Preparing to Sail Off into the Sunset
It Takes a Lot of Effort, But Worth It
“Excuse me, ma’am. Do you mind holding up?” A woman with a British accent, dressed in casual resort wear, waved and walked toward me. Her posh sounding voice sounded out of place on Raiatea, a French island. My own outfit was the next step down from casual; sun-bleached shorts, rubber Teva sandals and Tilly sun hat. Sailors were a common sight—Raiatea is one of the few islands in French Polynesia with a real marina. I had just landed the dinghy on a stretch of deserted beach in front of where our sailboat was anchored. Did this beach belong to the fancy resort next door? I rested the heavy bag of dirty laundry on the dinghy pontoon and scanned up and down the beach for another spot to land if she said it was off limits.
But her next words sent a different message. “I won’t keep you. It looks like you have errands ashore.” Inclining her head to the resort next door, “My husband and I are staying there. We’ve been admiring all the sailboats and have talked about joining your numbers some day. It has always been a dream for my husband, and now I am intrigued. We are trying to figure out where to start. How do you prepare for a quest as big as sailing off into the sunset?”
Figuring they didn’t want a list to follow, I offered, “It’s like any other goal you work toward. You proceed slowly at first, finding out the basics of what you need to know. Spend time talking to sailors and looking at boats. Then you make steady progress, sailing in all kinds of weather, reading everything you can lay hands on that helps. Get experience any way you can and feed your dream as often as possible with first hand accounts and books. There may be some setbacks with your boat, job, finances… there were with us. But just keep moving forward. Because then, there’s the one big breakthrough that always comes once everything else is in place.”
The woman’s head was cocked like she was listening hard, but it was difficult to know if the she absorbed what I said. Maybe she really was looking for a list or shortcut. Catching a whiff of my dirty clothes brought me around. I had a longish walk to the wash, dry and sold laundry service in town that would cost an unavoidable small fortune. Hefting the bag on my shoulder, “Good luck! Do whatever it takes to make that dream come alive. It takes a lot of effort, but is worth it.”
Slowly, Very Slowly at First
Preparation was a long process for my husband and me—ten years. I was career Army, stuffing books like Heavy Weather Sailing and magazines like Ocean navigator and Cruising World into my duffle bag on deployments. I knew so little I didn’t know where to start. Envisioning the stacks of books I read made me wonder if I had made it sound to easy. Because it was a long, slow process.
Scenes flashed back of standing with Glen on the deck of our first small sailboat, holding a plastic sextant and squinting at the sky. I’d read the old sailing classics and thought it important to know how to use a sextant. After days of practice the closest I ever came was 32 miles away from our real position, which I determined using our GPS. I cringe at memories of using a precious weekend at home to go sailing in bad weather on the Chesapeake Bay as training for what might await on our voyage. I smiled, remembering that during one storm we caught a crab pot around the propeller and reckoned it was practice for avoiding long line fishing nets. Looking back, I see we framed everything around our coming departure. But all that work made me feel like I was ready, deserving even. That I could do it. Anything uncomfortable was a rite of passage before the fun could begin.
Then All At Once
Countless small, slow steps and a shared plan kept our dream alive. Those baby steps eventually moved us to a place where we could take advantage of a big breakthrough (ours was financial—Army retirement). Since we had taken those tiny, plodding steps, we could then pursue what I call the All at Once activities: sell everything, buy a blue water boat with our nest egg, and sail off. Friends and family who read the email I sent announcing our departure only saw the dramatic final stages. But, in fact it was a ten-year process with roots that went deep. It was focused, relentless commitment to small actions that got Glen and I sailing off around the world.
Every person who ever went off sailing had their own way of getting there. No doubt your version of sailing away looks different than mine. You will have your own timeline and version of the steps you need to prepare. And know that if you keep moving forward, your big breakthrough will come. And by then you will be ready for that larger-than-life adventure. Don’t lose heart if things move slowly at first, because the all at once part is coming. And who can tell how exciting that future will be.