We've been out of touch for a very long time. It has been a busy period for both of us, and we are both more than ready to get back to HAWK and settle into our normal cruising routine - as much as we can be said to have a routine!

We spent the winter with our families, and HAWK spent the winter in a shed at Canoe Cove about 20 miles north of Victoria on Vancouver Island. We both enjoyed catching up with friends and family for the first time since we left on HAWK in 1999. When we weren't socializing, both of us were busy with several winter projects. In addition to managing the refit, Evans put together a CD compilation of most of the articles we've written while we've been out on HAWK. He returned to oversee the last of the refit at the end of January and ended up doing a number of extra unexpected projects including replacing the windlass.

Beth put together a new slide show and presented that at Mystic Seaport and gave the original Following Seas show at New Bedford Whaling Museum and Peabody Essex Museum. She was able to meet up with many of you along the way and very much enjoyed being able to spend some time and catch up with your sailing and non-sailing adventures. After returning to HAWK in early March, Beth also did slide shows for the Vancouver and Victoria chapters of the Bluewater Cruising Association. When she wasn't presenting, Beth was writing. After three years, she FINALLY finished the revision of The Voyager's Handbook. The first two sections of the book have been entirely re-written and greatly expanded, and there are eight brand new chapters. The new book will be half again the size of the original. She also took the best of the columns that ran on the back page of Blue Water Sailing and put them together into a book to be titled Blue Horizons. Both books will be out in the fall, and Beth will be returning to the east coast to promote them at the Annapolis boat show and several other venues.

Over the winter, HAWK had an extensive refit and is now ready to do another 50,000 miles. We had the mast pulled and did a major rebuild on it, redid the hatches and replaced our hatchboards with a new, watertight Dutch door - expensive but a huge improvement both in terms of convenience and safety. In fact, HAWK's all set to head back to Chile, which just happens to be the long-range plan. In the short term, we intend to head north to explore the rich cruising ground between Vancouver Island and the British Columbia coast, an area that we missed by sailing down the west coast of the island last summer. Beyond that, our plans are still very fluid and will depend on Beth's promotion schedule for the new books. But we're thinking along the lines of the west coast of the US, Mexico, Polynesia and then south to Chile in time for the summer season of 2007/2008. After that? Stay tuned!

We apologize for being so out of touch over the winter and look forward to hearing from you over the next few weeks while we're still in the land of fast Internet connections. Please drop us a line and catch us up with your lives, and if you've sent us e-mails that we've been remiss in responding to, expect to hear from us soon. The next HAWK update you get will be about SAILING!

Fair winds,
Beth and Evans
s/v HAWK