One step closer...

We have had a lovely relaxing 2 weeks at Dylan's parents on Salt Spring Island (check out the view from their living room below!) being fed amazing food in large quantities. Xmas presents have equipped us with boat related items including a magellan GPS, cruising guides for the Caribbean, a germinator and solar showers. Gem (Dylan's Mum) has given me a cruising recipe book containing her old favourites and I have been using the time to test some out, with successful results!

Salt Spring Island is full of interesting characters and people who have jumped off the corporate treadmill, choosing instead to move to a slower laid back lifestyle, living on an island with like minded people. Hippies aside (and wowzer there are a lot of them), we need to get cracking on our Caribbean adventure.

After hours and hours of trawling through the internet with the help of Dylan's parents, we have come up with a short list of ten boats consisting of 3 Cabo Ricos, 3 O'Days, 2 Tartans, a Hood and an Amazon all between 34 and 40 foot and all in Florida. Flights have been booked to Miami for 4th January and we are now lining up the viewings. By the time all boats have been seen, we will be experts on the geography of Florida! The viewings are taking us from the northern town of St Augustine, all the way down through Titusville to the West coast towns of Sarasota and Fort Myers, ending up where we started in Miami.

Excited and slightly daunted at all that needs to be done pre and post boat purchase, we are under no illusion that there is going to be a helluva lot of work that needs to be done to get a boat ready to head to the Bahamas.