2022 - THIS is the year!

In 2019 we were going to take the summer and cruise to Newfoundland.  That was the year both our sons got married there was a family wedding trip to Vietnam.  We’ll do it next year, we thought.  But then 2020 was the year of COVID and Canadian borders weren’t open.  We set a goal of 20 new anchorages in Maine and discovered some wonderful new places to cruise.  In 2021, the Canada borders weren’t open to boaters until late in the summer and so we explored Maine’s rivers, and managed to find 21 new-to-us anchorages.  We also needed to stay close to home, as Dan’s mother was declining in health.  2022, we decided, we were going to stop putting it off.  

So here we are, in June of 2022.  The boat is in the water and we’ve said our goodbyes to our friends. We even had a little open house that included a blessing from our minister.  We launched a bit later than we’d hoped - there were family matters, work needs, and unforeseen boat problems - but we are very close to moving aboard and leaving town.  Two questions we’re being asked all the time: when are you leaving? Where are you going? 

Willie Dawes 2022

The answer to leaving is soon.  Very soon!  Fresh water leaks have been fixed.  Engine coolant leak is being addressed as I write this.  The cat had her vet visit and vaccinations updated yesterday.  We have just the last minute things to do - clearing out the home fridge and household chores to leave the house ready for overnight guests - and we’re waiting out the weather for the final move-aboard.  

The answer to where we’re going is a little harder to define.  We like to tell people what we want to do.  We want to explore Lake Champlain and the New York finger lakes.  We want to experience the canals in Canada.  We want to winter in the Bahamas.  We want to do the Great Loop - a circumnavigation of the Eastern portion of the US.  We still want to cruise the Northern shore of the St. Lawrence and hop over to Newfoundland.  We also need to be flexible.  My mother passed away last winter and we have to be at a family memorial in July, so we’ll need to be somewhere we can safely leave the boat for a week, rent a car and drive to Wisconsin.  We know there will be times we’ll have to come back here, for visits, doctor's appointments, or other family matters.  So we’re going to cruise as we can, where we can, and be flexible about our adventure.  We will start by heading to the Erie Canal.  That’s the beauty of combining retirement with adventure, right?  To enjoy it all without stress, and just go with the flow.  

We know some of you are enjoying our adventure vicariously - if you click the “follow” button at the top, you’ll get notices of when new blogs are posted.  

Dan & Kathy