TransAtlantic Day 15: Land HO!! How Did This Happen? One More Day.

There it is, Land Ho! Blobs emerge on the hazy horizon, and it’s so nice to see something out there that's not blue, lol!

So many people I love it my life have said such kind things about this adventure we’re on, asking how this happened?

How Did You Do That?

And I don't know, I think about the beginning when we started bare boat chartering. We'd be out for just a few days at a time, always within sight of land and stores and a restaurants and a nice mooring ball to make sure you’re safe at night. Then when we thought about open ocean sailing and passage making, it seemed overwhelming, even scary.

But when dreams are big, they pull you forward. We did our first overnight sail heading to Corsica from Sardinia. One night out. That was it. We had watches and did all the things you’re supposed to do for a legit passage.

Then we got our own boat, and needed to bring her from Florida to North Carolina. Now it was a 4 day offshore passage. We brought a delivery Captain, which helped us build confidence in our boat and in ourselves. Next there was a longer passage, but with another instructor captain coaching us. And now we’re doing the same thing, just more of it. Our little accomplishment became bigger by just doing it one more day, and one more day, and one more day.

It’s just like learning Amari, and all her systems. For example, I say that we learn our boat “one screw up at a time.” Something breaks and then we have to learn that particular system to fix it. Thank you Google, thank you YouTube. But at some point someone’s going to say, omg you know all these systems of your boat, how do you even do that?

By continuing. One more day.

The accomplishment is actually in continuing, not stopping, putting your head down and doing what needs to be done without getting so overwhelmed by the long term goal that you stop trying (or worse, never even start). So how do you cross an ocean? One nautical mile at a time.

Tales of a Galley Slave

Ugh the food. I was so uninspired tonight. In fact I was SO very uninspired that I couldn’t be bothered to take pics!! Can you imagine, lol?

We had leftover bell pepper, onion, squash and yes, MORE baby red potatoes. So this is very unsexy, but Dottie stir-fried the veg with oregano, salt and pepper. The potatoes were made just the same as before and I am so done with those spuds for the foreseeable future!

You know the whole “one more day” thing I just talked about? That so doesn’t apply to these potatoes.

I sliced the pork loin into medallions and tossed them in a pan. To Asian them up, they were seared in a makeshift teriyaki: sesame oil and soy sauce. But we also had some Chinese 5-spice that we normally put on fish.

In you go! Oh, then I thought I’d add some spice by plopping a dollop of harissa in the mix. So the meal was totally a fusion of sorts. “Hey we have to get rid of this, throw that in there.” Fusion? More like (con)fusion, lol.

In the end it actually turned out okay, just one more day of making it up as I go along. One more day of taking care of the people I love. One more day to be grateful for the gift of this life we live.

One more day.