svIslandSpirit.com

Please follow and like us:

Hayden and Radeen at Amy & Brian’s Wedding

We are BACK, the blog is back, and we will soon be living on Island Spirit time once again. In May we moved our boat to the Island Packet Yachts Factory for a refit and then we moved home to our passive solar home for a summer. This was the first summer in 22 years of Island Packet ownership that we did NOT sail during the summer. Instead we enjoyed some peaceful time at home and also took some amazing trips.

A highlighted summary:
…27 day trip to Italy
…New Hampshire Cottage with a close friend
…Williamsburg VA with boat buddy friends
…Family vacation in Florida
…Family Wedding in California
…Friends and Family dinners at our home

The other highlight of the summer was simply enjoying land based life where we (you, too) are seriously spoiled by life on land. Features such as curb side trash pick up, HOT water, endless electricity, 24/7 Broadband Internet, driving a CAR to get your groceries, and multiple places to lounge and relax around the home! WOW, life on land is soooooooooooo easy, when compared to life on a cruising sailboat.

Island Spirit, Exumas, Bahamas, THIS is the DREAM

But, we are very excited to depart this land based life of comfort and easy living and trade it in for life on a cruising sailboat. Life where you live fully with the weather, where you know exactly what the winds are doing, and what direction the wind is blowing from. You know if it is cold, rainy, windy, sunny, hot, mild or comfortable outside because you are living outside. You watch the sunset. You watch the sunrise. You listen to birds as the dawn awakens. You walk, hike, and climb miles everyday. You walk for all your food, water, and sightseeing. Car, who has a car? You read on a cruising boat, you write, and you study and you learn. TV, what TV? You visit and you talk, and you actually have lengthy conversations.

Life simply slows down, and life is peaceful. This is WHY we do it. There is no better life than on a cruising sailboat, especially when all systems are working well.

So, in the near future, we will be relaunching the boat out of the factory, splashing it and then spending the month of November rebuilding the on deck systems. We have allowed the first three weeks of November to rebuild. After that, we will set sail and re-explore Florida’s West Coast, and then onto Biscayne Bay. From there, we will set sail for the Exumas for year two of exploring there.

Thank you for following along, we hope you enjoy the sharing as much as we do. We look forward to another wonderful year of cruising.

Please follow and like us:

Please follow and like us:

Reflecting back on our year #2 of cruising, we feel so blessed and so lucky to be living this long term planned dream. Our second year took us down the ICW from Maryland to the Florida Keys where we spent another wonderful holiday time at Harbour Cay Club. From Florida, we headed off to the Exumas with our good friend Jeff arriving in Georgetown where Jeff rented a beach front home. From there we continued south to Long Island and then we began our trek northward to the Abacos. We spent a beautiful month in the Abacos where good friends Wendy and Craig flew down for a visit. From the Abacos, we headed for the Island Packet Yachts Factory in Largo, Florida!

We decided to truck our 1994 IP-35 back to the factory for a full refit and a few upgrades. The factory has started a new refit program and we are the first yacht to sign up. Our boat will be in the factory for 6 months, May to November, 2013. While the yacht is in the factory, we will be spending our first summer in 22 years at our home. Usually, we set sail in June and enjoy sailing to New England. This will be our first summer at home since we started sailing our Island Packet 27 in 1991. This will be a different summer for us.

Once the factory completes our refit, we will re-launch the boat in St. Petersburg, Florida, in November. At that point we will then begin year #3 of our Bahamas explorations.

We manage Google Maps of our yearly sailing trips and here is a picture of this past year… the blue pins are for the trip south to the Keys, the yellow pins are south to the Bahamas, the aqua pins represent our return to the US from the Exumas and the green pins show our way across the Okeechobee Waterway to Largo, Florida.

Team Island Spirit ICW to Exumas to the Island Packet Yachts Factory

Thank you for following along with our sailing adventures. We love to hear from you. Please leave us a comment below or use the CONTACT US link to send us an email.

Hayden & Radeen…..at HOME!

Please follow and like us:

Please follow and like us:

After our group tour of Italy, we stayed one more week in the Tuscany area to tour the wine country. We rented a condo via RCI in the beautiful hillside town of Loro Cuiffenna with waterfalls and street side cafes and bakeries. From this location, we drove (over 1,000 km.) into the Chianti Region and tour vineyards and hilltop towns from the 11th century! Italy, a wonderful place to get lost…

Here are some photos of the Tuscany Area:

A Cappuccino Girl is BORN…..oh NO!

San Gimignano, a walled hilltop city from the 13 century

Local restaurant in San Gimignano

Typical Tuscany Meal, meat and salad

San Gimignano meal, Tuscany, meat and beans….. and you thought it was all pasta in Italy

San Gimignano Piazza, center of town

Our little town, Loro Cuiffenna where we spent a week

Our little town, Loro Cuiffenna looking down the river

Our little town, Loro Cuiffenna and the BROOM MAKER….look close (see next pic)

Our little town, Loro Cuiffenna broom shop

Olive Trees are every where

Typical Tuscany Driving view

Overlook view from a hilltop town

Beautiful architectural details

Oldest wine cellar in Montepulciano: Cantine Redi 1200 years old!

ahhhhh   Montepulciano: Cantine Redi

Walking the streets of Montepulciano

The view from Montepulciano

Montepulciano the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, 1594-1680 A.D.

Montepulciano the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, 1594-1680 A.D.

The street of LOVE 🙂

Departing our little town….our stay has ended.. We are sad to leave Italy 🙁

This has been a wonderful 24 day adventure. We shot 3,000 photos and shared our best 25 or more. We hope you have enjoyed the photos. Thank you for traveling along with us.

Please follow and like us:

Please follow and like us:

We are home from our Italy 2013 tour, reflecting on our wonderful visit and discovery of this fabulous country. Here are 25 photos that progress in the order of our trip. Thank you for traveling along with us and sharing in this adventure.

We flew using Frequent Flyer Miles and they routed us… Phil – Chicago – Berlin – Rome ! At least it was FREE

Once in Europe, we rode the high speed train to Naples

Walking the streets in Naples is really great

Our first excitement discovering Naples….FUN

Roof top breakfast in Naples

A drive down the Amalfi Coast to Positano

Touring Pompeii

The beautiful domes inside St. Peter’s Basilica

St. Mark’s Square in Vatican City

The Pantheon in Rome is spiritual

The FORUM in ROME, 312 A.D.

The Colosseum

The Colosseum had stages that lifted and dropped into the floor!

The Trevi Fountain, 1762 A.D., a must stop location

Trevi Fountain Italian Model

Wine Cellar for our first wine tasting

Hayden and Radeen enjoying a wine tasting

Florence….wonderful….Florence

Siena and the Palio, a colorful sight to enjoy

The Palio in Siena with the parade and horse race. Every contrada or neighborhood participates

The canals of Venice, so romantic

The island of Burano north of Venice, a fishing village

Runing around Venice on a private high speed taxi….FUN

On the water at night….Venice

Lake Como, Northern Italy

Please follow and like us:

Please follow and like us:

We are so blessed to be able to share both of these worlds……..

We have been at home and off our cruising boat for over 2 weeks now, still adjusting to life on land and the many contrasts we observe. It may sound crazy, but we are really noticing the differences of life afloat vs. life in a house. No longer are we certain which is the “REAL LIFE” as we honestly are not sure what real life is or is supposed to be. We do know that we like this option of coming home as an interesting counterpoint to the cruising life. Living between these opposing worlds will certainly make us appreciate both worlds more!

Here is a comparison: Boat vs. Home

These are a few observation after being home for two weeks living in a house vs. living on a cruising sailboat. It is not that we haven’t enjoyed this time at home, it is just more stressful and more rushed than we are used to. Is life better at home? Some aspects are, but it is also very wonderful to be cruising and traveling and exploring on a sailboat.

Please follow and like us:

Please follow and like us:

…boat is there, we are here…

With our boat trucked to the Island Packet Yachts Refit program in Largo, FL, we hit the road to drive home! Lucky for us, we have great friends and family along the way home, so we leaned on them to take a break, enjoyed their kindness and hospitality, and began life on land in a BED, in a HOUSE, with unlimited water and power! WOW, we have been out of the “normal land life” for a bit and these simple aspects of living on land are a real treat.

One of the reasons we decided to move home was the fact that our terrific house sitter was moving out and our beautiful home would be available to us. We had moved out of our house two years ago and the thought of spending a SUMMER at home sounded great. This would be a first in 22 years, as we are usually sailing the Chesapeake or New England! So, off the boat we moved, rented a mini-van, and drove home! What a dream….six months living in our house!

Larry, Gerri, Radeen and Hayden

Along the way, we were so fortunate to have a lovely lunch near Charleston, SC, with fellow Island Packet Yacht owners, Larry and Gerri. owners of IP37 Galileo. It was so kind of them to go out of their way to intercept us on I-95 as we were passing by. This is the great aspect about our IP fleet of owners. We are so connected and we all love to meet up to share stories and visit.

Greg, Kate, Radeen and Hayden on the Beaufort waterfront

Our next stop was at our great friends and gracious hosts, Greg and Kate, who are located in the Beaufort, NC area. Arriving late at 9:30 pm, Kate presented us with hot chicken picatta, green beans, spaghetti and red wine! OMG. did we die and wake in HEAVEN? No, we were at Greg and Kate’s home!

After dinner, we moved into our beautiful massive bedroom suite on the second floor where we passed out on a king sized sleep number bed. That night, we did not even move. I awoke the next day in exactly the same position I feel asleep in. It was great to be in a home with endless water, power and light. We lounged around their beautiful home for a few days, enjoying great meals and loving their Doodles, Gracie and Lucy.

Even Radeen, who is not a great animal lover, enjoyed having Gracie climb up on her lap. Lucy and Gracie are Australian Doodles and they are really wonderful pets. each so different and very fun to play with, walk, and simply pet. If we ever get a dog, this would be the breed. They are lively, well-behaved and so very smart!

The van, loaded with stuff to move home

You will notice we were living out boxes in the mini van as there is no room for luggage while living on a sailboat. When we moved off the boat, we simply packed our clothes in liquor store boxes. This required going to the van for changes of clothes, shoes and socks, and simply trying to find our stuff. This was not part of the plan, but it was how it all worked out. Life on the road in a mini van is NOT for us, that we have learned. Living on a cruising sailboat?  Now that is EASY.

Here is a great photo of Kate and Radeen, enjoying a class of Champagne

Radeen, Baby Brea and her proud aunts, Heather and Allison

Hayden, Baby Brea, Aunt Heather and Aunt Allison

Radeen, Allison, and Sherry, who is Norah and Brea’s Grandmom

Brea’s big sister, Norah, with her mom, Kristin, and Radeen

Thane Hayden with his Grandmom Diane and his Great Aunt Sherry

Diane and Thane Hayden (a family name used for many generations!)

Norah teaching school

Thane Hayden, Norah and Baby Brea…the next generations of cousins!

Paul, Radeen, Sherry and Hayden

The next day, we sadly departed the DC Cousins, excited to move back into our own house!

Saltbox 13….there it is…what a beautiful home. We designed and built this in 1984. It is cozy and simple, with passive solar, and it is our very own design!

Radeen gives a “WE DID IT!” We moved HOME…..at least until Oct/Nov, when we set sail again

Welcome to the JUNK MAIL, a table full of mail

So….good bye to the cruising life for a break. Hello to land life for several months. We are so looking forward to this time where we can live in our home, relax, drive a car, have barbecues and share some dinners with the friends and family we have missed so much. We can also run all the water we want because WE HAVE A WELL with 38 gallons/minute capacity! This may spoil us, but I doubt it. We already miss the boating life a bit….the peace, the calm, and the friendships. We will return to that in late October, when we rebuild the boat after the factory refit is complete.

Radeen says goodbye to the Gulf of Mexico at Bradenton Beach

Please follow and like us:

Please follow and like us:

…there is our boat as nearly as big as an auto carrier…

Today we hauled the boat at Snead Island Boat Works and loaded it onto a Joule Yacht Transport Tractor Trailer. The truck driver drove it up to Largo Florida via route 75 then route 4 and 275 because the boat was too wide to truck across the Tampa Bay Skyway Bridge! This was really an exciting process and a relief after months of planning, emails, and this massive final week of offloading.

Now, Island Spirit, our 1994 IP-35, is back where she was designed and built! Imagine if you loved a classic car and you could send it back to the car manufacturer 20 years later and ask then to refurbish and upgrade the car to modern standards. If you can imagine that, then you have an idea of the excitement we are experiencing!

Many IP owners do not know that the factory has started an extensive refit program. If you are interested in this program, please contact the Vice President of IPY, Bill Bolin, for your refit needs. See this page for the email link.

Here are photos of the delivery process….

At 0830 am, we moved the boat into the haul out slings

Terry is driving the lift via a remote control which gives a better visibility

The travel lift is driven over the special yacht hauling trailer

I wore my HOPE TOWN shirt…hoping that next year, we will sail her back to HOPE TOWN

That is an IP-35 (39′ 6″ plus 5′ dinghy davits) on a 53′ yacht transport trailer

We followed the truck onto the road…the dinghy davits are hitting the trees!

Notice the width of the yacht, 12 feet on the road

Driver takes route 4 to Tampa because the boat will not fit the Skyway Bridge

Several times, it looked like she would clip the bridges, but she was just close…..maybe a foot

Next we took route 275 where they were doing road shoulder work

SAFE ARRIVAL at 1979 Wild Acres Road, Largo, Florida The Island Packet Yachts Facility

The truck driver did a GREAT JOB, here is his co-pilot and navigator

Island Spirit is backed into “Assembly Building #5” where she will live for 5-6 months!

Great Friends and IP 420 owners of TRUE NORTH, rented a car and met us at the factory! Hayden, Debi (aka BLONDIE) Dennis, Radeen and Bill Bolin Photo Credit: Captain Horace, friend and frequent crew on TRUE NORTH

Hayden and Radeen turn their yacht over to good friend and VP Bill Bolin Mission Completed…..we DID IT…..we trucked our yacht back to the factory for Refit !

Now, it is time to refine the work order list and the scope of jobs for our factory refit. We will take the summer off from boating and drive home to our house in PA.  In late Oct or early Nov, we will truck the boat back to the water for our third winter exploring the Bahamas.

Thank you Bill Bolin and Island Packet Yachts for taking on my factory refit program!

Please follow and like us: