Old mindsets, new friends

We've spent the weekend in Cape May and have had a marvelous time. After arriving on Friday after our all night sail, we took the day to relax and get caught up on a few things. Of course, we only managed to get to a few items on a list of projects that seems to grow daily. Just between sailing and my part-time consulting work and Kevin's online business, we wouldn't be bored--but on top of that, we're trying to get prepared for being truly away from home once we leave the Chesapeake in early October. Until that time, we've got access to our families, who are in PA and MD and our car, which Kevin will be retrieving from CT via train later this week. So I think both of us feel like there's a bit of a safety net--not to mention that we're still in US waters, making relatively short hauls (first overnight not withstanding). But once we start moving further south and getting in longer passages while getting closer to being out of the country, we really need to get our gear (life raft, repair kits, electronic charts) and our lives (insurance, mail forwarding, finances) more figured out. Or at least that's how I'm feeling at the current moment. It may be that I'm so used to having something (real or imagined) to be stressed about, that I'm having a bit of trouble shifting gears to a life less dictated by deadlines.


Of course, it's also difficult to get everything crossed off on the "to-do" list when there are so many other interesting things to do and people to meet. In just the past two days, we've enjoyed the company of three other cruising couples who are working their way south, just as we are, and planning to head down to the Caribbean for the winter. Before we left, I'd read a lot of first hand accounts that detailed how warm and welcoming the cruising community would be--and when friends and family would ask how Kevin and I felt about having just each other for company while traveling, I'd often refer to the books that I'd read and assured them that we'd meet tons of people everywhere we went. In the back of my mind however, I worried that it would be difficult to meet people and that we would feel lonely and isolated. I can happily report that our experience has been quite the opposite. From the moment we become live aboards at the marina in Stamford, we've seldom lacked for the company of others. Within the cruising world, there's a wonderful culture of striking up conversations with others at the docks or while dinghying by their boats--and usually that conversation turns into an invitation for drinks and the start of a new friendship. People are genuinely curious about our plans and in turn have wonderfully interesting stories to share about what brought them to sailing and their experiences aboard (and in case anyone thought our rocky experience at the Thimble Islands was unique, we have yet to meet a couple who hasn't introduced the bottom of their boat to a rock at some point!). It's been one of the best parts of our experience thus far--and I imagine it will continue to be as we head further south.