Featured Content
Why We Want to Sail
We traded a conventional life in Ottawa for the dream of raising our children aboard a sailboat — even though I had never sailed.
About Our Boat
SV Aphrodite is a St. Francis 50 catamaran — Hull #1 of an award-winning bluewater design. See her specs, equipment, and offshore features.
Long Reads: Galapagos
Volcanoes, sharks, penguins, sea lions, offshore fishing fleets, and a message in a bottle — the Galapagos is one of the most interesting and diverse places we have visited during…
Long Reads Grenada
A muddy hike, memory-making at Grenada Carnival, drama on a public bus, sailing passages from Trinidad to Grenada and Grenada to Haiti, and what happened when COVID-19 arrived in a…
Why the Caribbean has virtually no tides
Why Caribbean tides are tiny — and why Panama’s beaches can vanish at high tide.
Luperón Long Reads — Boat Kids Go Local
Joining a local school taught entirely in Spanish, learning baseball, making friends, and discovering how quickly the Luperon cruising community can rally when help is needed.
Luperón Long Reads — Designing and Building a Mooring for Our 50-foot Catamaran
A technical long read about how we built a three-point hurricane mooring.
Luperón Long Reads — Waiting Out Hurricane Season
A gritty, funny, and affectionate look at Luperón, Dominican Republic — from stray dogs and bureaucratic red tape to unexpected kindness, cruiser culture, and lunch with Bruce Van Sant.
Bahamas Long Reads — Exumas Stories
Isolated anchorages, tidal creeks, swimming pigs, dock drama, cruiser life, and an encounter with a wild dolphin.
Southern Bahamas Long Reads — Beyond the Exumas
New to sailing, our family navigates shallow reef cuts, spots nurse sharks and wild flamingos, and visits remote island communities in the southern Bahamas.
Latest Blog Posts
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VHF DSC radio: what everyone should know
I passed my VHF license today, which makes me the newest internet expert on the subject. Fair warning, my old technical-writer self is showing. Today’s lesson: respect the red Distress button.
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Antigua sailing where slow is pro
Slow is pro, the mantra I kept hearing in Antigua. This is a post about taking your time under sail, the central lesson from two days with Logan Knight, a Rasta instructor who knows these waters intimately.
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Preparing for a lifestyle change in six weeks
My time in Antigua is ending and I’m ready for home, missing the twins’ chickadee voices. Rick has sold most of our furniture, and I’m struggling to part with the bicycle that wrecks my shoulders.
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Gaining awareness on my best sailing day yet in Antigua
Personalized sailing instruction in Antigua, and my best day on the water yet. After finishing Competent Crew, I spent a day with a better-than-one-to-one crew and finally saw exactly what I needed to work on.
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Dinghy drama reaps rich rewards on Great Bird Island
The wind is howling as we prep for a swift sail from Great Bird Island. Yesterday we dinghied ashore under oars, no motor, per the RYA course, and it was not without drama when Julia leapt in among the rocks.
