We are baaack! Well on the internet anyway. I hope everyone will understand that keeping our blog up to date took a back seat in our life after some family issues brought me back to the States for the month of April. Our blog continued to stay on the back burner as boat issues kept us in port for the month of May in Puerto Rico. In June, we were back in the States for our annual six week trip. The flurry of visits with family and friends, and the usual cycle of doctor, dentist, veterinary and optical visits kept us hopping.

So you ask, why are you posting this at the end of July from Cheyenne Wyoming? The answer is as simple as it is annoying. With less than two weeks until our return to Puerto Rico, Barry’s doctor called to say his thyroid was super, super low and he needed to be on medication, but then refused to prescribe the medication unless he was going to be in the area for a minimum of a month (up to three months). Given that a low thyroid is not immediately life threatening, I would think the doctor could have prescribed the meds with the instruction for Barry to follow up once we were back in the Caribbean, but no. We were extremely lucky to secure a spot in Puerto del Rey’s marina yard with hurricane tie-downs. The contract for the spot was for a minimum of four months. This turned out to be just as well since it is looking like the soonest we could have gotten out of here will be mid August (they are still tweaking the dosage of Barry’s thyroid medication) and realistically it would have been closer to September before we could be heading south – not the best time to be sailing during hurricane season.

It has been an interesting few months so far – I think the realities of the cruising lifestyle have affected us much more this year than last. Starting with being pretty far away from family when they need you. Fortunately, the family issues that brought me home in April were not catastrophic, but I felt strongly that I needed to be home and feel that having to stay longer has been a blessing to be here to support my family when they needed it most. I think for women (more than men) we feel the push-pull of family more and tend to stress a lot about whether we are making the right decisions living the cruising life. For me, having the extra time here has helped give me some much needed perspective. It has also made me examine what I really want out of the cruising life much more closely, weighing the pros and cons learned during the last nearly two years – things you can only learn and see clearly through experience. In the end, we absolutely love cruising and are committed to living the lifestyle more than ever! We still have some questions that need answers like what is the right balance of time split between home and the boat, how far afield should we travel, should we cross oceans, should we try circumnavigating? Only time will tell what the answers will be and we are okay with that. I think we are a bit odd, unlike most people we have no problem starting and moving forward in an endeavor without everything mapped out in advance.

So what do two cruisers do when stuck on dry land for five months?!? The answer is plenty! Stay tuned for some pretty fun blog posts. Here are a few in the works right now: ‘Sensory Overload – Holy Cow Did You See That’, ‘The Art of Being Homeless’, ‘Summer Camp For Smart Move’, ‘Our Alaskan Adventure Aboard HAL’s Zuiderdam Cruise Liner’. I’m also reviving Fun Facts Friday since I no longer have the excuse of bad to no wifi. Look for: ‘What Do You Call A Group Of Oysters’ and ‘Teslas – Oh La La’. WARNING not all Fun Fact Fridays will be sailing related.

Thanks for checking back in on us.
Robyn and Barry