Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Getting ready to leave!!
It's Tuesday night . 2pm today we packed up, kissed the kitty good-bye and left Pa. Headed back to Maryland to spend one last night on our own boat, before we head out for at least a month.
Of course, traffic sucked through Harrisburg and around Baltimore, ugh. We ARE here and now I'm thinking about what we brought, and hoping we didn't forget anything. We probably packed way to much (or at least I did.) Most men can live off 2 pairs of shorts, 2 pairs of underwear, 2 pairs of socks, 3 shirts, and 1 hat for at least a year!! I was able to fit all my clothes and bathroom needs for a whole month in one big 'ole duffel bag. Not bad. Foul weather gear in a separate bag of course, and I'm ready!
Chris is strategically packing tonight, as I sit here drinking orange Vodka drinks..... yum. :) I have all day tomorrow to do (boat) laundry, grocery shop, pack, and clean the boat, before we jump over onto Ron's boat.... soooo I'm not doing anything tonight but kickin' back. He has that dirty work thing to do tomorrow. Poor boy. :(
The plan is to be ready and on Ron's boat by 3pm and head over to our sister marina about 40 min away. We will fuel up, have an early dinner, and then early to bed.
Thursday morning, we will be up with the birds, and crabbers, and sailing off to our first destination.... Solomon's Island.
Pray we are able to get internet!!!
Of course, traffic sucked through Harrisburg and around Baltimore, ugh. We ARE here and now I'm thinking about what we brought, and hoping we didn't forget anything. We probably packed way to much (or at least I did.) Most men can live off 2 pairs of shorts, 2 pairs of underwear, 2 pairs of socks, 3 shirts, and 1 hat for at least a year!! I was able to fit all my clothes and bathroom needs for a whole month in one big 'ole duffel bag. Not bad. Foul weather gear in a separate bag of course, and I'm ready!
Chris is strategically packing tonight, as I sit here drinking orange Vodka drinks..... yum. :) I have all day tomorrow to do (boat) laundry, grocery shop, pack, and clean the boat, before we jump over onto Ron's boat.... soooo I'm not doing anything tonight but kickin' back. He has that dirty work thing to do tomorrow. Poor boy. :(
The plan is to be ready and on Ron's boat by 3pm and head over to our sister marina about 40 min away. We will fuel up, have an early dinner, and then early to bed.
Thursday morning, we will be up with the birds, and crabbers, and sailing off to our first destination.... Solomon's Island.
Pray we are able to get internet!!!
Monday, September 28, 2009
Technomaditch, Telecommuting from the Atlantic Intracostal.
Agua-commuter?
There are only a couple days left before we set sail. I'm very happy Ron has allowed us to go with him, but, as "the day" gets closer I am getting nervous about the logistics. This is the first time I have attempted a 'working trip' with absolutely no back-up plan for connectivity. I've done several working trips.. kayak trips, camping trips, sailing trips, trips to Belize. Many times the clients did not even know that I was not in the office. There's nothing like it - being on a conference call, or working on code, all while sitting on a little island [key], off the coast of Florida, in the Gulf of Mexico, in February. Your home - a tent. Your kitchen - a small cooler and a camp stove. Your only mode of transportation - a kayak. Awesome.
But this time things will be a little different. If things went wrong on the prior trips, or things broke, I could just pack up and return to shore to handle the issue. If I couldn't get internet connectivity I would simply choose a different place where I could get connectivity. But this time I am not able to change course. First, it's not my boat, and my clients are not the top priority of the skipper. Second, there is only one way to get where we are going. If there is no connectivity - I am not working...
The Plan:
The goal is to go as far as possible without tipping off the boss or clients about the situation. And if all goes well, I will be able to use this blog to reassure my boss that I will be able to keep working for the company next spring.. when I plan to move out of the house and onto the boat full time. If this fails.. I may not need to worry about having a boss to inform.
I will be dropping notes daily, Monday through Friday, about how the trip is going from a technical standpoint. I'm hoping this will serve as a road map for others who may be thinking about adopting the nomadic lifestyle of a water-based telecommuter.
A little background: My work is mostly scripting/coding, simply creating or modifying text files, and very little heavy bandwidth or processor intensive stuff. A third of my day is typically spent on the phone or chatting with co workers on the internet, and the other two thirds is writing code or debugging it. The servers are all remote, so the text files are downloaded, modified, and put back up to the server. (Sometimes they are simply modified via emacs or vim on the server.. although I like to work in TextMate when I can.) I work an average of 6 - 7 hours a day, between 10AM to 6PM. Of course, this schedule will probably change based on connectivity.
The Gear:
MacBook - 2.4/2 10.5.8
The Verizon USB760 wireless card with an external antenna.
An iPhone 3G.
The boat has an inverter. Most of the time we will be motoring which will provide plenty of charge to the batteries. Top speed will be 7 knots (8 mph). We will seldom be far from land - although we may often be far from service.
Stay tuned for the details.. Until then, fair winds and rum drinks!
- Chris
There are only a couple days left before we set sail. I'm very happy Ron has allowed us to go with him, but, as "the day" gets closer I am getting nervous about the logistics. This is the first time I have attempted a 'working trip' with absolutely no back-up plan for connectivity. I've done several working trips.. kayak trips, camping trips, sailing trips, trips to Belize. Many times the clients did not even know that I was not in the office. There's nothing like it - being on a conference call, or working on code, all while sitting on a little island [key], off the coast of Florida, in the Gulf of Mexico, in February. Your home - a tent. Your kitchen - a small cooler and a camp stove. Your only mode of transportation - a kayak. Awesome.
But this time things will be a little different. If things went wrong on the prior trips, or things broke, I could just pack up and return to shore to handle the issue. If I couldn't get internet connectivity I would simply choose a different place where I could get connectivity. But this time I am not able to change course. First, it's not my boat, and my clients are not the top priority of the skipper. Second, there is only one way to get where we are going. If there is no connectivity - I am not working...
The Plan:
The goal is to go as far as possible without tipping off the boss or clients about the situation. And if all goes well, I will be able to use this blog to reassure my boss that I will be able to keep working for the company next spring.. when I plan to move out of the house and onto the boat full time. If this fails.. I may not need to worry about having a boss to inform.
I will be dropping notes daily, Monday through Friday, about how the trip is going from a technical standpoint. I'm hoping this will serve as a road map for others who may be thinking about adopting the nomadic lifestyle of a water-based telecommuter.
A little background: My work is mostly scripting/coding, simply creating or modifying text files, and very little heavy bandwidth or processor intensive stuff. A third of my day is typically spent on the phone or chatting with co workers on the internet, and the other two thirds is writing code or debugging it. The servers are all remote, so the text files are downloaded, modified, and put back up to the server. (Sometimes they are simply modified via emacs or vim on the server.. although I like to work in TextMate when I can.) I work an average of 6 - 7 hours a day, between 10AM to 6PM. Of course, this schedule will probably change based on connectivity.
The Gear:
MacBook - 2.4/2 10.5.8
The Verizon USB760 wireless card with an external antenna.
An iPhone 3G.
The boat has an inverter. Most of the time we will be motoring which will provide plenty of charge to the batteries. Top speed will be 7 knots (8 mph). We will seldom be far from land - although we may often be far from service.
Stay tuned for the details.. Until then, fair winds and rum drinks!
- Chris
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Invited to the Ditch...
Its late September... the air has the faint smell of aged leaves, the water is beginning to cool, and finally, we are able to sleep peacefully with a crisp little breeze sneaking through the portholes and hatches. Sounds romantic ,but in reality it just means that very soon we will be freezing our asses off.
Our boat rests almost dead center on the Chesapeake's western shore, that means cold winters. The house we live in is in northeastern Pa... and winters are even worse there. Saying that, we have decided to get out of Pa next April and move onto our 30' Baba sailboat, Sanuk. Spending next summer finishing, fixing, replacing, and adding things to Sanuk ,to make living on her more comfortable and self sufficient. This way we will get the chance to see more of the Chesapeake.
It is a vast body of water with hundreds of tiny inlets and anchorages to explore, but we won't miss the chocolate water, clueless power boaters and sea nettles. Oh and by the way ,no we don't eat the crabs, we believe they belong clinging to our boats slowly eating that delicious film that forms at our waterline.
Anyway, we have decided to wait until next fall to take her south for the winter but have been given the opportunity to accompany a very young gentleman of 79, dubbed himself "captain Ron",and his 46' Morgan sailboat for a journey south, from Herring Bay, Md to Palm Beach, Fl. Ron has been sailing 60 years, living aboard 20 something yrs, and physically and mentally fit as any 50yr old, says allot about living a sailboat lifestyle.
This is only our second season of sailing, and it will be our first adventure south via the water. Chris and some captain friends from the Baba group, sailed Sanuk down from Cape Cod this past April, so he has touched the ocean, I haven't yet. We are both excited and curious about popping out, and then traveling inside on the ICW. It should be interesting and so we thought sharing the experience through a blog would be fun, and get us motivated to start a sailing blog when we move aboard Sanuk in the spring. Woo-hoo... :)
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