Sail now or forever hold your peace

July 2024

By Christopher Birch

Two years ago this month, my wife Alex and I left the confines of Boston Harbor, bound for adventures unknown. Since then, our course has taken us up to Newfoundland and down to the Bahamas logging over 12,000 nautical miles over the past 24 months. Now we’re in the process of crossing to England via Bermuda and the Azores.

The itinerary sounds exotic, but living it has felt like a logical evolution of our New England sailing routes. We’re just a pair of Bostonians on a Maine boat doing what sailors and boats are built to do. There are no gates on the harbor.

We’ve learned a great deal in the past 24 months. Three takeaways stand out.

Lesson #1: Sail now or forever hold your peace.

In my three-decade career of maintaining and repairing other people’s boats, I prepped many dream yachts for extended voyaging. Yet a remarkably large number of those boats and their owners never embarked on their trip. Something always got in the way: health problems, work complications, family obligations, cold feet. Those excuses stayed with me. It became obvious that if you truly want to sail off for a few years, it’s smart to jump through any window of opportunity that opens up. Once postponement creeps in, a lengthy sailing voyage more often than not gets terminally delayed.

The people you meet out there on the water are the ones who made the decision to actually get off the dock and go. Their stories about how they decided to prioritize voyaging full-time are enlightening.

Greta and Michael from Italy quit their jobs early in their professional careers, and headed out sailing indefinitely on their small sloop. Their financial planner was not amused. Greta spells out her rationale this way, “My mother told me I could be anything I wanted when I grew up, so I chose to be financially irresponsible.” It’s a fun joke, but in all seriousness, Greta goes on to clarify how she was compelled to question what is, and what is not, a responsible way to live a life. Striving to satiate the unquenchable hunger around retirement math didn’t feel right to these two. Sound financial planning advice isn’t always good life advice.

Shelley and Tom from North Carolina both retired relatively early from military careers. After just one day of sailing on a friend’s boat, they were hooked. They decided to trade in their house for a 40-foot catamaran and go sailing for a few years with their two dogs and three children ages seven, three, and two. A total lack of sailing experience wasn’t perceived as an obstacle. Shelley explains, “I figured that if I could fly Blackhawk helicopters, I ought to be able to manage a sailboat.” (She went on to say that she was a little bit worried about her husband’s learning curve because he only flew “fixed-wing” – meaning fighter jets. “His boat handling skills are coming along OK,” she added, seemingly with some surprise.) Tom still works as a pilot episodically, and when he’s away from the boat, Shelly holds down the fort solo as a different sort of helicopter mom. This family concluded that now’s the time. Homeschooling remains a viable option for them in the short term, and they’ve been pleased to find an abundance of other “kid-boats” out there to share the anchorages with. Learn-ing as they go about sailing and life afloat has all been a part of the adventure.

Tales circulate around beach bonfires through-out the sailing world about a famed Dutch couple, Jan and Pam, who have taken budget sailing to the extreme and are thriving. This middle-aged pair was short on money, but that didn’t stop them from going on their dream voyage. They bought an old, engineless sailboat for just over $500 ten years ago. Since then, they’ve been cruising the Caribbean on a $1,000/year budget. They routinely purchase only six things: Rice, beans, coffee, cooking oil, propane, and toothpaste. They fish and forage for everything else they need. Yup, that’s about $10,000 total cash outlay for two people for 10 years. They may do a fair bit of dumpster-diving, but one thing they don’t do is punch a clock at work. Legends. You don’t need a lot of money to go to sea.

The sailing life is truly accessible. Long-distance voyagers are just cruising from one sailor’s home-waters to the next, all up and down any coast. Out in the middle of the ocean, the sailing is still just sailing. You don’t need a special boat or special skills. A budget of just about any size will do the trick. All you really need is the inclination, determination, and time . . . and the chutzpah to pull up anchor and go.

My wife Alex and I were nervous about making such a radical choice: sell our house, leave our jobs for a while, and sail our beloved old boat off to distant shores. We were also acutely aware that opportunity doesn’t always knock twice. So when the kids finished school and moved out on their own, we felt a window open and eagerly jumped out. There has been no regret.

Famous sailors Lin and Larry Pardey explain the thinking this way: “Go simple, go small, go now.” The more time I’ve been around boats, the more wisdom I find in this advice.

Lesson # 2: Avoiding the three D’s: Drunk, Dropped-Out, and Dissolute. Stay tuned to this column in the next issue of Points East for a hard look at the soft underbelly of the voyaging life. Lesson #3 to follow thereafter.

Christopher Birch is the founder of Birch Marine Inc. on Long Wharf, Boston. He and his wife, Alex, are now cruising full-time aboard their 36’ Morris Justine. Follow their voyage at www.EagleSevenSailing.com.

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