Matt and I just spent a good part of our morning/afternoon “planning” our route when we take off next summer. We’ve come to learn that planning and sailing rarely go well together…
But we know we want to cruise the East coast of the U.S. while Matt is still working full-time with his current job. We want to hit some major historical locations, visit awesome museums, see the majestic islands in Maine, and generally be tourists in our own country before heading around the world. Knowing that we will move aboard next summer, and knowing when hurricane season is, and knowing when the seasons change, and knowing we want to have some idea of where we should be, when we should be there, and how long it will take, we made a very tentative, very flexible PLAN.
We went through three or four different scenarios before kind of definitely deciding this was probably the best route for our launch:
July 2016: Leave Port Aransas and head to Kemah/Houston/Galveston area. Not a big launch, but there are actually lots of museums and NASA and other cool stuff for kids to do there. We can finalize any stuff we still need to sell, purge, etc. like our vehicle. Spend July and first part of August in Houston area. HOTTEST PLACE ON EARTH DURING THE HOTTEST MONTHS ON EARTH. So it should be awesome!
August 2016: Gulf Crossing. We debated back and forth on whether we wanted to crawl along the intracoastal and hit New Orleans, and the beaches in Alabama and Florida, but we decided it would be hot and we’ve actually visited all of those cities before and there are bridges and locks to deal with, and blah, blah, blah… and so we decided to skip it and do a gulf crossing and head straight over to the Tampa area.
August – September 2016: We think we can spend a couple of months here… There are a ton of places to stay/do/see in Tampa/St. Petersburg: Clearwater, Longboat Key, Sarasota, Marco Island. Probably cruise along the coast through September, working our way south to the Florida Keys.
October – November 2016: Hurricane season will determine a lot of where we go/stay during this time, but if weather cooperates, we will sail south and visit the Keys. So that is our plan.
December 2016: We would like to jump from the Keys over to the Bahamas for a “vacation” at the beginning of December. With Matt working Monday-Friday while we are cruising in the U.S., I will be taking the boys out and about to see museums, go kayaking, swimming, visit libraries, homeschool, etc. during the week. We will need to get off the boat so Matt can work, but then that means Matt will miss out on lots of stuff we do… so having a vacation to the Bahamas will be a chance for all of us to spend time together. Plus it will be our first international adventure!
After a week or two in the Bahamas, we will sail back to Fort Lauderdale, where we can hop a flight back to Texas to visit family for the holidays. We will have been gone for six months, so it will be a nice chance to go “home” and see everyone.
At this point, the “plan” gets very rough and we just jotted down cities and things we definitely want to see/do with a basic timeline.
January – February 2017: We plan to make our way up the coast of Florida so that we end up in Jacksonville by end of February.
March 2017: Looking at Savannah, GA, Charleston, SC (following the weather/temperatures north as it warms.)
April 2017: We want to be in North Carolina by end of April ready to jump to Maine at the beginning of May.
May 2017: Offshore passage. We think it will take 7-10 days to make an offshore passage from North Carolina to Bar Harbor, Maine. We would like to land in Maine around mid-to-late May.
June 2017: Maine. We want to spend about six weeks touring islands in Maine before making our way to Portland, ME.
July 2017: Portsmouth to Boston. ish.
August 2017: Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, Connecticut
September 2017: NYC, around Cape May into Delaware Bay to make our way up to cross over into the Chesapeake.
October 2017: Maryland/Chesapeake Bay – Annapolis for Sailboat Show, and then DC area. We might haul out in the Chesapeake to get any work done before we leave the U.S. We might also make one more trip back to Texas while boat is hauled.
November 2017: Hurricane season will be over, so it would be a great time to head to the Caribbean, Yeah Mon! (But it will depend on $$ and sanity. But if we go in November, this would then be the official end of our “plan” because we have ZERO plans at the moment on where all we will go in the Caribbean, other than ALL OF IT.) However, based on our current rate of spending $$ on the boat, I’m going to guess we’ll instead follow plan B… which would be: Matt continues working a few more months and we sail the Hatteras Bypass along the Intracoastal from Norfolk, VA to Beaufort, NC.
December 2017: Keep trucking south… making our way to Jacksonville/St. Augustine area. Stopping anywhere we didn’t stop on our way north.
January 2018: Make our way down the coast of Florida.
February 2018: Final prep to boat in Fort Lauderdale.
March 2018: CARIBBEAN HERE WE COME!
Now that we have a general idea of where and when, we need to start looking more specifically at marinas, anchorages, towns/cities, museums, must-sees, etc. If you have any ideas for us, please PLEASE share them with us!
A few must-haves when choosing a marina/anchorage: 1) Wi-fi. Matt has to be able to work and reliable internet access is imperative. 2) Kid-friendly. We have boys. That do boy things. 3) Pet-friendly. We also have two dogs and a cat.
So excited to start this adventure!! (still need to get the boat from Florida to Texas. sigh.)
I bet that was a lot of fun putting the plan together and day dreaming about the incredible adventures you’re going to have!