Thanks for the welcome!

[Kelly]

I just got a voicemail welcoming our boat to the club – happy to be here. I’ve been “easing my family into sailing” since our oldest was born – so about 11 years now. I had just caught the sailing bug after crossing over from kite skiing. I joined a local sail club so I could get access to the clubhouse where my growing family could stay warm while I went out and played in the snow (I was feeling guilt over leaving them home all the time). One of the sailors urged me to go for a sail with him, which I declined. But the following spring I asked if he’d still be willing to “show me the ropes” and he did. I was hooked.

Not long after that I bought a Hobie Getaway which we had one family outing on. Three minutes after leaving shore the kids (then 4 and 1 years of age) thought “This must be the part where we jump around on the trampoline”. And they weren’t completely wrong. You see, whenever I came home from the lake I’d rinse the boat down and while doing so would let the girls jump around on the tramp. So naturally they thought that’s what you do on a boat.

The very next week we sold the Getaway and began the search for our Mac – which we found on the hard in the Crescent Beach Marina in the fall of 2014. After motoring for the first two seasons I raised the main for the family crew for the first time in 2017 and then in 2018 treated them to full sail outings. I started the process of rewiring the boat in the fall of 2019 which was interrupted by winter. And then, well, then 2020 happened. Thoughts of “finishing the wiring” were not top of mind. But they are now!

So why am I here?

I need the information you all possess if I hope to splash some salt water on our boat once again. My dream of dreams is to spend as much time on the boat as we can this summer (we’ve yet to have a family overnighter). The goal being ready to hook up and haul out to the Island next spring (2022). However, without knowing where to even launch the Mac I feel overwhelmingly not ready for coastal cruising with my family on board. I dream of the day I can slide into the slip at the Ganges Marina where I wrote (and passed) my CYA Basic and celebrate by taking the kids to the toy store in the village there.

We’ve got commitments that lock us to Alberta mid June through November but I was out there in April for my CYA and know gorgeous weather can be had even in advance of the summer. And in a couple of years we’ll have things in place that will enable us to sneak away for at least one 10-12 outing in the late summer. I’ve got a yearning for Desolation Sound.

So a big thank you in advance for all the wisdom I’m going to soak from you like a well tuned baling sponge! Good winds until we meet on the water…..

[Author]

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