Departure Time Late-October or Early-November

This past week, I had some discussions with a boat insurance agent for the coming year. An important item on the list was when the hurricane season ends for the insurer we will use. End of hurricane season for that provider is October 31. This means we can leave as early as late-October/early-November. Our first destination will be Bermuda. This will be to position ourselves for a southward passage to the leeward islands in the Caribbean. The more direct route via the Bahamas is not a good route for sailboats because you would be beating into the eastward tradewinds.

This means we have less than four months to be ready for departure. We have a lot of work left to do! There are still several significant equipment upgrades to be made on the boat: new radios (SSB, satellite comm), new onboard computer and networking, new anchor and longer rode, more safety equipment, decorations, tools, spares, cameras, etc. We also have a long list of household matters (mail handling, bill paying, arranging for storage for items we're keeping, selling everything we're not keeping (including the house and cars), moving our DVD collection to a digital archive, and the list goes on, and on.