When we first talked about buying a sailboat and traveling full-time, people often assumed it would be a cheap way to live. And, honestly, so did we. But the real answer to “Is it cheaper to live on a boat?” is: it depends.

A lot of people think of sailboats as wind-powered machines—and they are. Yes, there’s a handful of engine-less sailors. But for the majority, chances are, the diesel engine is the go-to for docking, tight anchoring situations, and emergencies. If that engine dies at the wrong time, it can put a boat (and the crew) in a tricky situation.

When we first decided to “sell it all and sail away,” we had no experience. No boat. No plan. No idea what we were doing. Our only time on the water had been in canoes, kayaks, and the occasional fishing trip. Sailing full-time sounded like a cool way to explore the world with our home, and dogs, in tow—but we had to figure it out from the ground up.

Ah, slow mornings with coffee and a book, long beach days, sunset views while gently bobbing at anchor, and wrapping it all up with a beach fire. Just another day in paradise, right? Old salty sailors say cruising is about sacrifice over comfort. They’ll tell you about surviving a summer in the Sea of Cortez with nothing but a spray bottle and a fan. Instagram definitely tells both stories - the luxe sunsets and the down and dirty boatwork.

We may have lingered in town a bit too long. By the time we got back in the dinghy, the wind had picked up and the bay had turned… sporty. One of us bailed water as waves poured over the sides, while the other tried to steer around the worst of it. We arrived back at the boat soaked and salty. Lesson learned.

“100% you won’t be able to paddleboard that back,” I said to Mark as he loaded our 100-litre dry bag onto his paddleboard. “Nah. It’s fine.” It wasn’t. He swam back to the boat while pushing the paddleboard—and our food. Just another day in the life of provisioning as liveaboard sailors.

We signed up for sailing lessons—but Covid had other plans. So we did what any desperate dreamers would do: we bought a sailboat off Craigslist, with no experience. Yes, really.

British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast and Gulf Islands offer some of the most underrated sailing anchorages on the Pacific Coast. While many cruising guides highlight dramatic destinations like the west coast of Vancouver Island or the glacier-fed inlets of Alaska, savvy boaters know there’s something special about these more sheltered local waters.

We left our anchorage the morning after a lively carnival celebration—slightly hungover but eager to sail. A nine-hour, 30-mile trip south sounded like the perfect hangover cure.

“Apparently Cabo Corrientes can be a little sporty,” I said, reading from the cruising guide while we sat at anchor in Chacala. The bay was calm and still, with hardly a ripple—hard to imagine anything “sporty” about it. “Tomorrow looks like a good time to go.”

Then, the tubas on the beach started playing. Then another sailboat hovered around, shouting, “Are you anchored yet?…”

We also had to navigate through what some Facebook armchair sailors called a mythical "triangle of death" outside Los Frailes.

And then it happened—the rattle exploded into action on the stern. We caught a fish! Mark eagerly pulled in the line

As August transitioned into November, the warm days spent in t-shirts and shorts began to give way to the evening’s creeping chill.

We sailed from Bahia Tortugas to Bahia Asunción to avoid some predicted strong northerly winds.

As the weather in Ensenada began to cool, we knew it was time to continue sailing down the Pacific coast of Mexico

The marina staff reassured us it would be fine if we "didn't get into trouble."

We dropped anchor off the beach in Santa Barbara with our friends SV Malaya and SV Cariba in the early morning. Both the air and water were

After an incredible 10 days of eating, walking and more eating, it was time to go. We had slightly less than a month to pull into Ensenada,