What lies before us and what lies beyond us
is tiny compared to what lies within us.

-Henry David Thoreau-

I hate sailing!

I don't like sailing. Sailing is very uncomfortable. The boat is in constant motion, making the simplest of tasks difficult and slow. If the wind picks up to any more than 15kn, things start falling on the floor.

Sure, I'm supposed to keep everything in its place, but being human, I don't always remember that I poured myself a glass of wine and left it on the saloon table, or that the plastic stock powder

container serving as an ashtray didn't have its lid on when it hit the floor. It's no fun when my friends, who initially thought that sailing was great, are all seasick, refusing to cook lunch and asking me about the next port.

'Good winds and beautiful weather' actually means tons of saltwater stinging on a sunburnt skin.

I also hate angle grinders, sandpaper, paint and hose clamps.

I get no pleasure whatsoever in mixing epoxy to fix a leak in a plastic water tank. Finding out why the bloody engine doesn't start is no thrill either.

What I do enjoy is being secured in a calm anchorage, lying in my hammock with a cold beer. (If the bloody fridge would just keep running!)

I enjoy relaxing on the fore deck playing my guitar. I take a lot of pleasure leading a lady in the aft cabin for a calm night of... well, eventually sleep. No doubt, my best moments on board are when I'm not sailing. And when a bar and a supermarket are less than 15 minutes away.

Why on earth do I live on the water then? Why in the world do I declare that on 31 July 2004 I will take my yacht around the world? Why do I want to fill my life with inconvenience?

Because a trip to Fitzroy Island with my stove, BBQ, fridge, double bed, toilet, 60 books, stereo, a carton of beer, food for a week and six pillows would be a mission impossible without my own boat.

Because I could not afford the excess luggage charges whilst traveling the world and dragging the entire house with me. Because every day forces me to learn something new. Because after rain comes sunshine, after the storm comes calm and after a passage comes a port. And because all those glorious moments could not be had without some sailing in between.

Don't get me wrong; I don't feel that life was meant to be difficult. I feel that life was meant to be an adventure, but whether racing or cruising, no-body enjoys being tired, wet, cold and bruised. I challenge anyone who tells me they enjoy doing 15 minutes of gymnastics just to make - and then spill - a cup of coffee.

While the times in ports and anchorages can be very pleasant, what really makes me the richest person in the world is the adventure. As for the inconvenience, an inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered, while an adventure is an inconvenience rightly considered. So come on heavy seas, leaking hoses, ripped sails and broken engines. Give me more inconvenience! I love it.

I hate cruising articles!

Hundreds of cruising yachts sail around the world every year. Many of them complement their income by writing to a cruising magazine. Most of the writings are boring to read. I really don't want to know how many knots of wind they had and how many fish they caught. They all have all sorts of winds and they all catch fish. Everyone knows that sometimes wind blows hard and sometimes not. They all pull up anchors and they all arrive somewhere to anchor up again. Information about anchorages and winds belongs to cruising guides and pilot books as a reference, it doesn't make good reading.

Right now I don't have much to write about. Yet. I don't want to bore you with my pathetic little battles in fitting the boat out and preparing for a trip. All that stuff is all too familiar for those who have done it themselves, and irrelevant to others. It is the game that holds the excitement, not the practice and preparation.

All men dream, but not equally.
Those who dream by night, in the dusty recesses of their minds,
wake in the day to find that it was vanity.
But the dreamers of the day are dangerous men,
for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.

- T.E. Lawrence -

My departure date is 31 July 2004. I have lived on board Aliisa for about six years. When I bought the boat in February 1998, I had been dreaming about sailing around the world for some two or three years. My plan was to get the yacht ready for a departure by July 1999 and be in Caribbean by January 2000. Little did I know about the expenses involved and the fears and other reasons that keeps a captain firmly in his home port.

My world cruise in 1999 was postponed until 2001 and then reduced to a two-month cruise to Papua New Guinea. After the events of that cruise, it was time to chill out and re-evaluate what I really want from life. Now the decision has been made and the date has been set. The date (and the link to the future) is in:

Cairns harbour is dotted with a hundred dreams of cruising. Some go, some stay. Others come and go. Some give up and sell. Some are quite content to just be here. My yacht has been in this harbour for five years. The weight of my dreams of leaving is nearly sinking the boat.