Surf n Turf! Dinner or Lifestyle?

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No isn’t a recipe post, but rather a post about dreams, bucket lists & adventures.  When we redid our list of goals and expectations for 2014, we decided to change our lifestyle to “Surf n Turf”!  So excited!  Not to worry, we’re not excluding our winter months aboard Winterlude.  We started with listing the top 5 activities we both enjoy.  Here’s our list – no, they’re not in order…

Snorkeling/Spearfishing in crystal clear tropical waters.

Hiking for spectacular scenery and wildlife.

Photography for Jan

Racing Y Flyers (one design scow 18′ sailboat) for David

Family & Friends

Approaching the Cocos Banderos Cayes in the San Blas Islands, Panama
Approaching the Cocos Banderos Cayes in the San Blas Islands, Panama

Next we listed places we wanted to go along with things we want to do.  National Parks ranked high on the list, as did cruising tropical clear waters.  We recognize we can’t sail the boat to most National Parks.  I also know from our monthlong trip to Alaska last summer that living on the boat has spoiled me.  I love having my own house with me wherever we travel.

I hesitate to say we have a plan because that implies dates & specifics, but we have an outline of adventures to come.

1.  s/v Winterlude … When we started cruising I had no interest in cruising the Eastern Caribbean because I’m allergic to crowds and envisioned too many boats.  But after studying the charts for awhile, we think there are places to go that can be off the beaten path.  So we’re planning to head south … Not sure of the timing yet.  We’re here in south Florida for my 92 year old Dad.  So maybe next winter, maybe a stage at a time, we’ll see.

Lance 1685. ... Our ticket to home while exploring National Parks, Forests, Wildlife Refuges & Recreation Areas.
Lance 1685. … Our new home while exploring National Parks, Forests, Wildlife Refuges & Recreation Areas.

2.  For the National Parks, we need a different approach.  Gasp!  We just ordered a Lance 1685 travel trailer to camp our way through as many National Parks as are fun.  Here’s the new addition to our family!  The ultimate goal for our new addition is a three month circle through all the Utah National Parks and the Grand Canyon.  But not this year.

Looking forward to hiking is Bryce Canyon National Park, my late Mom's favorite national park... and I've never been.
Looking forward to hiking is Bryce Canyon National Park, my late Mom’s favorite national park… and I’ve never been.

Our first camping adventures will be this summer, traveling to the 2014 Y Flyer National Championships to compete & enjoy time with our Y Flyer friends.  After that, who knows!  Son Billy thinks the Rocky Mountain National Park might be fun for our first National Park in the camper…of course he lives in Denver.

After that we’ll meander our way south, camping in the North Georgia mountains, the Georgia “Grand Canyon” and the upper gulf coast beaches before ending up back at s/v Winterlude.

Georgia's
Georgia’s “Grand Canyon” – Providence Canyon State Park

In the meantime, we have some sailing to enjoy and this summer we’ll have to make time for slalom skiing on the little lake we enjoy.

Surf n Turf!  s/v Winterlude – to continue cruising part-time and the as yet unnamed Lance 1685 travel trailer – to  explore national parks and beyond.  I’m sure there will be a lot of correlations and many surprises between life in the boat and life in the trailer.  But I’m betting in the Lance 1685 we won’t ever wonder if the anchor is holding in a 180 degree wind shift in the middle of the night!

So are we Surf n Turf or trailer trash?  🙂

2 COMMENTS

    • Hi Keith! We’ll add Summerlude to our name list! Thx! I’ve also toyed with Viewfinder – that was the name of the boat in Isla that shared their cruising guide & w/p with us our first winter cruising the NW Carib and I love the name. Friends have the “Rollin’ Ritz”, a travel trailer, and we toyed with naming it after a major glitzy hotel chain, but haven’t found one that rolls off the tongue like “Rollin’ Ritz”, so for now it’s the “as yet unnamed Lance 1685”. 🙂

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