Once Upon a Time...

...in 2007, at a summertime gathering of sailors in Mystery Bay on Puget Sound, two solo sailors who happened to have two identical Pacific Seacraft Dana 24s, met. And shook hands. And talked a little. That was it. After a month, he called her and asked her a few questions about the rake of her mast. We kid you not. The rake of her mast. They talked about rigging for 45 minutes, long distance. Just rigging. A month later he called again, more talk about rigging and mast rake. She thought he might be fixated on rigging. He was fixated alright, but not on rigging. She trekked through China and Tibet for awhile, and when she returned he called her from the Point Hudson marina (he had sailed into Port Townsend for a seminar on... rigging.) He wanted to talk about... Alaska. Not just rigging. Whew. Lunch lasted two and a half hours. And turned into dinner, an exchange of boat tours, more phone calls, some emails, and finally, in December, a first date. Fast forward to late winter 2009--they are completely nuts about each other, have both retired, and are working on... the rigging. Well hey, you need good rigging if you're going to cross oceans on a small sailboat together. Ah, but we digress. This summer's cruise will be north, to Canada's Queen Charlotte Islands and wherever else the weather permits-maybe Alaska. And we know what you're thinking: will they take both boats? One boat? If not both boats, whose boat? His boat? Her boat? Can you say toy boat five times fast? The suspense is unbearable. That's why we created this blog. We will keep in touch from far-flung and near-flung places with this blog. (We just love to say that word: bloooog. It sounds like the sound made by a green Swamp Thing.) We will add links to photos once we get them posted, too. We are Jim Heumann and Karen Sullivan, and we are testing the limits of the theory that there is no such thing as too much fun.