Exit Strategy, Part 1

Boot Key Harbor, Marathon, FL
34 42.54 N 081 05.58 W

One topic requested by reader Chuck is that of our exit strategy. Being that tomorrow night is the last day of 2010, now could be a good time to write about it. Below is Chuck's question.

I am curious to know if you felt any temptation to, prior to embarking on Tarwathie to the places you've migrated, set up an "exit strategy" just in case you tire of cruising. I'm interested in slow cruising, for such adventures as you so thoughtfully describe in your blog, (I have a small motorboat now though would choose a sailboat for my version of cruising, the Inside Passage to Alaska my particular region of interest here in the Northwest)


BUT--ever the person thinking ahead, find myself at odds with the reality that, limited in means, I can either have a boat---OR---a humble terrestrial home, but not both, and find that, to embark on such a chapter of life, I keep wanting to make sure that, SHOULD I want off the boat in coming years, I'd already have a plot of land somewhere. Did you struggle with such a tempation? I "get" that you and Libby live simply by virtue of your decision NOT to encumber yourselves with possessions on land---but I'm asking if you have in some recess of your soul any inclination to WANT a safety-jump-off place, a home, something to return to should you ever have a change of heart. Or...are you equipped with such a sense of confidence that should you tire of cruising, you will just "cross that bridge" then, and are not in any way thinking about that now? 


 Please don't mistake this question for timidness--I'm primed for at least 2 years spent between Portland and Juneau with no haste and little in the way of destination------I seem though to struggle with the confidence that I'll be able to extract from a cruising boat the money I invest in it, and...of modest means, feel inclined to "set something up first" in terms of a home to return to, which of course delays embarking on such a journey to the point of nullifying my chances. A real psychological trap. I go round and round with this. Did you?


Tomorrow, I'll post part 2 with my answers to Chuck's questions.