Coming Soon... By MichaelWOODACRE, CA

Our good friends Shane and Tina
of Vagrant, in lovely, lovely Tonga.

The cruising life is akin to the pioneer life of 150 years ago. Folks then spent a great percentage of their waking hours just meeting basic needs: getting water from the creek or well, making repairs, obtaining and preparing food, schooling and parenting, and washing and repairing clothes. Windy and I don’t have jobs, but as cruisers we spend a heck of a lot more time meeting our family’s basic needs than we ever did in a conventional land-based life. Yet we still have it good because filling jerry jugs with water, maintaining Del Viento, provisioning, schooling our kids, and getting the laundry done doesn’t fill the time that our commutes and full-time jobs used to take.

Over the past five years we’ve been cruising, I’ve used this acquired time in my life to do what I love to do: write. I’ve written faithfully in this blog. I’ve written dozens of diverse stories for magazines (including one in Canada and one in the U.K.). I co-authored Voyaging With Kids with Behan and Sara and then Lin Pardey swept it up and took it under her wing.

And this past year, I’ve given much of my attention to a new book I’m especially excited about. It will hit shelves next month. It’s already received enthusiastic pre-publication reviews from magazine editors and successful magazine writers. I’m going over the printing proof right now and I’m very excited to announce the book…in just a couple blog posts from now.

Stay tuned.

--MR

 

Frances on a Tongan beach, writing clues to a scavenger
hunt she made for her sister.