Approaching a milestone….of sorts

Offshore Sunrise
Offshore Sunrise

 

As we approach the end of our first year as an official blog I have become curious about how many visitors we have had to our little site.  As many of you who know me personally are aware, I can be somewhat technologically challenged. This hasn’t been an easy learning curve for me and I’m certain that I am missing out on a lot of blogging shortcuts and probably money making angles in this whole venture.  I had hoped our Google ads program would have been more successful, but maybe that will come in the future.  Kim mentioned that the ads don’t seem to show up in the posts when she views them on her iPhone? If anyone else isn’t seeing them, please let us know and let us know what device you are using.

That was in part, responsible for my curiousity about where we stood visitor-wise.  I had hoped that the ads would have generated more income or maybe the services we offer might have generated more, by this point.  So, I thought “maybe we aren’t getting enough visitors?”.  It took me about an hour but I finally figured out how to wring the numbers out of the tracking programs that watch our blog 24/7.  I was pleasantly surprised to learn that we have had……drumroll please….over 1800 visitors to our blog!!!!! 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉

Now, before we get too worked up…..a “visitor” can be the same person who visits more than once but, a little more digging, and I learned we have also had 969 unique IP addresses, which means almost 1,000 different people (or at least devices) have seen our blog….and that’s pretty exciting…..or maybe one person who travels…..a lot…or owns a LOT of routers ……haha.

This data has somewhat buoyed my optimism.  Since we don’t spend a lot of time in the same place it can be tough to get repeat marine services business so we are counting on the ads program to a large extent.  Doing the simple things like cleaning boat hulls or replacing zincs in the water is a pretty saturated market anywhere we arrive and advertising outside the blog in each place isn’t feasible.   I have received a few calls for repeat business, but unfortunately, we had moved on when the customer need had arisen again or for a new service.

I’d like to thank everyone who has visited and supported us in this last nine months and I hope we can continue to post things you find interesting…..please feel free to send us suggestions of any topics or photos you’d like to see.  I am considering adding marina reviews to the rotation of posts or maybe even restaurant or location reviews of areas we visit if that might be of interest?

Thanks again for all the support!!!

Our first successful boat purchase consultation…..!!

I am pleased to announce that after some time consulting with someone who was considering living aboard and been looking for a liveaboard sailboat that a purchase has occurred !!!

In the interest of their privacy, I won’t name this person outright.  I can say that they are one of our very best friends and that they have appeared in our blog.

And this is their new boat !!

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I edited the name of the boat out of the photo, since, it wouldn’t do much good to not name them but then leave the name of the boat visible ….😝….I’m sure there is a renaming ceremony in the not too distant future, though.

I found this particular boat by coincidence while recently visiting with our friend while we were drinking coffee one morning.  I was browsing online for the model of boat they liked.  As it turned out, the boat was only about ten miles from their house!!

The boat is an Island Packet 350….a great design and this one was apparently owned by someone who was amazingly meticulous and had a great eye for detail.  We had only spent about ten minutes on the boat and I could already tell that this was the one for our friend.  A full survey confirmed my suspicions that the boat was in fantastic shape and ready to go sailing.  She’s scheduled for a bottom job in January and then our friend is planning to make the transition to living aboard over the next few months.

Congratulations to……well,….you know who you are ……haha

If we can do it, you can do it…..but we all need a little help sometimes

The road so far……

It has been 24 years since my first trip on a sailboat of any type. My first was a group charter trip on a 1979 Solaris catamaran on a ten day trip to the Bahamas.  That one experience has influenced the course of the remainder of my life as I am sure it does for many, many people.  My wife and I have spent the last 15 years researching, touring, inspecting and sailing on as many sailboats and with as many people as we could find to expand our knowledge base and to eventually live on board our own sailboat.

We spent many years hitting the Annapolis Sailboat Show.  We quickly realized that our boat was probably on display there, but long before we started to attend those shows.  Initially, we had hoped to buy a 5 to 10 year old catamaran in the 42 to 44 foot range, which would have cost us in excess $250k.  We wanted to live aboard and sail sooner, rather than later, so we decided to keep our initial investment under $150,000.  In an effort to find an affordable, well maintained vessel we drove the East coast of the U.S. around the tip of Florida and then North up the Gulf Coast on more than one occasion touring every boat we thought was remotely suitable.

We decided that a blog in conjunction with a sailboat cruising and selection consulting service would be the best way to incorporate our love of boats and sailing into our everyday life.

 

We hope to assist others interested in the cruising lifestyle in these areas:

A small selection of marine services…hull cleaning, painting, light maintenance, wiring and sometimes just providing an extra set of moderately skilled hands at a very affordable price.

A journal of our experiences, failures, successes and issues during our search and transition to life afloat

A candid discussion of the boats you are currently considering; design, construction quality, seaworthiness, safety, speed and comfort along with resources for research

Answers regarding suitability of various designs

Analysis of your total overall cost of ownership: purchase, refit, outfitting, maintenance and resale value

Additional boats for you to review based on your cruising plans, itemized lists of criteria for your new floating home based on your desires

Evaluation and forwarding of listing and selling prices of comparable vessels utilizing information from various sources and personal experiences

Referral to a qualified local marine surveyor

An in depth review of your individual survey with detailed recommendations for post-survey price negotiations

Evaluation of equipment needed for offshore passage making

Advice for choosing USCG documentation or state registration, offshore flagging and/or tax implications

Recommendations for insurance coverage

Gear tests and real world performance

Thanks for visiting and if we can be of assistance please contact us for advice!!

Capt. Brett and Admiral Kim…..