Bands go on the road; mom/artist types with a kid in tow usually do not. But I sorely needed to look at life from a different vantage point, and to reconnect with beau and babe in a not so 9-to-5 way. So we cut through all of the excuses not to, and went off adventuring.There was, of course, a year of planning and waiting while the mountain of anchors and spare tires and expired safety flares grew in the garage. But on a rainy, windy November day we hitched FIG, our 15′ skiff, behind IDA, our unpredictable ’69 Chevy van, and rolled away from Seattle, headed for Mexican skies and the Sea of Cortez. The windshield wipers quit about an hour into the rainstorm. But, hey, we were going to Mexico, so a little Rainex and we carried on. On our way south we killed off our Seattle mossyness with some climbing in the boulders of Lone Pine, California, at the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains. Our boat generated many strange glances in the high country.
Joe Talbert
Read this article now for Free!
Ready for a second free article? Create a free account by entering your email address and a password below.
— OR —
Subscribe now for $29.99 a year and have immediate access to all of our content, including hundreds of small-boat profiles, gear reviews and techniques, adventure stories, and more! You can also browse our entire archive of back issues starting from September 2014, as well as post unlimited classified ads. This is an extraordinary value!
Wonderful. wonderful story. A beautiful adventure in a lovely little boat. And you will love your Oughtred yawl, for those boats are real champs. I too adore the spritsail, and would not have anything else on a boat under about 23-25 feet. Thank you so much for sharing this story.
Thanks so much for sharing your story and your wonderful sketches/paintings and photographs. What a super experience for Ely—the three of you will never forget it. I hope you have experiences in your yawl that are as wonderful. What will you call her? I look forward to the next installment and the building of the yawl.
Thanks for this. I enjoyed the story, and the illustrations add a dimension that photos can’t match. Baja is on my list of “someday” sailing destinations.