1000 days at sea

Ben and I are considering living on a boat when we move to Monterey, CA. I spent a year and then summers living aboard Feather, a 38ft sloop, when I was a child/teenager, so sailboat-living feels like home to me. Ben spent a little bit of time on Feather too, and we spent a week on a couple sailboats up in the Great Lakes a couple years ago, so he's familiar with it, but I think it seems very novel to him still.
The main reason for considering this is the cost of living on the West coast, which everyone keeps telling us is horrendously expensive. If we play our cards right, we may be able to spend less by living aboard than living in an apartment (buying a house is prohibitively expensive) for two years. We are open to buying or renting a boat/slip; whatever seems to make the most sense once we've examined all the options. This could go nowhere, and we might end up living on land afterall, but we're definitely trying to think outside the box to eliminate some of our financial stressors.

So, for inspiration, we've been looking at boat listings, and googling all sorts of live-aboard situations. Amongst beautifully decorated houseboat interiors on Apartment Therapy, I found this website, 1000 days at Sea, the Mars Ocean Odyssey. It's immensely inspiring, fascinating, and a testament to how brave/strong/amazing humans CAN be when they put their minds to a task. Basically, this couple (now just the man because the woman got pregnant and went back to land to have the baby), is sailing in open ocean without coming to port and without restocking for 1000 days (nearly 3 yrs!). They (He) achieved this goal just 3 days ago, and is still out on the water til summertime. Here is a direct link to a nice description of their plan when they set out (where/why/how). And here is a link to their daily blog, starting at Day 1 (if you're reading it chronologically, you have to click "previous" instead of "next" to get to the next day, which is a little counterintuitive). Reading through this feels comfortable, exciting, and reminds me of why I love sailing, and it also reminds me of all the troubles/travails you have to deal with when the only person who can help is yourself. Of course, what they are undertaking is several orders of magnitude more intense than anything I've ever done (my longest ocean passages have only been ~60 hrs long), so I am learning lots and enjoying the insight into their explorers' minds. I recommend reading their blog, it's light reading--only a couple paragraphs per day--but gives very good insight into what their lives are like.

Soanya washing sprouts in the galley

Soanya and Reid in front of their bent bowsprit from colliding with a freighter one night. Doh.