Holy crap! In just a few days my wife and I will be moving into our 32 foot cabin cruiser for a whole year. Talk about shaking up your life! I expect nothing less than a life changing experience. Or maybe a life affirming experience. That would be cool.

“How does one prepare a 6,500 mile journey around the eastern United States?” you ask. Well for starters, take a year leave of absence from your job and save up a bunch of money. Easy peasy. Ya right! Easy my ass! It took us five years to get that done. After that, everything else was pretty painless. Oh, we did a few extra things to the boat, but nothing too major, a couple of new shelves, some grab-rails, new goodies for the engines, just stuff we probably would have gotten around to sooner or later. Because we’ve had her for 7 years, Ginger Lee is already set up for long cruising, which we do every Summer, but this is different. I suppose during a year-long cruise unexpected things could happen, but since there is no way to plan for that, there’s no sense in worrying about it.

Changing out the alternators.

New safety rail that runs the length of the salon.

New tranni oil coolers installed.

More solar panels installed on the hatch covers.

Our 5 solar panels make 13.9 volts and 11 amps! I like the pictogram of a happy battery. It frowns when there is not enough charge.

But ya know, I’m excited about this trip in spite of all its unknown factors. Why not shake it up for a while? I feel just like I did when I was a kid waiting for Christmas, worried that I might get hit by a bus before it all happens.
No! I’m not taking my usual morning walk through the woods. I’ll get Lyme’s disease from a deer tick for sure. I’ll just walk the streets and the beaches.
No! I won’t ride my bicycle on busy route 6. A hung-over driver will surely sideswipe me and knock me into the cranberry bogs where I’ll drown in a foot of water and never be seen again. I’ll just stay on the sidewalks and side streets.

Will the boat be ready? I think so. I mean, she’s floating; the engines start and run; the props turn; the electronics work. When you think about it, whatever problems come up will be handled where ever we happen to be, same as always, business as usual. Just the scenery will be different. Oh, there will be problems, I’m sure of it, but we’re not going to Siberia; we’re travelling the open waterways of the good ol’ U. S. of A., where there are plenty of enterprising people ready to make money from our misfortune. It’s the American way. Yup. If I can’t fix it myself, I’ll be paying big bucks to have somebody else fix it. I can accept that. At least we’ll be under way, and the Great Loop prep will finally be over.

Sporting my new buzz cut.