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Retiring on a ship.

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Horn of Gabriel

Horn of Gabriel 1614

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This thread is the epitome of different strokes for different folks.  Retiring on a boat sounds like my nightmare.

Serious question: those who contemplate this, are you married?  How do you plan on surviving for years on a 40-foot boat with a wife who has no one else to talk to and no where to escape?  My wife (no pics) and I love each other, but damn, we need time away from each other to retain our sanity.  Maybe we're the outriggers outliers!

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Jhawk

Jhawk 1075

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3 hours ago, Horn of Gabriel said:

This thread is the epitome of different strokes for different folks.  Retiring on a boat sounds like my nightmare.

Serious question: those who contemplate this, are you married?  How do you plan on surviving for years on a 40-foot boat with a wife who has no one else to talk to and no where to escape?  My wife (no pics) and I love each other, but damn, we need time away from each other to retain our sanity.  Maybe we're the outriggers outliers!

I'm not married, but when I was engaged, I let me fiancee know that I wanted to retire ASAP and travel between beaches looking for the perfect one.  I let her know that money for travel outside of beaches would never be a problem so if she wanted to go somewhere else for a bit I was good with it.

The truth of the matter is that no one probably wants to live on a boat forever.  But being able to hop around at your own whim is very attractive and living in airports waiting for the right flight just isn't all that attractive.  If you can find great spots that are all a day or two away from each other you can probably find some longevity in getting lost with someone for a while.  

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52-80

52-80 19144

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8 hours ago, Horn of Gabriel said:

This thread is the epitome of different strokes for different folks.  Retiring on a boat sounds like my nightmare.

Serious question: those who contemplate this, are you married?  How do you plan on surviving for years on a 40-foot boat with a wife who has no one else to talk to and no where to escape?  My wife (no pics) and I love each other, but damn, we need time away from each other to retain our sanity.  Maybe we're the outriggers outliers!

I think you're born with it or you're not.

I grew up near the coast most my life and the boating things never been on my radar.  Like ever.  Love scuba and wanted to try that America's Cup Yacht thing when I was in Auckland but outside of that... It's as foreign a fascination as Running.

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Sbbruin

Sbbruin 21829

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9 hours ago, Horn of Gabriel said:

This thread is the epitome of different strokes for different folks.  Retiring on a boat sounds like my nightmare.

Serious question: those who contemplate this, are you married?  How do you plan on surviving for years on a 40-foot boat with a wife who has no one else to talk to and no where to escape?  My wife (no pics) and I love each other, but damn, we need time away from each other to retain our sanity.  Maybe we're the outriggers outliers!

I don't think my marriage would fare well on an extended cruise.  My wife is good for about a week on a boat and then really tires of it.  I think if I ever did this, it would be solo.  The most enjoyable times I've had on my boat have been by myself.  And I really think if I had the right boat and proper funding, I could live on a boat indefinitely.

I have found myself youtubing a few interesting vids.  This channel of a young couple sailing the Pacific takes me back to a lot of places I've been.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkExLY1E6CE-GPsMCdSjmxQ

 BTW, OP kinda bailed out on this thread.  

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Brew

Brew 3049

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My optimum view of being on a boat is doing numerous short term trips of a week or two or even less, not being permanently out on the open water. I also think I’m changing my earlier post of keeping it at the house to the best case would be keeping it in one of the marinas I’ve passed through that has a good live aboard community. I can say for sure that I’ve never had a bad time at one and I have several friends that keep boats at marinas like that and never leave the dock.

The one other exception to my earlier time frame spent on the boat is I’m determined to do the Great Loop in one trip. I had been eyeballing a couple of 42-46 foot boats but an upgraded beach house won out this round.

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markstanco

markstanco 12570

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That is that couple that sold everything but didnt buy insurance for their boat right? Started a go fund me?

And oddly enough I was in rockport about 3 weeks ago. Read that story a while back but didnt pay attention to where it happened.
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Sbbruin

Sbbruin 21829

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20 hours ago, Viking said:

My wife and I have been planning to do this for 2 years now. Sold everything 6 months ago and bought a Manta 42 cat in SW Florida. Neither of us are boaters so we're taking our time learning and hope to leave the dock for good in the spring.

 

 

 

Well good on ya, mate!  But in my humble opinion, if you really aren't boaters (yet); this spring is too soon.  Spend the time to learn the boat's systems.  They are infinite.  Learn to sail.  I mean really learn.  Take a few shorter cruises to get a feel for life away from the dock.  Put yourself in some weather so you can experience it, but not too far from shore.  You really don't want to learn all of this on the fly.  Things will break, and if you are totally unfamiliar with what it is that failed and how to fix it, you can get yourself in a little trouble.  But awesome for you.  

 

 

 

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Viking

Viking 301

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On 11/9/2018 at 7:42 PM, Sbbruin said:

Well good on ya, mate!  But in my humble opinion, if you really aren't boaters (yet); this spring is too soon.  Spend the time to learn the boat's systems.  They are infinite.  Learn to sail.  I mean really learn.  Take a few shorter cruises to get a feel for life away from the dock.  Put yourself in some weather so you can experience it, but not too far from shore.  You really don't want to learn all of this on the fly.  Things will break, and if you are totally unfamiliar with what it is that failed and how to fix it, you can get yourself in a little trouble.  But awesome for you.  

 

 

 

I vacillate between thinking we're going way too slow and way too fast. Most of me wouldn't mind staying in Florida for 6-12 months but I'm leaning towards getting out and avoiding another summer storm and hurricane season. Our marina got hit by lightning several times and took out the electronics on a couple of boats.

I hear you on the maintenance. I dedicate a full day each weekend and a couple of weekday evenings working on the boat. I enjoy it but damn does everything take 10x longer than in a house. I installed a Vesper AIS transponder, VHF/AIS splitter, and new fixed VHF this weekend. I spent 16ish hours on that and still have work to do (need to feed ais/gps data to chartplotter, heading data to AIS, AIS to VHF all over nmea0183).

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Sgt Hulk

Sgt Hulk 13713

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On 10/2/2018 at 4:47 PM, Sbbruin said:

I wrote on the old site about our family cruise in 1982-83.  I'll cliff note it here for now.  But we left Marina del Rey in June '82- after spending 4 months on a shakedown cruise to Mexico-  and sailed 2,600 nm to Hiva Oa in the Marquesas Islands.  We spent the next 10 months sailing the Marquesas, Tuamotus, and Society Islands, returning to the Marquesas to begin what would be a 40 day non-stop return trip to San Diego.  The crew were my parents (mid 50's), 5 kids ranging from 23 at the high end and 13 at the low end (I was 15 when we left), and 2 dogs- a Rottweiler and a Pekingese.  And this was all on a 51' boat.  So   

So my question would be- is it you alone, or with a crew?  From my experience- and the experience of many others we met who knew way more than we did-  don't get bigger than you need.  Don't think of what size boat you can handle solo in settled weather.  Think about what you can handle in heavy weather.  Smaller boats can handle the weather.  But you may not be able to handle a larger boat in heavy weather by yourself, or with only one other crewmember.  

But I say do it.  Just do your homework first.  And whatever you think you need for money, double it.  You can live simply, but the boat will require repairs and parts are not always available.  And you don't get to choose when something breaks down so you can be sure you are in a cheap location.

this story sounds so LA lol  

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HOOKEM4

HOOKEM4 5036

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Posted (edited)
On 11/8/2018 at 10:15 PM, Viking said:

My wife and I have been planning to do this for 2 years now. Sold everything 6 months ago and bought a Manta 42 cat in SW Florida. Neither of us are boaters so we're taking our time learning and hope to leave the dock for good in the spring.

 

 

 

Awesome. I am with SB, dont rush it. I have been sailing (cruising, racing) for over 30 years and I wouldn't feel comfortable heading out with my wife if she only had a year of experience. Both people need to know how to do most everything (and be capable physically) on the boat before I would go anywhere near blue water. May only be 90-100 miles across the gulf stream to the Bahamas, but a lot can go wrong in that distance. 

 

With that said, I look forward to you posts of boats and hoe's and wish you smooth sailing.

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