Well I just got one of the most important pieces of cruising gear out of the way. I now have a Cat 1 ACR Globalfix ipro 406mhz satellite EPIRB with internal GPS. What a long way EPIRBS have come since my old ACR satellite2. This is one -if not the most- important piece of cruising gear you can have. The magic button if you need immediate rescue at your fingertips. I got it sponsored for some advertising and I’ll be making an instillation video for them. The Pacific is growing closer, thanks ACR! I’ve had ACR EPIRBs on various boats for the past 15 years or so. I’ve never had to pull the trigger on an EPIRB but what a great peace of mind. The 406mhz signal is credited with saving over 30,000 lives. And the new ACR EPIRBs can even send an “okay” message when you’re at sea, pretty cool. Check out www.406link.com for more information. If you plan on doing cruising of any kind you’ll want one of these onboard.
I’ve been engulfed in my blog-book project. I’m trimming out much of the mundane (waiting for weather/fixing) blogs and focused on the travel for the most part. I’m telling some of the behind the scenes stuff which includes my experience in LA, Canada, and making the break to cruising and minimalism. It also tells a behind the scene story I was afraid to tell until the statute of limitations was up. No, I didn’t intentionally break any laws.
What a quick and fun read it’s turning out to be. I got kind of emotional reading my Pacific crossing blogs, what an adventure that was! I still can’t believe I did it. If you want to go back and read some of the Pacific crossing it starts on my 3/2/2007 blog, Tick Tock.
Carla and I are going to make some plans. We are thinking to transit the Canal around our birthdays (mid-July). Transiting the canal is an expensive but once in a lifetime experience. Twice in my case. I’m going to be looking for 3 guys to pitch in about $500 and spend a week with me which will include a 2-day Panama Canal transit from the Atlantic, to the Pacific.
If I had about seven grand I could do everything I want to do on Splendid for our trip across the Pacific, however the reality is it isn’t going to happen. I’m not able to work here and I’m not willing to beat Splendid up with backpackers getting drunk, vomiting all over the boat, putting cigarette butts out on the deck, and doing everything they can to transport illegal drugs. If I can stir up some conventional charters I’m all about it, but otherwise, I’ll just have to do without and go minimal.
Carla is getting super-excited about the crossing as am I. Reading back in my older blogs I’m reminded that putting together this old boat has got to come to an end and I need to feel the sea-spray on my smile, the wind in my hair, and adventure in my soul. That’s what I was built to do and its getting to be that time again.
Once we transit the canal I’m thinking to go up to Costa Rica for some surfing and a change of scenery. Then down to Ecuador for some inland adventure. If we can scrape a little money together I’d like to bus down to Machu Pichu before crossing the Pacific again. Maybe my book will bring in a few bucks?
Carla posted another beautiful blog and I’m starting to worry she may steal my readership. She is so insightful, talented, and kind, I feel a bit guilty sometimes. Why do I deserve such a nice woman? The truth is we are just really kind to each other, honest, trusting, and happy. We both have an uncanny ability to care for the other, it’s a constructive relationship.
Well that’s it for today. I’m planning on writing the rest of the day away as it’s grey & nasty outside.
I still feel like the luckiest guy on earth :)
Sail far and live slowly.
-alex
Hey Alex, Man im Happy to see you heading to the Pacific again I have been going back and reading your old blogs, honestly i started from day one. and I stopped at 4/20/2007 but im not done. ever since I started reading your blogs and fallowing you I had always wished you would have sailed to Hawaii. I guess it is because your so insightful, I know you almost did but then chose to go to the French Polynesia. Anyways I think its great that you have a woman like Carla to share your journeys with, you guys are a true pair…. I have thought about your blogs and how it would make a great book and a even better movie.. like Hollywood type movie, lol. you might think im crazy but I can almost visualize it, call it ” Where the Whales Play”
I actually planned on starting a blog / website called “Dreaming Where the Whales Play”
I guess just food for thought, I know it may sound crazy but I kinda got it from one of your blogs and wanted to run it by you as an idea for you and if you minded if I used my version of it, you Have my email if needed. Anyways im gonna get off here. Take care man I still have the vision in my heart to sail away, and the sights in my eyes.
Steve
P.S. Carla Keep it up your doing a great job you two are each others Great Catch.. I am so Happy you came back..
did you sell the bike? handy in ecuador…….and hawaii….G
Grats on the Epirb! Another expensive itenm off the list.
ACR makes great products and are a great company.
First off lets be perfectly clear you deserve Carla like I deserve Lisa. We both need to wake up each morning and thank our lucky stars they are still with us. I can’t wait to actually get to spend some time with her when Makayli and I come down. I think Steve had a great idea I am going to go back and start from the beginning all over again as well. I happen to like your poor grammar at times and certainly never minded waiting for weather with you back then, it was raw and real and it got me through some pretty crappy Canadian winters. You look so happy with your new EPRIB could be the EPIRB but more likely it is making steps in the right direction that keep you smiling I know that is the way it is with me. Take care and we will speak soon my friend!
Coldcell, thanks for the words, Carla and are are a “pair” for sure :)
Gary, Still have the bike and ride it often. I’m contemplating weather or not to sell it or try and bring it with me.
Mike, thanks for reading my crappy grammar over the years :) Carla is a savior in that department.
I’ve been quiet as I’ve been knocking out the final stages of my book “The Minimalist Sailor”. There is too much rain to film and I’m taking this opportunity to finish up a creative project I’ve wanted to finish for quite some time. I’m writing the days away, and Carla has been editing 8-10 hours a day as well. I think my book “The Minimalist Sailor” will be finished in a few weeks. I hope to have it available before Christmas.
I need something to generate some income for us to cross the Pacific and I think this is just the ticket :)
Sterling Hayden:
“To be truly challenging, a voyage, like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of financial unrest. Otherwise you are doomed to a routine traverse, the kind known to yachtsmen, who play with their boats at sea – “cruising,” it is called. Voyaging belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who cannot, or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you have the means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change. Only then will you know what the sea is all about.
“I’ve always wanted to sail to the South Seas, but I can’t afford it.” What these men can’t afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous discipline of “security.” And in the worship of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine – and before we know it our lives are gone.
What does a man need – really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in – and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That’s all – in the material sense. And we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention from the sheer idiocy of the charade.
The years thunder by. The dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves of patience. Before we know it the tomb is sealed.
Where, then, lies the answer? In choice. Which shall it be: bankruptcy of purse or bankruptcy of life?”
if you are going to ecuador, keep the bike. it opens up a big world beyound peurto amistad….G
Wow! Thanks for the Sterling Hayden quote. We all need a good “jolt” from time to time.
Hopeing to live up to it.
Can’t wait for the book!
doing my first squally night on the hook…. Mama! Quit uncommon in this part of the woods (GR), but it is October …
Right on Alex!!! Jack London used to say that the only reason he wrote was for the money! So, keep that philosophy and ignore all the other necessary evils and you’ll be swinging. Cool on Carla, what an exceptional and witty person she is! As I ditto the previous post, I really laughed loudly when I read your bad grammar, as I have followed your travels since your first post.
It seems that you are really coming into your own; spiritually enlightened and absolutely enthralling, all while having such a fascinating journey!
As they say in Canada: YEEAA!!!
STEW
Hello Alex,I was going to ask how the movie is coming along? You are a busy man with both the movie and a book on the go. I can’t wait to see the movie and read the book.
I was going to ask a question on not so very nice subject but one worth talking about. What do you and Carla do when it comes to waste on the boat? I know you are at anchor. Do you go for a sail and pump out? Do you compost your waste matter? How do you empty your tanks? Grey water and waste water.
I am all about composting toilets because the thought of storing and sleping over my own waste seems a little wierd to me.
Curtis
Tell me would WIFI work instead of EPIRB these days? -Ken
Ken…..I am confused by your question. How would WIFI work as an emergency beacon when I fall in the water?
Charles..the wifi enabled device would short out and catch on fire, thereby attracting the attention of rescuers. Think of it as a personal flare device.