Author Archives: Wally

Repositioning Cruise Day 2 – April 9 – At Sea

April 9 – 9:00am ADST
Present Position: At Sea

25°59′14″ N 76°2′21″ W

Above is a photo of the Fort Lauderdale skyline at sunset as we were headed out to sea. Red sky at night sailor’s delight! Hopefully this will continue 🙂

Woke up at 7 this morning & headed to the buffet for an early breakfast. No land in sight in any direction & I was a bit concerned that other passengers might get worried about a limited food supply & start eating to calm themselves. Thankfully most were still asleep, no doubt recovering from yesterday’s hectic pace.

The weather this morning is beautiful & the sea is calm. Last night’s passage was so smooth that when I woke up a few times I could not even tell if we were moving. We are far enough north & east now that the ship’s time has moved ahead 1 hour to Atlantic DST.

I attended a lecture this morning about the history of the Atlantic Ocean & its influence on the world over the centuries. The speaker is from Canada & he will be giving a talk on a different subject each day. He was pretty good so I’ll add these lectures to my routine!

Time to get moving again, it’s only an hour until lunch.

Here’s some travel minutiae for anyone that may be interested in this kind of stuff:

– Ship’s Heading: 074 degrees
– Distance Traveled So Far: 246 Nautical Miles
– Ship’s Speed: 17.6 knots
– Wind Speed: 11 knots
– Apparent Wind Speed: 30 knots
– Sea Depth: 15,500 feet
– Weather: Sunny & 22 degrees C

Cheers!

The Repositioning Cruise Begins! Day 1 – April 8

April 8 – 2:00pm EDST
Port Everglades Cruise Terminal

26°5′52″ N 80°7′12″ W

I boarded the Crown Princess (shown above) in Fort Lauderdale about 12 noon today – along with about 3,000 of my new best friends 🙂

Here’s a view of the waterway where the ship is now docked – taken from my balcony cabin (L201) on the Lido Deck. It’s a long way down!

We set sail for England at about 7:00pm tonight. As soon as I got aboard I noted that there were already long lineups at the buffet restaurants. I hope we have enough food on board to make the crossing.

The crossing will take 14 days with a few stops along the way.

Sadly, Catherine is not on the trip with me. She has no interest in crossing the ocean on the water, but it’s been a “bucket list” wish of mine for several years, so away I go & there will be a reunion at the end of my journey. Thanks for the support honey!

Catherine & I are going to meet up at Heathrow Airport on April 22 & spend about 12 days self-guided touring around Bath, Oxford & London. Should be a lot of fun & I will have to do some extra walking to try & shed the extra weight I am probably going to pick up on the way over!

I hope to post some short blog entries while I am crossing. Each time I post I will include the ship’s longitude & latitude. If you copy & paste that information into Google Maps you will be able to see the ship’s position at that particular time.

Better go for now. It’s only a couple of hours before the ship sails & I see that the lineup at the buffet is much shorter now.

Cheers everyone!

Wally

A New Adventure Begins!

When we sold Ananda last fall I was not sure what our future held for us – with respect to boating. I had contemplated spending a year or two without owning a boat and trying some more vacation charters instead.

It’s been a long winter so I spent some time on the internet looking at boats for sale – just in case I found something interesting.  I was not planning to buy anything, I just wanted to see what was out there and to learn more about the type of boat that I might buy sometime in the future ;). I was most interested in a single engine, double cabin trawler that had no (or very little) exterior teak.

Well, the future was a lot closer than I thought! Here’s a photo of the newest member of our “boating family”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This boat is a 1993 Marine Trader Aft Cabin Trawler (“the Trader”). She’s 34 feet long and has a single 6-cylinder diesel engine.  She is currently named “Scott Free V”. Apparently the original owner’s last name is Scott & he wanted to associate the boat with his surname.

To make a long story short, I found the Trader on Yachtworld. She was berthed in Jacksonville, FL. I called the listing broker and had a good long discussion with him about the boat. With that information in hand, I had a long conversation with Catherine (read: me pleading) and we agreed that I should go and take a look at the boat.

I went to Jacksonville this past Sunday, had a close look at the boat on Monday and made a conditional offer – based on a satisfactory survey. The survey was conducted the same day & did not reveal anything that caused me to lose interest in the boat so the purchase transaction continued and it finally closed yesterday.

What Happens Next?

Even before we found the Trader we had a lot planned for April, May and June. Now I will have to find a way to squeeze in a little trip home for it :).  I have always wanted to travel to Florida via the Erie Barge Canal, Hudson River and the Inter Coastal Waterway and am quite happy to have the opportunity to do the trip in reverse!

We are storing the Trader in Jacksonville for April and May and then I will begin the trek home in June. That gives me lots of time to plan the trip and equip the boat with the stuff we will need on the journey. Stay tuned for future updates!

Cheers everyone!

 

 

Homeward Bound

Wednesday, October 5

Sadly, today is the day we head home. We’ve been gone almost 3 weeks. In some ways it feels like we have been away for twice as long, yet in other ways it seems like we just arrived in the UK a few days ago.

We’ve had a great holiday & made a lot of memories that will last us a lifetime. It may take me that long to sort through all of he photos we took. If we invite you over to see some “slides” of our trip you’d better bring your pajamas ’cause it might take a few hours to get through them all.

We took a commuter flight from Edinburgh to Amsterdam. More photo ops! We’re tired but happy.

I’m not exactly certain of our route but I believe the photo below is of the eastern shoreline of Southern England in the Flamborough / Bridlington area as we were getting ready to fly across the English Channel. We hope that someday we can take a driving tour around the perimeter of the county. But this is the last time we’ll see the UK for a while.

One last thing before we “sign off”. Catherine & I both really enjoy watching the TV show “Rick Steves Europe” on PBS. On our last few trips we have purchased his guidebooks for the areas we have travelled to. These books are excellent! The information they provided added so much to what we got out of our trips. If you are planning a trip I recommend you take his guidebook along with you.

Looking forward to catching up with you soon!

Now it’s back to “auld claes & porridge” for us. This is an old Scots saying meaning old clothes & porridge – the holiday is over, now it’s time to go back to work & everyday life.

Cheers everyone!

Edinburgh Day 3

Tuesday, October 4

We got up early & walked up to the castle, hoping to beat the crowds. It turned out that a few thousand other people had the same idea 🙁

The original parts of the castle were built over 1300 years ago and through the centuries it has been renovated & expanded numerous times.

We joined a guided tour of the grounds. The guide was excellent & had so much historical information, facts & figures to share that it left our heads spinning.

The views of Edinburgh from the castle walls are spectacular.

We toured the great hall & saw the Crown Jewels of Scotland. Unfortunately no photographs were allowed in the main room.

After braving the crowds at the castle we got back on the Hop On/Hop Off bus & toured the “New Town” part of the city. This area is full of beautiful Georgian style buildings & has broad streets & numerous parks. It has a much different atmosphere compared to the Old Town part of the city where we were staying.

We even found some time to do some shopping in Jenners, a classy department store just a few steps away from the Sir Walter Scott monument.

It was a treat just to walk around inside the store.

On the way back to our hotel we stopped by the Writer’s Museum of Edinburgh for a visit but nobody was home. Maybe next time.

Cheers!