SAILING KOKORO

We left Porto on Thursday the 5th of August. Our estimated journey length was about 36 hours, but in the end we managed to make it from Porto to Cascais in a mere 25 hours. The Atlantic was almost as flat as glass for much of the journey, which meant we had to motor for a considerable chunk of it. The kids got their chance to steer when we let them switch the auto pilot off for a bit, more so our youngest son (Micah) as he's suddenly taken an interest in being more into this whole sailing thing than his brother is. The two of them are highly competitive, a characteristic that isn't always endearing as we have to bear the brunt of most of their loud and angry arguments that somehow require parental mediation.  Sigh.  Anyhoo...Main thing is, Micah is now very keen on sailing and knowing everything about how it works. Sasha's interest has somehow waned, mainly because he doesn't like wearing full gear just so he can sit outside, so honestly, its a comfort thing.  The decis...

When we departed the Netherlands, I bought enough dry goods to last three months, well, its what I did because that is what my husband suggested. Now I find we are sitting on so much pasta, wraps, beans and rice that I am trying to get creative with how I will make meals out of all that we are sitting on while also making the most of the fresh produce we find in various ports.  Fruit, beautiful as it can be, doesn't keep very well. So its best to eat soon after buying. Potatoes, much the same. You should only buy potatoes when you know you are gonna eat them soon, any longer and they start to sprout and sprouting brings with it the problem or raised anti-nutrient levels which can cause you to get digestive problems and more.  Vegetables that keep long aren't always on the kids "favourite" list, although, truth be told, broccoli seems to be the only vegetable that makes the cut for them. I have managed to get the kids to eat Chinese cabbage and mashed potatoes (somethi...

  This morning as I woke, it dawned on me that our lives have essentially changed rather permanently thanks to the pandemic. Sure, we lived through it, its not like we were sleepwalking, but I think it takes some time for reality to actually sink in, you know what I mean? I mean...my husband used to be a Pilot. Sure, technically, he literally still is a Pilot, someone with the skills necessary to be able to fly a plane, but he is not flying right now and may never fly again. That, once you really think about it, its just so tough to get ones head around. This sense of purpose, this concept of identity, for so long, it was wrapped up in flying...and suddenly, that simply isn't so any more.  For three years, I woke early, I worked in a kitchen, I ran errands, I did accounting, I created dishes and compiled menus, I did all the stock taking and ordering, I negotiated with suppliers, I trained staff and ran myself ragged...and then suddenly, I wasn't that person any more...and I...

Sometime before 2:00am on the 18th, our autopilot failed. This left Roman, our cheerful Polish Skipper, with the joyful task of hand steering in the pitch blackness of the Bay of Biscay where the depth drops off to 3000m, so deep that even our depth gauge showed a blank, unable to measure it as our boat pitched from side to side on the vast body of cold salt water.  I had woken just around 2:00am upon hearing a loud bang. I had been midst shallow sleep, it seems most sleeping on a boat underway is shallow, unlike the water you lay your head to rest on. I had been dreaming of going on a journey with friends, it was like a sleepover on a big old barge, and I was having the time of my life right up until the resounding "BOOM!" when we hit something, possibly a whale, I imagined.  Reality was not as dramatic, they had just jibed, when you cross the wind when its at your back, so the boom I heard, was the boom itself, shifting loudly from one side of the boat to the other! The boo...

(You will be able to see exactly where we are, in real time by clicking the link in this post)  Its a shame that Blogger doesn't offer a visual like they do with when you upload a Youtube video, but this is as good as it can be, if you are interested in checking on where we are located at any given time, being as we will update our blog once a week and that we won't always be within range of wifi, its still handy to know you can see where we are in the world when you click the link we are providing. Predict Wind is an app that we are paid subscribers to, so that is why we have the capability to share the link with you.  https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Kokoro   We hope you enjoy following our journey. Maybe save this link in your bookmarks if you don't want to keep searching for this post :)

Have you ever felt so frustrated at some point in your life that you want to cry? We've had many of those moments this past week.  Just this Thursday night, I watched my husband as he crumbled, his shoulders slumping as he sat on the floor by the encasing to the mast in the middle of the boat, swearing under his breath as he held back tears. He'd been cutting wires, stripping them, reattaching them, all in the hopes of getting our radar working. Our radar had been working when we motored across from the boat yard next door to our berth at Amsterdam Marina, but somehow it stopped working.  Not only was the radar not working, our VHF radio was not working either. Both had been working just a few days prior, so the only issue could have been when we put the mast back in and something went wrong with the wiring.  People have this idyllic view of sailing, you know, the ocean blue, the warm winds, the sunsets...you don't realize that every day its like a game of "Whack a Mo...

As I sit here, unsure of where to begin, we are comfortable in a mooring in Amsterdam Marina. Its chilly but not unbearable, despite it being early July. There is condensation on every single window panel, or maybe its rain, Dutch weather never ceases to amaze me. You can have all four seasons in the span of an hour! I mean it! A few months back, I recall seeing a beautiful sunny day suddenly turn to rain, and from rain to snow, and from snow to hail...only to end in a rainbow of a day. We are in Amsterdam as we prepare for what we are telling ourselves will be the adventure of our lifetime. In all honesty, I am scared to the core. I am scared of the unknown. I am an anxious person, always have been, and this morning, I woke up with my salivary glands working overtime, I was so sure I was going to throw up! Have you experienced that feeling? When you feel nauseous, and you are stuck somewhere you don't want to be sick in, like a car (think of car sickness) or a plane (more of the s...