One turns to the other and says, ”hey what’s all that moss about?” “Well I’ve been hanging around here for quite a while now and it kinda feels like a change would do us good.”
Where to start? I’m searching for the words. After all, I’ve found Rebak Island to be an amazingly safe hurricane hole, both for storms and Covid, quiet, friendly, beautiful, with abundant birds, sea eagles hornbills, monkeys, lizards and so many fish that it can be annoying.
We’ve even been able to carry out many projects, collecting boat bits from all over the world’s chandleries.
But after returning from our South East Asia travels and getting locked down by the pandemic, we took notice that a curiously odd bit of lurgy was spreading out from roughly our neck of the woods. Some of our cruiser friends provisioned up and asked to be excused. I mean they rolled right on out of here while the rolling was good, even though the traditional harbors along the way were closed. Even Thailand’s border, almost within sight, was closed. Many of those brave souls got involved in international imbroglios spending many months quarantined on their boat. Most, in true cruiser fashion, found a way to have fun and adventure regardless. Unable to travel off the boat because once you left Malaysia you couldn’t return, and feeling less and less inclined to cross the Indian Ocean, we stayed put.
We aren’t used to “put.” We don’t do “put.” It chafes. We watched as the world turned upside down under lockdown. Stuck in our own little tropical paradise doesn’t sound so tough, but it wears. A velvet lined trap for the traveling soul.
Maybe it was time for a serious change. A big change. It’s tricky changing when everything you own in this world is stashed into forty feet of sailing yacht.
For me it felt like a stealthy plan that formed out of the ether, which then snuck up on me while Yours Truly was dozing poolside. Much too soon, before anyone was even allowed into Malaysia, improbably an offer was proffered for our loyal home. Big changes were afoot. It was madness from the get go. Eleven large boxes, overstuffed with, well stuff, numbered, weighed, categorized, schlepped, ferried to Langkawi to await a slow boat to New Jersey.
But what will we do with us? I mean what’s the plan Stan? Every day we have to field that question and I usually say, ”I’m not driving this bus my friend.”
The logical destination would be Thailand but they’ve been working Covid as a money making proposition with weeks of quarantine at their special hotel eating their special food, with special testing, special visa prices, etc. We will pass on that at least for now, although rumors persist that they’re going to lighten up.
I don’t know, where do you Escapees think we should go? The problem is that we’ve been here so long we’ve got to calling it home.
Malaysia was my home for three and a half years(1968-1972). Langkawi has no hotels and there was only a government rest house situated between Kuah and the jetty. I would travel there 2-3 times a year to conduct malaria surveys, wandering through the kampongs taking blood slides. Sometimes we would survey an entire school. I have been back several times, once with my family. I always loved Langkawi, especially pre-commercial.
Sorry to hear that you are swallowing the hook. Please keep publishing your adventures, we love hearing them.
Jeff Wahl
You guys are an inspiration to us. The next step of the journey will present itself all in good time. For now, kick and back and relax after all that schlepping! xx
I warn that it’s not without psychic trauma and serious questioning of life choices, but life is getting very short and there’s still so much to do! Andiamo!
You will sort it out, though I will not lie and tell you it is easy. I am happy to hear you are not trying to hurry up and force an answer, but taking it one step at a time.
We stopped counting our plans when we got to “COVID plan #27,”when we sold the trawler we lived aboard and cruised on based out of Portland OR to buy another sailboat with the intent of returning to the Caribbean post-COVID then decide what to do. Then we realized if we got a boat big enough to call home for more than a year straight and for friends and family to have their own stateroom with a door, it was more boat than we wanted. So we sold it.
I’ve come to accept that home is wherever Wayne and I are together. I expect we will always travel at least some, though now after 4 years of temporary plans, we found a place we want to call our “home base” to come back to. Making that happen is still in process.
I am sure we are not done with boating, but we don’t plan to cross big oceans or make our primary home base home.
Yes, please keep writing! You are taking on a different kind of adventure. Both of you, Jack and Marce, make life an adventure wherever you are. I love seeing and hearing how you experience the world from your insightful and eloquent perspective.
Never forget that you need to choose your own way. No one else has lived your life, felt your thoughts, seen what you have seen or will know what feeds your soul and makes you excited to get up in the morning and make your way in the world.
If you need a. sounding board along the, feel free to call.