A man on a boat

Yesterday while filling up tanks of our motorboats I noticed that there was a new boat moored to our pier. A beautiful 40 feet long and about 12 feet wide sailboat it was. The same kind of a sailboat I want to have myself. Since I am pretty darn serious about owning something like that in the future I decided to hesitate no second and went to talk to a captain who was fixing things on a deck of the boat and find out his beautiful vessel as much as possible.

The captain's name was Leo. He's norwegian. Leo had a hoarse voice and a classic captain's look: thick red beard and side-burns framed weather-beaten face, a golden ring in his ear, sharp grey eyes. I told Leo that I really wanted to have a similar sailboat and had some questions about living on a boat life-style.  He gladly agreed to answer my questions about his boat and his life on it. 

First of all I checked if the estimations about the size of the boat were corerct. Leo told me I was spot on. The boat (can you actually believe that I totally forgot to find out her name?) was built in 1998. I shared my concerns about bying an older boat being a risky business and so on and Leo told me that in most of the cases even older boats are in a pretty decent condition and it is only an engine that needs to be changed. Basically he told me that I could totally aim for buying an older boat with an engine that's been changed recently, because everything else could be repaired with own hands.

Leo lives on the boat for the past....seven(!!!!) years. Now tell me how cool is that? I asked him about his average montly budget, but Leo couldn't give me an exact figure, but said that the largest fraction of his travel budget goes for buying groceries. I thought it would have been gazoline, but Leo said that he mostly uses sails and in case there's no wind (or wind is too strong) he just waits for favorable weather conditions in harbors. There's no rush in his travels. I like that.  He mostly sails in the Nordics and these places are rich with fish, so it really cuts food expenses down. 

I asked him how he tolerated living aboard alone and Leo introduced his travel companion-- Skipper, a puppy of a puffin dog (also known as Norwegian Lundehund) that just ran out of saloon to a deck. A very energetic cute little dog. Leo also toldme that his daughter joins him on journeys during summer time. I would imagine that such a life-style affects his family life, but I did not ask about it because it wasn't my business.

Leo told me that his biggest enemy on his travels is moist. It is gets everywhere. But, as the captain said, if you make a conscious decision about living on a boat it is something you have to be either ready to accept it or fight it till one of you wins. Of course there're numerous solutions for keeping the inside of your boat dry and it all depends on your budget.

I could not but notice the fact of how happy and content Leo looked about his life. He aknowledged that even though he had to make some certain sacrifices he leads a life of a very happy person. That was when I had to move on with my daily business. I thanked Leo and Skipper for their time and wished them safe travels. Leo wished me to buy my boat soon.

This morning I decided to go to the pier before work and ask Leo's permission to make a short video about him and his boat for my Instagram, but when I came there he was already gone...Meeting Leo was very insipring. I hope he's safe on his travels.✌

*A picture in the heading is a painting by Ekaterina Amelina