There comes a time in every adventure when it changes from being just a hare-brained scheme into something very real. A kind of water shed moment, the point of no return … like handing the boss your resignation letter. I gather those moments arrive at different times for different people.

For instance, when I did a bungy jump, I was absolutely fine walking out on that bridge, I was fine with being trussed up like a chicken for roasting and attached to a giant rubber band, I was fine with shuffling out to the edge of the platform and looking down at the river far, far below. I was even fine with the concept of leaping off a perfectly safe and secure platform and hurtling through space. My “oh shit” moment came when my feet were about 2 inches off the platform after I’d actually jumped. That was when my (admittedly slow) thought processes suddenly realised that this mad idea wasn’t just an abstract concept anymore and that my body was stupidly going through with it, while my brain was quite desperately searching for the escape hatch in an effort to avoid this madness.

The whole concept of sailing our yacht offshore is, in theory, quite an achievable adventure. We’ve had a few things to do to make it happen and we’ve quietly and deliberately set about doing those things. There have been some major milestones along the way – selling the house, selling the cars, etc. There have been some terribly sad moments as well as some tremendously fun ones. Frustrations, learning, triumph and laughter, all of it necessary. But all in all, sailing away to tropical islands has been a concept for me … an escape from reality maybe, a mid-life crisis, a sustained moment of madness but an abstract idea that isn’t quite real.

Yesterday, we dropped the docklines at our marina berth in Gulf Harbour and headed north overnight to the Bay of Islands to do our final preparations before leaving New Zealand to sail to Tonga. I was fine with getting the boat ready to go for a sail, I was fine with the passage plan, I was absolutely OK with the whole thing …. Right up until the point where was said goodbye to some good friends who saw us off, dropped those docklines and backed out of the slip.

That was my “oh shit, this is really happening” moment. We’re not actually leaving NZ for a few weeks yet, but this shit is definitely getting real.