Siskiwit

So two weeks since the launch of WIN SISKIWIT and 998 of you have been active on this website and likewise many are talking with friends about this amazing contest and the dreams you have if you won. If you are talking with friends who have cruised or sailed they will tell you it is a wonderful lifestyle and Phil Rhodes OS40’s are a stout, safe and gorgeous boat. However, asking for advice from land-based friends comes at a price. When my family and I announced to friends, employers, school principal that we were going cruising for a year,  the concerns were top of mind.  “You’ll never get another job like the one you have now, you will be lost at sea, our daughter’s maturation will be delayed and she will be behind her peers academically when she returns, you’ll be robbed by pirates.” Cruisers know and understand that there are downsides to cruising. They also know how amazing it is to have the ‘perfect’ passage, finally fix that mystery leak, discover a great new “galley recipe” and snap astounding sunsets. No matter how hard you try to explain why you want to sail to land-lubbing friends, I promise THEY JUST WON’T GET IT.  Oh, and did any of the concerns expressed by land-lubbing friends come true? NOT A ONE.

If you haven’t taken an ocean cruise you have not really experienced emptiness, endlessness. It is that feeling of the enormous, uninterrupted expanse of sky, unbroken horizon, with no verticals – no trees, road signs, electric power and cell towers, mountains or skyscrapers to halt the vision. Life is so often defined by what is lacking rather than what is being offered.