The Edge Of Madness

I've been wanting to do a RTW on a bike for a while. The problem being that Lana can't sit on the back because of her knees. And she was totally fine with me doing it solo or with someone else, but I can't bring myself to disappear for 2 odd years and spend a bucket of cash on it.

Doing it in a car just doesn't appeal to me in the slightest. Don't know why.

With my laziness in regards to traveling normally, you might be asking why would you do an RTW? I really enjoy the random touring on a bike. I just hate weekend trips. Same amount of packing as if you'd do a rtw, you run around like a mad dog trying to do everything. I like the more chilled randomness of touring.

So now we're looking at getting a sail boat and doing a RTW on that.

This is raising a few issues.

Starting with the personal.

Firstly, neither of us can sail. I've boated erratically, but last time on a sail boat was 10 years ago.

Secondly, neither of us are rather good swimmers.

With the sailing, if we assume we kick off this adventure in 3 or so years time, enough time to get some lessons and practice in. A weekend intro course is around £200, spending the night on a boat. Bunch more lessons easy enough. Then hire a boat to do some solo sailing around the med. Maybe crewing for a few weeks to get some additional practice in. Or hiring an experienced skipper for a few days just to make sure we don't get into trouble.

In regards to the swimming bit. It's not really a huge issue. Packing an aqualung on board for emergency repairs will be good enough.

Now onto the other stuff. I have been reading and doing some research. All this is in very early exploratory phase. We need to get the lessons in first to see if we enjoy it, and can handle it.

Pirates. After investigating attacks on sailing yachts, the numbers are fairly small. Leaving out arden/somalia, there were about a dozen reported cases last year. And 90% of these were muggings/robberies than pirates. So my stress factor on that went down. It's enough to be slightly worried about it, without going paranoid.

Boredom. But then after a few lessons, a week around the med sea, we should work this out.

24 hour watches. So assume it's just me and Lana. That means while sailing you need a 24 hour watch. Solo sailors normally wake up every 15 minutes to check everything is fine. But checking up on this, a 4 hour watch at night, and a few naps during the day cover it.

Cost. The boat costs the most obviously. Around £50k will get a sweet 40 foot boat. Cost per year of sailing, including maint, is around £20k. So assume 3 years, we're looking at £110k. Doable. Plus at the end we've still got the boat.

Solo or with others. Undecided on this. If we get a boat with 4 berths, it does mean if we want we can pick up hitchhikers. Prob will help with duties and such. And help with me not strangling Lana.

Internet. They have satellite laptops now, which are meant to work anywhere in the world.

Captain. There can only be one in charge on the boat. But we're going to decide this after we do some lessons and see who is better at the sailing bit.

All in all, yet another option we're exploring. Next month we'll prob do the weekend course and see how that goes. Then wait until the warmer months before doing anything more on it.

There is a shit load to learn though.