire. It’s a feeling I only get when I find myself somewhere new. It starts in my belly and works its way up my chest, tingling and almost burning as excitement works its way to the tips of my fingers while my face opens in a broad smile – the only time I smile like this. Sounds like a heart attack, you say? Perhaps it is related. I think of it as a heart expansion. And certainly, a mind expansion. Arriving in a new country, a new city, a vast and stunning natural landscape or a new, and sometimes slightly uncomfortable, culture brings lightness and awareness. Lightness in that I feel as if I just float across the ground as my five senses work in overtime, trying to understand this new place much like a labrador on a walk in the forest. Awareness of my limited time on earth and of the very small portion of the world that I’ve seen. And of my responsibility to share the experiences that an open mind can hold.”
Pondering all of that, I asked Kevin how he thought we’d FEEL when we went back to Red Rover. Would we feel relieved? Conflicted? As if we had never left? Would we miss Lola and the mountains and Seattle? Would we feel the same passion for cruising that we once had? What if that special spark, that love for the ocean, the boat and exploring was gone? Ever the wise man (and now and then a dad-joking wise-ass), Kevin thoughtfully responded, “We’ll simply follow our hearts.”
But before we could follow our hearts, we needed to move out, move across the country and get back on our boat!
In late May we moved out of our apartment and put our new “apartment in a box” belongings in a storage unit and moved into Lola for a week. At the end of the week, we patted Lola on the fender, told her to behave and left her with our friend Liz. Never fear, Lola isn’t lonely as both Liz and Darren are each taking her on adventures too!
At this point we had shipped twelve boxes of crap back to Baltimore – winter clothes that had to be purchased after 5 years in the tropics, shoes, items brought to Seattle from the boat, new boat parts, dog beds, you name it. We arrived at Sea-Tac Airport with our succulent plants ready for carry-on (who knew you can travel with plants?), Max in his magic flying crate and enough luggage to max-out our allowance. Thanks to Alaska Airlines for somehow knowing this was an important moment and upgrading us. Wahoo! Drinking champagne… up in the sky… all the way to Baltimore.
Arriving in Baltimore, the boat work began. Well not that first night after all of our 30,000 foot beverage enjoyment. It was time to take Red out of storage mode and get her ready for cruising mode. Provisioning needed to be done. Everything needed to be looked through and old items needed to be thrown away or donated. Three weeks later we departed, with the bow pointed north. Our biggest concern was the watermakers. We had pickled them for the first time ever, and we were uncertain how they would transition back into use. Phew. Both are busily making water in the clear seas of Maine as I type.
We began our cruise north with an overnight run from Baltimore to Long Island Sound. Might as well get back in the saddle and ride! After yet one more super fun and super-chaotic E-ticket ride up the East River in New York, we settled in to sleep like rocks in Port Washington. With a little rest in our personal tanks, we wandered up to experience Sag Harbor and Greenport, NY on the northern portion of Long Island. Swinging on our anchor in constant 25-30 knot winds, we were reminded of some of the less-exhilarating aspects of cruising. But our happiness to be home outweighed any small inconveniences – weather, our daily commitment to doing work (work-work) and ongoing boat projects.
From Long Island we re-visited Newport, RI where the wind accelerated even further, but that didn’t stop us from enjoying this town that I spent so much time in as a kid. Cuttyhunk Island (a very special favorite place) brought us our first lobster dinner of the summer, great wandering on foot and some more time to learn about our new tender, Zoe Girl.
We fell back into the rhythm of route planning, twice-daily GFS and European model wind and swell forecast reviews, anchorage review reading, current timing, anchor watch setting and fuel re-balancing. After the first day or so, muscle memory took over and we worked together to bring Red up the coast.
But how do we feel? Did the spark come back?
We feel so many things. We feel like we are home, where we belong. We feel a sense of peace, deep inside, that makes me personally feel balanced, as if all is right in the world. We’re happy about spending 24/7 together. I realize many people wouldn’t care for constant spouse companionship, but that works for us. We’re delighted to be reading and researching about destinations and anchorages – we’re learning every day. We’re adventuring and exploring and sharing in all the work that it takes to run, manage, maintain and cruise in this boat. The adventure feels as if it is new again, in some ways, while at the same time, it is as if we had never left. It is comfortable, like the feeling of a favorite, warm, baggy sweatshirt on a fall day. The spark came back. Life is good.
PS – Thank you to all of the readers who have prompted me to get started again. You’ve made me feel so loved and appreciated – from people we met off the stern of our boat everywhere from Maryland to Maine, to people who approached me at boat shows to the launch driver (retired former Nordhavn owner Kent) in Camden, Maine, you all inspire me to write! I promise I’ll try to be more on top of it!