Getting Ready

Well, making a drastic change to our living arrangements means lots of things to take care of. 

We’ve decided not to sell our house.  We’re going to rent it, furnished.  That way, we can keep (and store) our furniture in the house and charge a bit more for rent.  So we have to find a tenant.

Even though we’re renting the house furnished, we still have to pack up and store our personal effects that we will not be taking with us.  Our winter clothes, for example.  We have limited storage on the boat, so we’re only taking the bare minimum with us. 

We have to cancel our phone plans, change addresses on all our mail, arrange for out of country medical coverage, etc., etc.

And, it’s breaking my heart, but I have to find new homes for both of my cats.  The tenants in the basement have agreed to take Archie.  Now I just have to find a home for Pig Pen.  I’d really like to keep them together, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.

We’ve been to the government to start the process of registering the boat.  This is where we finalize the name of the boat.  The official did a quick search for us and says we cannot use the name “The Vortex”.  Apparently, it belongs to a very old boat.  He said he could petition to get it deleted, but it has lots of problem surrounding it, so it best to just leave it.  Our second choice is “In the Vortex”.  We’ll have to wait and see if we can have that name.

Lots to do to get her registered.  We need all kinds of photos and measurements.  So we’ve had to get our broker to go get the pictures we’re missing and to get some additional measurements.  Funny how US and Canada have different requirements.

And another little glitch; as it turns out, in order to totally avoid both Canadian HST and US Personal Property Tax, we cannot have her listed on the roster of any US marina when the yearly inventory is checked.  So we are now working on having her taken to Mexico until Jan 5 or so.  Luckily, marina charges are much cheaper in Mexico.  However, it will take someone 7 – 8 hours to get her there.  We’re looking at paying a captain to take her there and back for about $300.  Not too bad.

Before we do that, however, we want to address the important stuff from the survey.  The mechanic has already indicated that he can do all the mechanical work – around $900.  We want to replace the rigging for the mainsail and foresail.  We’re still getting estimates, but figure that will cost around $2000.  But after that, she’ll be ready to go.

Right now, our plan is to leave Toronto on or around Jan 10, 2011.  We’re going to drive down and take our time, so we’ll get to San Diego around the 16^th or so.  We’ll stay in San Diego until around the end of May.  By then we will have had lots of additional training and we’ll have our sea legs.  We’ll return to Toronto in April to get the last of the belongings we need (in case we forgot something the first time),see our doctors and dentists, etc., sell the car and fly back.  By May 22, we’ll be on our way.

Every day we learn something new.  Its fun and exciting, though scary at times too.