Long Overdue Update

I have received a flurry of emails from friends and readers that have wondered what the heck happened to us...
Did we quit cruising?
Are we okay?
Did we sell the boat or move back to the US?
Are Jim and I still married?
Did the kids finally kill each other because of living in such a small space?

Well, yes and no.

We did lose someone...
but not to death or divorce.

December 2008: Tim holding his 45 lb. Yellow Fin tuna

We are living in La Paz, Mexico aboard Hotspur. We're not exactly "cruising" anymore - once you decide to stay put for a spell - longer than a year - it is hard to call it cruising.
But when you're a full-time cruiser there are times you make the choice to put on the brakes and stop for a while (meaning whether or not you're moving around, your boat is your home and you will eventually pick up the anchor and go some place else).
Maybe you stop because you love a place so much that you want to enjoy it a little while longer.
Maybe you need to feed the cruising kitty and you found some work opportunities.
Or maybe your boat kid(s) need something different.

Boat chores: covering the mainsail

Moreover, our "cruising-pause" was decided so that our 17 year old teenager could figure out what options he had for the future. And moving around seemed to disrupt that. And so,
LA PAZ... or "The Peace"... what a perfect place for us to stop and reflect -  and look forward to - and discuss - and take a break from the gypsy sea life so that we could help our son make some decisions.

And so...what do you want to do when you grow up?

Who really knows what they want to do when they grow up?
All we can do is give our children the tools to forge their way and hope we have taught them how to think, how to survive and how to be happy. So, we arrived in La Paz and tossed our 12 year old (now 13) into an all Spanish speaking school. Sink or swim philosophy.

Summer 2009: Tim's catch of the day in the Sea of Cortez

Unfortunately, we could not get Tim into public school here and I tried and tried (lots and lots of bureaucratic red, white and green tape) - so we oozed our son back into some kind of 'normal' - a community format that allowed him lots of free time away from his family and off the boat. And, he got himself some experience working with other people. And he met lots of young adults. And he studied his Spanish. And he agreed to study for and take the GED -
which he passed just this past February and scored in the top 1%!
And yes, we had to fly him to the US to register for the exam and take it. No online options for the GED.

Friends at The Shack - La Paz, MX

Our son has officially graduated from high school!! Yay Tim!!

And while I was in the midst of planning his graduation party, the little turkey made a grown-up decision...
almost 3 weeks ago, Tim moved back to the USA to go to college.

It had to happen some time and we were expecting some thing somewhere along the way-
but it has been a surprisingly sad loss to have our son go so far away. And yet a very exciting adventure of a different sort for him.

April 2013: Tim - college bound!

Tim saying good-bye to his sister

So the Hotspur crew is down to 3 crew members. And we are planning to go somewhere between December 2013 - March 2014. We have discussed the South Pacific. We have pondered Panama. Jim mentioned the Caribbean just this evening. Heck, I don't know where we'll go, but we're going! And Jim keeps asking me, "So... what do you want to do when you grow up?"

And next week I'll share some tidbits about what Carolyne has been doing.