OK, so this has been a long, long break. I left off blogging as Quest pulled out of Fernandina, Florida and crossed into Georgia on April 29, 2013. That day we made it to Golden Isles Marina at St. Simons Island and the following morning w…
More wall art in Anacortes
(View Post…)
Another One of the World’s Marvels
As soon as we arrived in Coron we heard of the famous Apo Reef. This is the world’s second largest continual coral reef, second only to the Great Barrier Reef. The diamond shaped reef covers many square miles with an emerald green plain of coral. A la…
On to a Safari
So many days i find myself in amazing places doing amazing things with amazing people. Often i pause i ponder “how did i get here?” After the excellent diving and rare opportunity to anchor alone surrounded by the second largest coral reef in the world…
Another One of the World’s Marvels
As soon as we arrived in Coron we heard of the famous Apo Reef. This is the world’s second largest continual coral reef, second only to the Great Barrier Reef. The diamond shaped reef covers many square miles with an emerald green plain of coral. A la…
On to a Safari
So many days i find myself in amazing places doing amazing things with amazing people. Often i pause i ponder “how did i get here?” After the excellent diving and rare opportunity to anchor alone surrounded by the second largest coral reef in the world…
Another One of the World’s Marvels
As soon as we arrived in Coron we heard of the famous Apo Reef. This is the world’s second largest continual coral reef, second only to the Great Barrier Reef. The diamond shaped reef covers many square miles with an emerald green plain of coral. A la…
Anacortes wall art
We enjoy the quaint town of Anacortes and its historic scenes on the walls of buildings. It was blowing up a storm when we docked, wind gusts to 40 knots, but Debbie did an awesome job getting us docked in difficult conditions. (View Post…)
2013: Looking Back
It’s always difficult to come up with interesting posts for the blog in the winter season. This is the time of the year when we sit still for a while and catch up on maintenance and projects, and usually they’re not the most glamorous or interesting things to describe. We run the boat and all her many systems pretty hard throughout the year, and it’s much easier to do preventative maintenance than to fix things in remote places – don’t ask us how we know that.
2013 was an unusual year for us because we made the huge leap from one side of the country to the other. We did a lot of cruising but since so many of the great cruising areas out here are fairly close together we didn’t put as many miles on the boat this season.
We started 2013 in Marathon (in our beloved Florida Keys)
Lat/Lon: 24 42.19 N 081 06.75 W (temperature: 80) and ended the year in Victoria, BC, Canada
Lat/Lon: 48 25.36 N 123 22.22 W (temperature: 45). In that time we traveled 1466 nautical miles (which does not count the miles ADVENTURES traveled on the freighter to get out here). That’s a big difference from the years we went to Nova Scotia and cruised around 6000 nautical miles in a year.
Moving to a very different cruising area has brought new challenges for us, and pushed us out of our comfort zone – which is a healthy thing. We don’t ever want to stop learning and growing.
We have lost some boating friends this year – far too soon. But both of our friends really lived their lives – they accomplished a great deal in their too-short time on this earth. Gary and Judy were extraordinary and beautiful people, each in their own way, and we remember them often. Their untimely passing reminds us how lucky we are to be able to have the adventures we’ve enjoyed so far, and we never try to take any of it for granted.
We are learning to embrace grandparenthood. Jim’s son Jimmy and his wife Valerie welcomed little James in October, joining big brother Donald who is now 17 months. While I can’t come to terms with the “G-word” to describe my role in all this (I am FAR too young!), I can manage to be a “Mimi”. And I have the irrestible urge to knit a lot of little sweaters for them.
Jim has no problems channeling his inner child, so he’s always on the lookout for interesting toys. For. The. Babies. I think he prefers bigger boy toys, so I’m not sure who he’s really shopping for.
Christmas is all put away now, and the city has changed all the lights around Parliament back to plain white. Now it’s time for chores and projects, and dreaming about heading north to Alaska in the spring.
Old Window Frame Art…
Old window frames are all the rage right now. Do a search on Pinterest to see some pretty awesome ways that folks are using these window frames. The ideas seem endless. When we moved from Maine, we brought two old window frames with us that Mr. B had…
