Heading South

Ok! Ok! Ok!  So enough of this winter snow and cold weather.

After several years of cruising down south on our boat during the winter, enjoying the warm southern climates, we were actually looking forward to spending our first winter in our hometown of Traverse City, Michigan. Don’t get me wrong, it’s been a blast – but, It’s been nine months now, enough time to have had a baby. We haven’t spent any quality time in and or around boats (not counting the sale and delivery of Kismet) since we moved home. Sure, last summer, we walked the docks, had drinks on friends’ boats, and even went on a dinghy ride or two but that was all just a big tease, just enough to whet our appetite for the pastime we really enjoy most – boating.

A few months ago our friend Rick asked if we would be interested in moving his trawler, Wishing Star, from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida down to Key West, over a 10-day period. How could we refuse? All Lisa and I have to do is get to Florida and back and we’ll have a free place to stay along with a 10-day cruise to the Keys – it doesn’t get much better than this for us.

As luck would have it, the Ft. Lauderdale TrawlerFest starts a few days before Rick turns his boat over to us and there is another boat show in Naples that is of interest to us. Being boatless, we decide to make this trip a twofer – attend the TrawlerFest to look at trailerable trawlers and help Rick at the same time. I guess you could call it a three-for as we’ll also get a much-needed cruising fix as we travel south to the Keys on Wishing Star.

So, we’re off to Florida to start our hands-on search for our next boat, a trailerable trawler. I remember meeting a couple in Anacortes, Washington who owned one rather large boat and had another even larger boat being built. When I questioned him about the complexities of owning two boats at one time, I’ll always remember his statement, ”The only thing worse than owning two boats is owning none at all.” Unfortunately, Lisa and I fit into his worst-case scenario right now, only because we have no boat at the current time. We hope our trip to the boat shows in Florida will help shed some light on what our future boating accommodations will look like.