Trade Offs

Each day there are many hardships and sacrifices.  We have made the choice to be away from our family, our friends and everything which up till now we have defined as a normal lifestyle.  Christmas is 5 days away and we are nowhere near anything remotely familiar.  It will be 88 degrees today and somehow Santa is on his way?

Each day there is something to fix which broke, or a continual maintenance schedule which we try to observe to keep things from breaking.  As I write, we are working with DHL to understand how the brand new replacement motor for our autopilot looks like someone did a touch down victory spike with it.  (more pictures of carnage)  And this is how it goes.

What makes all of this worth it are the trade-offs.  For every hardship, and there are many, you are rewarded with a positive trade-off.  These trade offs are what keep you going.  These trade-offs are what we use to justify having left all that we know behind us.

An example of this is when Robert needed to go the restroom while we are out in the middle of town.  The solution to this is to go to the local public bathroom which you have to pay 50 cents to use.  Good deal you say.  A paid-for-bath-room should be hospital clean.  I will let you judge from Amy and Robert's expressions how the experience was.  They could not tell me about it, but Robert requested that anti-bacterial wipes be applied to him after he was out of there.

Why would you do this?  Because of the trade-off- that as a family we were able to venture into a small Mexican town and find our first Christmas tree and trimmings for Calpurnia.  The bathroom was never thought of again as we expertly selected our tree and took it home to dress up.  Amy and Robert have now made a popcorn garland for it, and Robert wonders how Santa will make his way through our hatches (windows) and will the mast get in the way of the Reindeer landing on our deck.

Other examples of this are when we go to fill up our two diesel fuel tanks.  The two tanks are about 80 gallons, and fuel goes for about $3 a gallon.  You do the math, Visa does it for me.  Why would we spend this money? 

Because it allows us to experience things and be a part of life which we could not otherwise.  Ironically, both of these points are captured to the left. 

Visibly shown are Robert and Amy at the diesel fuel pump after we have just filled up, and a large yacht has come in to take our place.  What is not so visible is the 12 foot salt water crocodile which has surfaced, taking a special interest in those near the dock's edge.  This one looked big, but not as big as the one in the stream which we had to hop across to walk along the beach.

By making these sacrifices, we are giving ourselves the opportunity to enjoy things like being the only people on this island, below, after all the "tourists" have left at 5:00pm.  With our own resources and effort, we are able to come and go, do as we please and enjoy a Mexican sunset all to ourselves.

Yesterday's required effort was for us to go out to sea and make potable water.  We have three water tanks on board, holding 220 gallons.  Our water maker, makes 30 gallons of water an hour, so it takes 7 1/2 hours of time, plus about 2 gallons of diesel per hour (2 gallons x $3 x 8 hours =) just to make water so that we can take showers, brush our teeth, have water to wash down the boat, and also to drink.  Pretty expensive water as I do the math.  Why do it ?

Because the trade-off was given to us in the most amazing manner.  Three tremendous humpback whales surfaced about 30 feet from our boat, for over an hour.  We were 10 miles out to sea, not another person for 30 miles and not another boat visible.  We three were the only ones able to enjoy three animals, who were just as curious about us as we were of them.

We believe that there is an incalculable benefit from Robert being able to experience animals in the wild, learning a second language in a foreign country, and learning that most of the world does not have the things, freedoms, and opportunities that he has almost solely because he was born in America.

This was recently proven to me, when we were approached by a pod of over 100 large dolphins in the open ocean.  Amy and Robert had gone to the bow (front) of the boat to watch them dance in the bow wave of the boat.  The bow waves "pushes" them along without much effort on their part.

Robert asked me why they were not in their cages or the swimming pool where the other dolphins are.  For him, that is where he had seen dolphins and where most people do.  At this moment, he learned where they come from and belong.

As we motored with the whales for oven an hour, Robert became skilled as spotting the slick spot on the water which indicated where the whales were underwater.  He also became very good at anticipating when they would resurface, about every 7 to 10 minutes.  These whales were bigger than our boat and could easily crush Calpurnia and all aboard.

But in this environment, Robert was able to learn what gentle and intelligent animals these are.

I do not know how much this trip will financially cost us by the time we get back to Texas. I can not begin to think of all the things which will break between now and then, nor all of the other challenges which we will face.  I'm not even sure what we are going to do about our still broken auto-pilot motor or what we are going to do about that to get out of here.

But the thing which keeps us going, is the knowledge that without this tremendous effort we will absolutely never see what is awaiting us around the next corner.