Aaron's blog

Thursday, October 18th we left Mickey's in Indianapolis at about 9:00AM.  We drove through Cincinnati and then took a state highway past Maysville, which was a nice break from the interstate traffic.  Later on we drove I-64 south of Charleston (toll road!) and sat on the highway for 30 plus minutes due to some construction.  We got a little anxious about running out of gas (even turned the car off a few times during the gridlock) but made it to the next gas station.  There was some nice mountain driving--Anna's car holds the speed down really well in manual shifting mode so that was not too stressful.

Around sunset we pulled into Little Beaver State Park, WV and got the camper set up before dark.  It was a nice quiet campground with a glorious bathhouse.  This was the first night setting up the camper and most things travelled well.  Our corn starch and baking soda containers had been stored on their side and their tops popped off but surprisingly didn't make too big of a mess. We had cup of noodle soup and a beer to celebrate our first night in the camper while we watched a movie.

We took our time packing up Friday morning (rearranging both the car and camper substantially) and left the campground a bit before noon.  There was more mountain driving at first and then we started to get into the really curvy rural roads with views of nice houses featuring huge porches.  Then we stopped for supper at a Wendy's in Dunn, NC.  We were not too fond of the clientele there and were glad to leave that area.

We found White Oak River Campground near Maysville, NC as a place to stay for the next few nights that seemed reasonably close to New Bern.  There was some ongoing road construction nearby so our navigation software failed to bring us to our destination.  We called the campground office to get directions and ended up having to turn around in someone's rural driveway which was a stressful experience. We finally arrived at 8:30PM, got set up, showered, and went to bed.

Saturday morning we went to look at a 1991 Hunter 375 as scheduled on Friday.  The broker had sounded pretty gruff and like we were really hassling him to see the boat, which had some hurricane damage and the owner didn't want it to be shown.  We got to his office and he talked to us for 20 minutes about what our plans were and whether we had thought through various things.  We then followed him in our car to a marina and looked at the boat.  The hurricane damage turned out to be just 6 inches of a rubber trim piece on the edge of the boat that had been torn off.  One of the sails was piled into the salon (standard hurricane preparation) and took up a lot of space, but otherwise we got a very good look at it and learned a lot from the broker.  He is a captain and has been cruising for many years; I think he said 70,000 miles of sailing.  He gave us lots of advice and talked to us about many aspects of cruising. It turned out to be a much better experience than we though it would be based off of the phone call the day prior.

Then we drove back to New Bern and had lunch at Morgan's Grill and Tavern.  Very good food (delicious croissants drizzled with honey as soon as we sat down) and excellent service.  On the way home we stopped at a dog park for 20 minutes so Louise could run. Then we picked up a few items at Target and Lowes (water hose, blanket, pillow, rugs).  Back at the camper we took a nap, rearranged stuff, took Louise on a walk, read a little bit, and did some writing.

Within 30 or so miles of the coast we have been seeing hurricane debris that people have piled on the curbs for pickup.  Most of the houses look like they have been cleaned on the outside but a few still have visible flood waterlines.  Some have huge piles of plaster, sheetrock, insulation, furniture, etc. in front of them, so even though they look OK on the outside there must still be a real mess inside.  There are many crews going around picking up this debris using trucks with crane arms, very similar to logging trucks but with solid trailer walls.

During the hurricane the campground was heavily flooded because it is situated near a river bottom.  Where our camper sits today was covered with about 11 feet of water.  There are a few rough edges but it is remarkable how quickly things are being restored. We are planning to stay here until Tuesday morning when we will move south onto the next town. We are not sure exactly where we will go next but at least we have a few days to figure it out.

Last night we arrived to our friend Mickey's just east of Indianapolis and slept while she worked the night shift.  In the morning we let her sleep a little and then headed into the center of Indianapolis to check out the sights.

We saw many tall buildings.  Then we went into the ArtsGarden which is a large glass building suspended over a busy intersection.  Feeling hungry, we went over to City Market which is like a food court but not really any chains.

Then we went to the Soldiers and Sailors Monument.  We took the stairs up to the top which is a considered equal to 20 stories.  The sign at the bottom has some guidance, and the first item on the list was to not do the climb immediately after eating.  We forged on anyways and saw some nice views in the solar oven (windows and no ventilation) at the top.

We walked by the very cool hotel that Mickey works at and then over to the canal walk to walk along the water for a little bit.  The boats were not in operation…too cold I guess.  On the way back to the car we stopped by the huge Catholic church which was very nice.

Back home at Mickey's we took Louise for a walk and then went to Hometown Classic Pizza--great service and great pizza.

Our experience looking at sailboats is pretty thin given that we live in North Dakota, hence the goal to just look at a bunch right away.  But here is all of the looking we have done so far:

We were in Duluth just after Christmas 2017 and stopped by a couple marinas just to look around.  It was VERY cold so we would step out of the car to walk between the rows of boats on stands and then quickly return to warm up.  It was interesting to see some of the parts that had just been previously read about--keels, through hulls, rudders, weather vanes, and many more.

When we were at sailing school in Florida we were on their Dufour Gib'Sea 43 for 6 nights.  So we became pretty familiar with that model.  I was a little disappointed that we didn't do much looking under all the floor panels and just in general checking out the different systems.  On the last day two of the school's other boats were at the same dock so we went to take a quick look at those.  First a Gib'Sea 51 which was much larger inside than our 43-footer, and then the Island Spirit 37 catamaran.  The salon and cockpit on the catamaran were enormous.

For Easter this year we were up in Minot and one of Aaron's relatives said that they knew someone who was selling a sailboat on Lake Sakakawea.  They showed us a picture and we decided we would stop by the marina on the way back home to Medora.  There was still quite a bit of snow to trudge through but we found the sailboat there.  It looked pretty classy and I figured that the full keel meant it would be a solid boat but couldn't see much from the ground.  A few days later we got ahold of the owner and found out it was a Tashiba 36 that he brought up to ND after it had been damaged in a hurricane near New Orleans.  He described it as "the best boat between Lake Superior and the west coast."  Some reading online indicated that maybe he wasn't completely in fantasy land as it was designed by a legendary boat designer and built by a very well-regarded yard in Taiwan.  He said we should come check it out once it was in the water, and we did early in the summer.  His son was there too and we poked around into all the dark corners--very fascinating for Aaron.  We also took it out for a short sale that day.  Ultimately it was too expensive and not a great design for us.

In August Aaron was in Duluth with his father and brother on a motorcycle adventure.  They stopped by one of the marinas and talked to the salesperson who jumped at the chance to take them out on the docks to see 8 or so boats.  This was helpful for Aaron to see many different floor plans and conditions of boats, but also very helpful for his father to see what this crazy boat idea was all about.  The salesperson had lived on a sailboat in Key West for two years and talked about his experiences there too.  It was too bad that Anna couldn't be there but hopefully we can replicate that great experience at a few of the marinas that we visit.

Aaron here.  I trace my interest in sailing to almost 3 years ago when I found the SV Seeker YouTube channel.  This is a guy named Doug that is building a 74-foot steel sailboat in his front yard in Tulsa, OK.  I think at the time I was more interested in the spirit and scale of what he was doing than the fact that it was a sailboat.  He lets people come help him and teaches them any skills they may need for the work--often welding and grinding.

I mentioned this to my dad that summer (2016) and in October we went down there on our motorcycles to help him for a weekend.  When we arrived Friday night we spent a couple hours grinding the edges of the portholes.  On Saturday we started manufacturing the floorplates that do double duty as the tops of the diesel tanks in the bottom of the boat.  I ran a CNC machine with a plasma cutter to cut out the shapes of the floorplates and hatch covers, and my dad drilled and tapped hundreds of bolt holes for joining the two together.  On Sunday we worked on welding a cast iron threaded fitting into each hatch cover.  The SV Seeker video that includes our time in Tulsa can be found here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Td707cC8UW8); my dad and I are introduced at the 5-minute mark.

Then other sailing videos kept being suggested to me on YouTube.  I watched a few and soon those were all I was watching, trying to learn as much as possible.  Sailing books started arriving in the mail.  Probably during the spring of 2017 I began to think that going cruising was something I was actually interested in doing (Anna wasn't opposed, but maybe didn't think it would actually progress this far!).  I figured that I should probably get some sailing experience so drove to Bismarck to buy an 18' 1976 Chrysler Buccaneer for $800.

We took out the Buccaneer on Lake Patterson near Dickinson, ND and had a pretty stressful first sail.  At one point the side of the boat dipped under the water…very exciting.  Hear me yelling "bail faster!" to Anna in this video we made of the event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9CH3XI5skc  The Buccaneer went out three other times that summer, once me by my self, once Anna, Daniel, and myself, and one time I took my sister out.  Small "dingy" sailboats are very unstable since they don't have weighted keels, and there is a definite risk of tipping it over and then struggling to right it again.  So I can't say that I really enjoyed sailing that little boat.  I didn't take it out this past summer and sold it to a guy who lives on Lake Patterson in July.

In February 2018 we went to Florida for sailing school.  We went through Blue Water Sailing School in Fort Lauderdale for a week-long course that gives you the American Sailing Association 101, 103, and 104 certifications on completion.  Those respectively are Basic Keelboat Sailing, Basic Coastal Cruising, and Bareboat Cruising.  In theory with these certifications a rental company would let you take out one of their sailboats on a charter for a week or so without a captain (making it a "bareboat").  Also a boat insurance company typically requires experience or certifications like these.

The school sent us three textbooks to study ahead of time.  Then when we arrived we spent most of our time learning the hands-on skills and then taking written and practical tests.  We spent 6 nights on board the 43' Dufour Gib'Sea named Third Wish.  We both learned a lot that week and passed all of the tests!

Our most recent sailing was in the early summer when we went to check out a Tashiba 36 on Lake Sakakawea.  We spent an hour or so examining the internals of the vessel and then went out for a short cruise along the lake shore.  Ultimately it was more expensive than what we want to spend and not a great interior layout, but it was a beautiful day to go out for a sail.

We looked at our first sailboat today and thought we should tell you about what we’ve been looking for in a boat. In general, we think that a 35 foot monohull made in the 90s would be a good fit for us.

A broad category of sailboats is whether they are a "bluewater boat" or not. Bluewater boats typically feature heavier construction, a large keel (no fin keels), and thicker rigging. Basically they are designed to be safer and more comfortable in heavy weather conditions that you may not be able to avoid when crossing an ocean, but often sacrifice performance and cost. We currently have no plans to do any longer passages and will not specifically be looking for a boat designed like this, but would be OK with one.

Specific things we will be considering:

• Diesel engine: this is pretty standard, typically about 40 horsepower
• Aft cabin: when the main cabin is in the back of the boat you get a more square-shaped bed instead of the more common triangular ones in the pointy bow (v-berth).  Also a little better walking room. However, they lack the excellent airflow of a v-berth and take away large amounts of cockpit storage.
• Sugar scoops and walkthrough transom: sugar scoops are when the back of the boat has a flat "scoop" surface down by the water line, and the walk through transom is when you can step into the cockpit from the transom. This would be great for boarding the dingy, swimming, and getting Louise on and off.
• Dual helms: having two steering wheels makes the cockpit feel more open since you can walk down the middle to the back of the boat, but was not very common on models under 50 feet until the 2000s.
• Pilothouse models: these have an enclosed cockpit and seem nice but are pretty rare.
• Navigation electronics: we have a relative at Garmin who has offered to hook us up with discounted instruments so a boat with aging electronics wouldn't be a downside.

We plan to keep the price under $50,000. This should be enough to get us in a boat that doesn't have any major issues, but will need some moderate repairs and updates. It seems usual to spend about 20% of the purchase price to do that, which for us might be things like adding solar panels, replacing batteries, painting the bottom, replacing ropes, etc.

We will need a dingy too, probably a 10 or 12 foot inflatable with a 10 horsepower motor.

So far we have left Medora at noon on Friday, October 12th, spent a night at Aaron's brother's house in Fargo, ND, and are halfway through a two night stay at Anna's parents' house in Rosemount, MN.  We had great goodbye parties at both of those places with many friends and relatives in attendance.

Our next stop is Indianapolis, IN to visit Mickey who we worked with in Medora.  We plan to spend two nights there and then cross off a few more states for Anna with a route through Ohio, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Virginia on our way to North Carolina.

A couple weeks prior to Hurricane Florence we had chosen New Bern, NC as the first place we would start shopping for sailboats.  Some brief research made it seem like we would still find sailboats in good condition for sale there so we will check it out.  From there we will work our way south, stopping in areas that have marinas with boats for sale.  For example, in New Bern we found 5 marinas that each have about 5 listings of interest to us.

Our loose goal is to see 50+ sailboats over a few weeks as we don't have much in-person experience.  This will basically be an education phase.  As we start to narrow down our interests in specific features or models we will also be looking on Yachtworld, Craigslist, etc. and schedule some individual showings.

If things go well we envision that we could close on a sailboat by early December.  This could be anywhere from North Carolina down to Miami.  Then we would spend about one month cleaning, updating, repairing, and adding stuff.  Probably towards the end of that timeframe we would have the boat in the water and go on shakedown cruises on some days.

That would bring us to January.  We think we will spend some time in the Florida area building up our experience in relatively protected waters.  It would be fun to visit Biscayne Bay where we did most of our sailing school training.  Towards the end of February we may feel confident enough to make the 80 mile passage over to the Bahamas.  This would be our first (and only planned, other than the return passage) time being out of site of land.

In April we would return to Florida and begin the process of heading north up the east coast of the US.  Aaron's brother is getting married near Boston in early July so we will try to be there by then.  We haven't thought much about what happens after that.  Possibly we would head further north for a while and then retreat back down towards Florida as the fall weather sets in.

Needless to say, this is all subject to change!

I made it home. 6050 miles is the final count. The highlight of today was all the familiar earthy smells on the last 150 miles of I-29, closely followed by the nearly completely burned tractor/trailer I saw still smoldering west of Columbus. Also northeast SD was more scenic than I remembered it being although I have not traveled there more than a handful of times.

Sunday I departed at 6:40, shortly before the sun rose. I took highway 27 out of Miami which had a lot of stoplights but saw some non-downtown parts of the city that way. In Tampa I met my mom's friend from Medora--Howard--and had lunch with him at Tijuana Flats. I had a good burrito there and tried some interesting hot sauces. Of course the best non-backtracking route out of Tampa was a similar stoplight extravaganza as what I had in the morning so I didn't get as far as I wanted to. I spent the night in Ashburn, Georgia and forgot to watch my odometer but online maps say it was about 500 miles, with 1500 mile left to go.

Today I left at 7:15 and stayed on the interstate all day. I managed to make it 850 miles and am in Columbia, Missouri for the night. I drove through St. Louis and got a good view of the arch (from the highway) but not much else exciting happened. 730 miles to go tomorrow.

Saturday morning we slept in, and then took the bus over to see Lincoln Drive. It was Walter's first time taking the bus as previously he has just used his car, the trolley, or the MetroMover (overhead rail). So it was educational. Lincoln Drive is a bunch of fancy shops that all the rich tourists from around the world go to so they can get fancy stuff, and I realized I was sort of tired of being around all these classy people. I think Walter likes to people-watch more than I do, as pretty much everywhere we had gone in Miami was full of people dressed to impress, whether they were tourists or local well-off people. And of course I didn't pack any nice clothes so I felt a bit out of place.

But there was a Tesla "store" there where I got to check out the Model S and also a stripped chassis. And speaking of nice cars, there were plenty that I saw out on the streets: several Ferraris, a McLaren, Bentleys, Maseratis, Porsches, and BMWs and Mercedes as plentiful as Fords and Chevys are in ND. I guess I like looking at cars and Walter likes looking at people.

After Lincoln Drive we were going to go to the Marlins game but we had only used the awesome pool area for about 30 minutes and I wanted to spend some time there relaxing so I could be ready to head out of town at first light in the morning. So we did the pool and hot tub thing for a couple hours and then got a pizza and some beer to enjoy on his apartment balcony high above the city (23rd floor). And we watched a movie about Jackie Robinson after that--it's a good one.

On Friday Walter and I drove out to the Shark Valley visitors center in the Everglades. We got there about 2 hours before the next guided tour so glanced around for alligators (there were none) and drove a little ways to the Big Cypress Preserve where we watched a film about the cypress forest ecosystem. There were no alligators there either. Back at Shark Valley we went on the guided tour and learned all about the "river of grass" and saw a bunch of blue herons and other birds. Also we saw some baby alligators that were about 12" long. Depending on the season apparently there can just be tons of alligators everywhere, but not now--there were hardly any.

Then we went to a Miccosukee restaurant nearby and ate frybread burgers and a sample of alligator. Alligator is no good to eat but the burger was. Also behind the restaurant was a big alligator so I did get to see one (oh we saw a dead one on the side of the road too).

We headed back to Walter's apartment to clean up and then went out for some drinks with his sister and some of her teacher friends. We walked a ways back to the apartment and saw many interesting and bustling bars along the way.