Top Five Questions for the Brave Oceanic Sailor

As we get closer and closer to the Pacific Cup start, more and more people are asking about it. I encourage this since I love to talk about myself (hence the almost 500 posts on this blog mainly about me). I have started noticing a trend in the questions. To wit, they're the same ones over and over. Again, I don't mind answering, but I really should share.

1. What do you do at night?
2. What do you eat?
3. How long will it take?
4. What if you don't like the crew?
5. How do you go to the bathroom?

These are actually easy to answer.

What do you do at night? We'll usually anchor, open a bottle of Wild Turkey and sing sea shanties until we pass out. If it's too deep to anchor, we'll just sail all night (still opening the bottle of Wild Turkey and singing sea shanties).

What do you eat? Either freeze dried food or we'll catch some dolphins and make sushi. Failing that, we do have a freezer and a lot of canned goods. I will not eat Dinty Moore Beef Stew or canned hamburger.

How long will it take? By my calculations, if you dropped a coconut in the water, it would end up in Hawaii within 3 months due to ocean currents and tradewinds. Given that we have sails, we should be just short of 3 months. Let's say 2 weeks.

What if you don't like the crew? What do you mean "what if"? Have you ever smelled a brave oceanic sailor after 2 weeks at sea? While encased in a 47 foot floating doublewide? Other than that, they're good people.

How do you go to the bathroom? As infrequently as you can stand. I, personally, just don't drink anything to lessen my needs while sailing long distances. But when the need does arise, the leeward shrouds are your friends. Oh, you were asking about *that*? Gross.

That usually ends the conversation before the real question can come up. I've only heard it once: "you keep calling yourself a transoceanic sailor, isn't it true you're only going a third of the way across?"