MissEmily

So the plan is to sail around the Caribbean seeing as much as possible, have the most amount of fun and take as long as I want doing it.
A few years ago I moved to Key Largo and took an internship with a dive company to become a scuba instructor, there were 4 of us in my class plus kids coming and going doing one course or another. We all lived in a house we called scuba house, 2 bedrooms 4 bunks in each room and they where always full. The course took 6 months but I stayed for a lot longer. Its a time in my life I will never forget, we all had such a good time, diving most days, working the boats and having a blast in the evenings, i'm still great friends with most of them. I think what i'm trying to do with Miss Emily is recreate that to some extent. I'm looking for a cool crew with a common interest, weather it be sailing, diving, fishing or exploring the islands, to stick around for a while, see this beautiful place, meet great people and share this amazing life I lead.

Ok your thinking of going sailing, lets break it down, there are a number of ways to get on the water.
Charter a yacht with or without a captain for an agreed lenght of time to go where you want when you want, weather permitting. This is a nice way to sail but also quite expensive.
Deliver a yacht is a good way to get experience, the captain is usually the only person to get paid for this. Crew may ride for free but are usually expected to split costs.
Work on a yacht as paid crew. There was a time not so long ago when crew jobs were easy to find, not so anymore. The money is great the hours are long and the captain and guests can be very demanding. Good publications are 'Dockwalk', Triton'.
Join a lonely old man cruising, hmmm!!! If you young and look great in a bikini and thats your thing.....

Cruising on Miss Emily is a life style and if I decide to take you on as crew you will find it is very relaxed, we move very slowly and can spend extended periods of time in one place, either waiting for spares or just because the place is beautiful, unlike holidays or backpacking where it can be a frenzy to get as much in as possible. Try not to come with a big itinerary, you will leave disappionted if we get caught in one place for a while. This is why we recommend you stay with us for at least 2 weeks. While onboard expect to have a lot of down time, I fill mine reading, fishing, diving, lobstering, exploring, beach combing, visiting with other cruisers, working on the boat, just a quick note here, I do not expect you to work on the boat other than your share of cooking and keeping the boat clean and in safe operating condition. Its like a little family onboard Miss Emily and as long as everyone is respectful of the boat and other people things work well. We also have 3 dinghies so getting off the boat and having a little alone time is not hard. We eat meals together for practical and social reasons
In the Bahamas where we are cruising at the moment everything is a day sail or less away, and I usually like to spend 3 or 4 days in one area all things being good. So in a week we may spend 16 hours under sail which is enough time to grasp the basics. Its a good idea to read what you can about sailing before you arrive and we do have reading material onboard and remember you will learn much just being on the boat. But if you want more sail time thats easy, stay longer.
I am a PADI scuba instructor (IDC staff) and am qualified to teach to the level of assistant instructor, so if you want to learn to dive or take your divemaster let me know. I have 2 sets of gear and 4 tanks but no compressor so filling the tanks can be a problem and at $10 per fill can get expensive.
So if your an active sociable person/couple, like the water, sailing or the idea of it, can survive without many creature comforts, reasonably layed back, can live in a very small space with others then maybe this is for you :D

20 USD per person per day includes everything EXCEPT food and drinks. We will do a food and drinking water shop when needed and split the cost evenly and we keep a kitty jar which everyone puts in an equal amount to buy incidentals like fresh produce and stuff we run out of. We are not a dry boat and you are welcome to bring your favorite rum or wine onboard, in fact we encourage it!! We are not vegetarians, we dont eat much meat but we do catch alot of lobster conch and fish.

ABSOLUTELY NO ILLEGAL DRUGS

Please understand that I am not doing this to make money, trust me i'm not gonna get rich on your $20. Every dollar I receive from crew goes back in to the boat and then some, just to give you an idea

$1500 bottom clean and paint every year
$1000 new dinghy
$180 new altinator
$450 replace aft stay
$1650 new outboard and dive gear when dinghy capsized

I was born in London in 1971 and grew up between cork, Ireland and England, you could say I had a misspent youth. I think I spent more time in snooker halls than I did in school. I started my own business at 18. At 22 I had two stores a warehouse 7 employees and lots of money. A combination of a bad relationship a recession and a friend heading to Thailand and I'd left England for good. It took me a few years and lots of different countries to blow through my cash. I was in Spain when it happened and I got a job washing dishes in a restaurant. within a week I was the cook. I've spent a lot of time in the states working in the bar/restaurant business. My last bar gig was running a club/lounge for a famous musician in Houston, Tx. But the vampire hours where getting a little much and a change was needed, so I moved back to the Florida Keys and became a PADI scuba instructor. Which is where I found my boat Miss Emily.
I became interested in sailing by chance, I was bar tending at a nice place in Miami back in 1999 and got talking to a guy about sailing and told him I'd always wanted to give it a try, well he turned out to be the commodore of the coconut grove sailing club. so i spent the summer racing in Biscayne bay and was hooked. Its funny how conversations at a bar lead to life altering changes for me. I ended up in Manhattan in a nice flat in Soho after hard selling a new vodka we were promoting to everyone in the place including the owner of the vodka label, I had no idea but he was impressed. Fortunately I'm not that good at sales and even worse at winters!!!
Well I sailed my boat to the Bahamas and kind of fell into the mega yacht business. Again at a bar I met the captain of a 116' motor yacht and he needed a deck hand for a few days, next thing I know I'm the chef and cooking 5 star meals for the rich and famous. The money is great but the hours are very long, its quite hard, especially now to find a good boat. I haven't worked on a yacht in 3 months and the marinas are empty.
So like I said I'm a sailor/freelance yacht chef/scuba instructor/bar manager/vodka salesman/dish washer... i'm laid back like to meet new peeps sail to beautiful islands catch lobster fish drink rum have fun cook good food take naps...........

Miss Emily is a 35' coronado sailboat, she is a center cockpit with lots of room bellow and on deck. She's a sloop rig, we have a new (ish) main sail, a gennoa, a 130 jib and a working jib on a roller furling. She has a yanmar diesel engine a small gasoline generator and a wind generator which charge the batteries.(solar panels coming soon). we have a large 12volt battery bank which runs most of the electrical items on board and an inverter which changes the batteries 12v into 110v so keeping things like ipods cameras and computers charged is no problem.
i bought her in the florida keys in 2004 and she needed alot of work. She spent 3 months out of the water while we finished the bottom (under the water line). then we went to work in the cabin putting in a new wood floor(cabin sole) and a new galley (kitchen), she's got a new stove with an oven so we can bake bread, I love to cook, and an under the counter fridge which makes ice for that cold cocktail or beer when the sun gets low in the sky, oh and it keeps the food cold!! there is 1 bathroom (head) with a shower and hot water, but we do have to be very careful with the amount of fresh water we use. In the forward cabin there is a double bed or 3 bunks depending on the need. in the main saloon is the dinning table and setee which converts into 2 bunks and the aft cabin is where I sleep. Up top in the cockpit is where we spend most of our time