This is the start of an adventure. I will be documenting with words and pictures over the next 2 years or so as we prepare for and begin the adventure of a lifetime. Since I was a kid I have always wanted to sail around the world. Well, that will not be happening. But the next best thing is for me and the love of my life to take our boat on an ocean adventure and explore this wonderful world we live in; meet new people, see new places, smell new smells and just take it all in.

Our plan is to finish fixing up the boat and then take it out to the ocean. There’s a lot more to it than that but the full plan, which has already been set in motion is this:

• Get rid of everything we don’t want. That means selling stuff, giving things away to friends and family or donating to charity. We want as small an amount as possible to store so that it doesn’t cost us a fortune. We are actively getting rid of stuff right now; pictures, TVs, mowers, clothes, furniture, whatever we don’t think is necessary to start anew when we return. We are down to 1 bedroom set, 2 dining room tables, a computer workstation (my land-based office) and a bunch of stuff we are still trying to get rid of. The house is emptying out…
• Move out of the house and turn it over to the landlord. This we will do after my wife’s oldest son gets married next month. After Easter will will have a huge garage sale, sell all the things we aren’t storing and donate what we don’t sell to charity.
• Move whats left onto the boat. There’s a lot of stuff on the boat – weekender type stuff – that will need to come off and then we will do a serious job of provisioning and packing for an 18 month journey.
• Finish the to-do list. There are some painting, hatch repairs and replacements that need to be done, as well as other equipment purchases and installs that we will need to do before we depart. We are VERY adamant about our safety gear, MOB beacons, tethers, harnesses, EPIRBs and the all important liferaft. Some of the things can be done while we are on the journey, and we will do that, but there are many things – like the hatches – that need done before we can leave.
• Depart…

To those interested in visiting us along the way, we will provide a spreadsheet with estimated times that we will be in certain locations. We will keep everyone updated as to our progress, and will welcome any traveles that wish to join us for part of our adventure.

Our itinerary thus far is to cross Lake Erie, transit the Welland Canal into Lake Ontario, then visit Toronto, and travel the North shore of the lake over to Kingston. From there we will briefly head over to the USA side of the river to Clayton and then Alexandria Bay. Then we will return to the Canadian side, and travel down the St Lawrence River to Montreal, Quebec City, and then out into the St Lawrence Seaway.

Our next major stop will be Tadoussac, a MAJOR whale watching area. This is at the entrance to the Sanguenay fjord which we will explore a little as well. Then we will head over to the East side of the seaway, and head North towards Riviere-au-Renaud on the tip of the Gaspe peninsula. Then we round the peninsula and head South to visit the Gannet colony off Perce and then on to Summerside on Prince Edward Island (PEI) where we will visit a Yacht/Curling club. Our next stop will be Charlottetown, the capital. Almost all the mussels you eat in restaurants come from this island. We will be sampling some of the local fare 🙂

When we leave PEI, we will sail to Port Hawkesbury and on to the Bras d’Or Lake where we will go to Baddeck and see the Alexander Graham Bell museum. From there we will go to Canso on the North East tip of Nova Scotia. We will travel down the coast to Halifax, Clarks Harbor, Digby, then across the Bay of Fundy to Maine where we will head South along the coast and explore some of the local towns before launching off to Provincetown on Cape Cod.

After transiting the Cape Cod Canal, we’ll put in a quick stop at Woods Hole, then off to Nantucket and Marthas Vineyard before heading over to Newport for a few days. We will leave there and head South to Norfolk Virginia and hope to arrive there in late September.

After some time visiting family, we will join a rally in early November and head to the BVI where we will explore the local islands before sailing North to the Bahamas in February. We will traverse the Bahamas moving North and eventually jumping back to the US coast. Heading up the coast we will take the Hudson River from New York up to Albany where we will drop our mast and take the Erie Canal to Buffalo and then head home to Port Clinton from there.

We expect to be gone until September of ’18 – God willing.

During the planning of this trip we have received advice and guidance from many people, some we hope to meet on our journey and personally thank for their assistance.

My next blog will be a teaser – I have already taken part of this trip! I left in early October on a friend’s boat and made it as far as PEI before bad weather forced an end to the journey. We wanted to check out whether this trip would be feasible for us, from a sailing AND a work perspective. I still need to work and wanted to ensure that I would have sufficient access to both internet and phone to be able to continue working while we travel. The good news is I  will – we had 4G LTE coverage for 98% of the time, so I am sure I will be able to serve my customers well. My office will however be mobile.