The Road Less Traveled

We quit our day jobs, pulled our kids out of regular school and moved onto our Mason 43 Clover when we were 40 and the boys, Tim and Simon, were 8 and 11. We spent the next five years sailing slowly westabout around the world via the Panama and Suez canals. We home schooled the boys with the Calvert program and later the University of Nebraska remote learning program. It was a lot of work for all of us and we had to live by our onboard motto, “first work, then play.”  When we were waiting out hurricane seasons or wintering over, we’d enroll the boys in local international schools where they could see how they were doing academically, catch up where need be and enjoy team sports. When we got home, they went into school at the age appropriate levels and, after a jolt of re-entry stress, did well. They were ahead of their peers in reading, writing, history, geography and world affairs. And, they were slightly behind in math and lab science. Still, they graduated with good enough grades to go to competitive colleges and then on to get graduate degrees. They have good careers, lovely families and we have three growing grandkids. They all live near us so we see them all the time and we often reflect around the dinner table on shared memories from our cruising years. Was pulling the kids out of school so we could sail around the world, explore 34 countries, live in in New Zealand and Cyprus for extended periods, and live an entirely independent life a good thing?  For Rosie and me, no question about it. For the boys, it gave them a chance to walk the road less traveled by and that has made all the difference.