Follow your dreams. Scociety does things backwards: School, work and save until you're old, then go have fun. If you have fun now, the experience you gain there will make school and work all that much more productive. Or you find out that school and work only buys you stuff. You can sail without stuff.
"The memories of a man in his old age are the deeds of a youth in his prime" - Pink Floyd
If I were 18 again and had little money but still wanted to see the world then I would crew around the world....on other peoples' boats. You can google boats that need crew and you'd be surprised. You'll learn lots, see many places and probably have fun doing it---on other peoples' boats and using more of their money than yours. Sometimes you even get paid.
Man,
All the above is good sound advice to be weighed up and considered, but damn I wish I had done what your doing when I was 18. Im trying to do it now in my late 20's post university(sorry college to the north americans), with a career I will have to leave and a significant other( also committed to cruising luckily) to think of.
Congrats on the boat, A book I would recommend to you is 'Ocean Cruising on a budget' by Anne Hammick. Its a early 90's book but copies are around on ebay/amazon etc. It is a very detailed look at every aspect of getting out there and giving it a go with minimal money and to still be cruising safely and comfortably.
__________________
'Life is either a daring adventure or nothing' - Helen Keller.
So I recently joined this site and happened across this forum. I read the whole thing! It was like reading a book, absolutely fantastic posts. Well I would like to know how its going at this point? When do you plan to have it seaworthy and start sailing around?
After reading all the posts and considering my own opinion, here is what i think:
Many people gave you advice to go to college first, I disagree with that. I have traveled extensively over continents countries and cities, mainly in between college semesters. I am now 20k in debt and will probably be about 35-40k in debt by the time i am done. The most important education i have learned thus far was not from any classroom but rather from the different cultures languages, and locales i have visited. You and i have the same dream, I unfortunately took the "educational" path. This situation reminds me of a poem by Robert Frost, many of you have probably heard it before:
TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; 5
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same, 10
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back. 15
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Which road will you take? Im 25 now, and i have very few regrets but i always wonder if i had taken another road when i was younger if it would have been better. Now i have to work after school for at least a year or two and pay off my debt and then another 2 to save up for a my boat. LISTEN to me when i say this, you did the right thing by buying your boat. There is nothing worse than suppressing that spark to sail as i have had to do and will continue to for several years now due to my path i chose. Girls will come along, job offers, the house, the car... more and more distractions until your dream seems like nothing but a mirage... TAKE it now while you have it within your grasp.
If you get nothing else from this rant, remember this, Ive taken over 150 credits so far (which i will probably end up turning into 2 separate degrees) many of them not connected with my major because i would rather have been doing something more interesting. 90% of what i have learned in college i could have learned from reading a textbook while on a sailboat.
So... you have to ask yourself, what do you want from schooling... an education from life experience and self study from subjects you are actually interested in, or a Piece of paper after 5 years and 40k dollars.
In closing, many schools offer the ability to "test out" of classes if you know the subject, i have done this 3 times with various classes just from my own research. Also there are accredited schools that offer "home study" courses that will transfer as well as count for credit. You could do something like this while you sail.
Best of luck to you, Ill join you on the seas in 4 or 5 years once i am no longer a slave to my "higher education". I hope your an experienced sailor by then with many miles under your belt, and life experience too precious for any mere classroom.
I think university is not for everyone. It sounds like 'living' has a lot of skills that are not taught at universities.
30 years ago university educated people were fewer to be had and so demanded good jobs. Now, everybody goes. That has diluted the value of a degree. To get the good jobs you now have to have advanced degrees.
I run into people who have university education who can't spell and are working at Best Buy.
Meantime, trade schools are folding left & right. Boat labor bills at around $90/hour and up.
Go against the flow, don't do what everybody else is doing. They are lemmings. Yachtmaster or welder will pay well and be significantly more interesting careers.
Speaking from experience as an art school dropout with a nice career in film production.
I will spare you the long winded advice. Keep going. Good work. You will not fit where you used to fit before you left. Not bad not good but different.
You cant get in a boat and take off, it's too dangerous.
Every day is dangerous. You might die out there.
You're gonna die anyway. You must finish college first
There are 30 year olds in college. You don't have enough money.
You never have enough money. By the time you do you'll just be another old rich a** h**e. You have to buy a house first and start a family.
Then you're stuck for 30 years if the housing market drops like it did on me. those other countries aren't safe
This one isn't so safe. Almost any country you visit is full of people doing just fine. They work, they eat, they enjoy each other, they just don't all have a BMW and a 196" flat screen. You might lose everything
You're born with nothing and you die with nothing but your stories.
young buck, what did you do? I am not much older than you, and it's almost impossible for me to try this. I have a job, debt, wife, family, dog.... It all adds up. But I am trying, and I will get there. It will simply take me YEARS to do something so simple and take 1 year off cruising. PLEASE - go, and go for the rest of us!
