470nm from St Helena and the clouds have settled since yesterday. We have to sail pretty deep to keep our heading to the island but we had some fun puffs this morning. Surfing down swell at 20kts like there’s nothing to it. Ray and I played our first match of Windigo. A sailing game created in 1968 that we found on Etsy. Serendipity connected us to that game, likely the only one left that isn’t collecting dust in someone’s grandparents attic. We’re looking forward to a few nights sleep at the island. With our speed, and swell directions it’s noisy and I’ve had trouble getting more than an hour sleep here and there.

We’re 4 days into the first leg of our 8,000nm passage. The first stop is St Helena. If the wind gods would have stayed happy we would have been there in another 3 days…but alas the wind has died off and we’re huffing and puffing into the asym. We’re in the groove now, eating well, and having a great time. With 4 onboard, the watches are decent. 4h during the day and 3 at night. It means that you have every 4th day without a night watch. No fish yet, well a huge one and took and almost all our line and that we lost. Our sushi kit is waiting patiently. The boat rocks, has great power but the sail plan makes it easy to gear down quickly. We love the Genoa and Code wing on wing for easy night sailing. Treat surface area is as big as the asym! We’re halving a hockey watch party tonight, Ottawa vs Toronto in the playoffs. It’s going to be late, but our South African crew are keen to drink beer and cheer with us.

The inaugural first leg of our adventure. Arrived in St Helena just as the sun was setting and managed to get the drone out for some nice pics of the dramatic southern cliff. The wind filled in as we arrived and had some epic surfs above 22kts (video below). We had 2 days of lighter winds and wing-on-wing down wind sailing with the code and Genoa. It’s a great combo and stable. But not that sporty 😆 Crew is in good spirits, and thankful for a few nights without night watches and some exercise on land. There’s a lot to do in St Helena, Jacob’s ladder, hikes, diving, fishing, and all the Napoleon tourist stuff. I’d like to try my new wing foil gear, but the anchorage is behind large hills and likely not the best for wind and it’s swelly. Just north of St Helena is where the trade winds kick in, as my friend said, it’s where god put the “On” button for the wind. But it’s looking light until next Monday so we will likely stay here until then. Looking forward to leg 2 to Fernando, likely a day or so longer than this leg. But looking forward to wingfoiling with the dolphins once in Brazil.

Last major problem resolved, water mater now works. We’re leaving Monday. It’s taken us a month to commission, test, fix. What a great place to be stuck commissioning than Cape Town. We almost don’t want to leave.

Sail maker and rigger onboard to tune every last detail. We always learn a lot when they join and geek out with us. Departure planned for a week from now, water maker is not happy and we need a few more fixes. Then off we go! Can’t wait. Feels surreal.

Had a bit of everything wind wise, from sun to fog. Wind mostly behind us, until around Cape of Good Hope and then on the nose. Fantastic crew and good memories. Now for a few weeks in Cape Town to fix and buy things and off again on the crossing.

If you can’t repair it, maybe it shouldn’t be on board. Last 10 days have been so fun, learning from the incredible team at Balance/Nexus St Francis. We’ve commissions everything, my spreadsheet had 352 rows, crawled into every corner and broken everything we could and then fixed. I’m going to miss this team. A lot. Photo shoot tomorrow and then off to Cape Town on Thursday. Sporty forecast along the south coast of Africa, time to see what she can do in big seas.

It’s go time. A week or so of commissioning and we’re off to Cape Town to finish provisioning before the 8,000nm jump over to the USA. I’m very excited, overwhelmed, and nervous. The boat is looking stunning and starting to feel like home. I’m getting this vibe that she’s tired of being at the dock, she wants to sail! Soon baby, soon… we’ll be off. PS: if you’re in St Francis or Cape Town I’ve got tons of SeaPeople souvenirs. PPS: a new feature called Voyages is launching in SeaPeople soon! Can’t wait to show you!

Spent the day checking and tuning the main boom locks and lower shrouds. Got the load sensors hooked up and calibrated. Then pulled out the code and pointed downwind and loaded her up. A nice easy 20kts boat speed was fun! Tomorrow we fix the hydrolic furler and setup Genoa and start instrument calibration.

We got extremely lucky, weather gods liked us as it was a full sun and 10kts. The south ocean is usually in a bad mood. We hoisted all the sail except for the code which we will do tomorrow. We got 10.5kts in 10kts of breeze. She’s a Ferrari 😆

The African sky welcomed us beautifully on the walk from the factory to the port. It was special, dodging trees, dagger boards clearing a few grass knolls by 1 inch. The Nexus/Balance team know what there doing and the whole village came by to celebrate with us. Lost for words. Next milestone, sailing this beast. Hopefully next week.

It takes a village they say. In this case, that village is St Francis South Africa. We took a team photo before we wheel the boat down the port for an early morning splash. Everyone put so much work into this and were so thankful for their hard work and attention to detail. Almost time to unleash her on the southern ocean next week and let her fly! I’ll remember this week for the rest of my life!

Now that SeaPeople 1.1 is out, it’s time to shift gears and head back to South Africa and splash our new boats. We’ve been waiting 3.5 years and have had a blast with design and meeting the amazing team building it. It’s our 4th trip to the factory and have been bringing over tons of gear. This trip is tools provisioning themed. 140lbs worth! So so excited.

End of the dry season and delta channels are tricky to navigate. No fish, one big one that got away!

Well, the boat was supposed to splash this week but as things go building it needs more time to finish. Splash ETA is now January. But… it’s coming together and quite a beauty. Can’t wait to sail her.

I’ve tried to foil a few times. Was terrible at it. Finally decided to take some lessons and wow! Once over the steep learning curve it’s so fun. I’ve been windsurfing for 30 years but switching to wing foiling now. Easier to launch from the boat, less gear, and as fun. Such a zen feeling floating over the water.

Our new boat is called Windigo and I randomly found this matched named game from 1968 on Etsy. It’s so neat and just arrived. Has anyone ever played?

Now that SeaPeople has splashed, the next splash is the new boat in early December! Engines installed and paint being touched up and polished. Suspect she will never be this clean again 😹 It’s hull #1 of the Balance 589, so we expect a few months of sea trials and tuning. The plan is to be in SA for splash and help install our electronics and comms, then return at the end of January for test sails and starting the provisioning to cross the Atlantic. SeaPeople has taken so much time that I’ve somewhat ignored the new boat 😆 I’ll have to catchup on prep and get excited again about getting back on 🌊.

It’s a busy fall. It’s been all-out, building and splashing SeaPeople soon and our new boat should be in the water by the end of November. It’s a new model of Balance Catamaran, the 580. Hull #2, but splashing #1 😝. And that means almost a 3 year build as we definitely paid some pioneer tax as we pushed the team in a few areas to be creative. We’re so excited, especially the crossing from Cape Town to Grenada next winter and really getting to know her. And of course using SeaPeople for the crossing (we have some new long passage features coming!). Oh, if anyone is looking for a used Balance 526 we are about to list ours for sale soon. DM me. Thanks for all the SeaPeople feedback, bug reports, and high fives. Means a lot. 🔱

Getting the cousins to shred on a great warm, and calm day on the Ottawa river. The Ottawa river on a calm day is great for wake surfing as all the sailboats are at dock 🤣

Water was cold, but good rust removing first day in the river.

Took the friends and potential owners on their first passage and boat training. Was a nice start with wind and fish, then wind died and swell didn’t and crew all got 🤢! No drama night, no wind, all moon, good audio book. Drone flying shitshow… for the life of me I can’t land, got a distance warning, and as usual the heart rate from flying took a while to settle. There must be a trick I don’t know about. Watched the hockey game and was on watch all night as crew was sick!

Staging for gulf steam jump north. Light wind started at 150 AWA, died completely, then last few hours upwind at 40 AWA. Screaming into our anchorage at night at 9kts under the fullest of moons! Our sail shadow at 10pm in 8ft of water was special. Hosting buyers of our boat and giving them a boat on-boarding and a Sea People on-boarding 😂

Speared my first lion fish and hanger crab last night. Yay. Small but tasty. Got spoiled with 14 days of wind. Every. Day. But today the engines got a work out. Visiting friends in Nassau, crew change, and trying to find a window to cross to st Augustine.

Everyone has moved on to foiling and kiting, but i’m over 50 and old habits die young. Had a great rippin’ sesh at sunset. Man, it felt sooo good. The whole anchorage heard me yelling “whoooooa” as 20 kts of beautiful wind flung me planing over the crystal water. Bliss. Pinch me. Heading north thru Nassau tomorrow, picking up new crew, and heading to St Augustine. Weather is strange, not sure when we’ll leave as I don’t want to get slammed in the Gulf Stream. 🤞

It’s been a long year programming and building Sea People for yall. Now very rewarding to have folks use and give us feedback. We really wanted Sea People to both be a community tool, but also a utility. An app you can use to keep track of your travels, track for friends to follow, and inspire others. We headed to the Exumas as I wanted to test out all our tracking for myself and tweak things here and there. Our friends who used to WhatsApp and ask « where are you » now DM me in sea people. It’s so fun. So yeah, I’ll expense this trip. It’s work related 😂

Second and final leg after leaving the Abacos. Finally a downwinder and very enjoyable with sun and no one in sight until we arrived at Highbourne cay, where it looks like the entirety of the Exumas is here! Busy place!

Bang’n’rock beating south. Lost fish, lost lures, busted lazy jacks. Regular fun day on the high seas 😝

Provisioning, hitting sandbars, and prep for jump to the Exumas for the month. Can’t really complain, programming Sea People while at sea! Tracking was 👌🏼 ✅ 🤩

Factory week and recruiting new sea peeps in the Cape Town harbour! Last visit to the factory before the splash late fall. The team is amazing, but it’s the first hull of this model and there’s a lot of tweaks and learning. The goal of this week was: 1. Inspect all plumbing and access for replacement and inspection. Finalize plumbing/pump locations. 2. We’re installing kinematic rod / gear steering and wanted to see it installed and working. 3. Finalize up and lower helm instruments and running rigging and nav station layout. Helm access and foldable bench (new design). 4. Comms and electrical wiring, worked out where to install starlink dishes, wiring lengths, etc. Busy but fantastic week again. South Africa, is stunning.

Packing up 2 Starlink high performance dishes and gear as carefully as possible and flying to South Africa. Will test and setup on new boat. Suitcase weighs 69lbs. I’m going to setup a PoE but brining their heavy power adapters for now to test. Starlink doesn’t ship to SA yet (some Elon drama with his homeland) but you can bring your own purchased for your boat and leave the country. As long as they are activated in purchased country with an active plan.

Low tide, sunset, doesn’t get any better

Compost pigs 🐷 🥕. While it’s a tourist trap, we drop off all our organic waste once a month and they chomp it down. We keep a few containers in the freezer as we collect the organic waste so that it doesn’t smell. Defrost a few hours before the pig-drop-off. And feel good that you both fed and diverted some waste from the already stressed landfills. Does anyone have other options for organic waste in the Abaco’s?

After 3 weeks of friends onboard, back to the home base to chill, code sea people goodies, and laundry.

Training day for new crew. They did great beating into a nice breeze.

Decided to get away from the hustle and bustle of south Abaco and jump north for a secluded anchorage.

I started sailing because of the solitude. The inner peace that nature brings. Now it’s more about the meaningful time we get to spend with family and friends. Our friends took a dip today and I tried to capture that pure joy. Just being there. Us Sea People have a gift we can share.

Dolphin being nice and posing for us in front of our boat.

We love taking friends to the sea. But it makes for a busy month. After 3 years in the Abaco we are looking forward to doing the whole Caribbean next year.

We managed to get a mooring in little harbour and waited out the high winds for 3 days. Finally made it out and able to explore and meet friends.

Preparing to help our neighbour who’s tender flipped overnight with the high winds. Would love to hear some tips from experts, here’s our plan: - prepare fresh water soak before pulling engine out of salt water - flip tender, remove casing and drain, then soak in fresh water - remove and drain, then remove spark plugs - drain fresh water from cylinders - oil cylinders / piston while slowly turning over After that corrosion is slowed, but I’m not sure what do to with carburetor and flushing etc. Or do we just stop corrosion and get to a mechanic asap?

Tested the extremely under powered spirit 1.0 electric tender engine. Made it slowlllllly.

One of the disadvantages of a longer boat is small harbours. Our neighbour was too close and before the front hit us we escaped and found an empty anchorage with all the swing room we wanted… and a nice sunset post storm.

The usual crew drop off and pick up in Marsh today and tomorrow. Rather be somewhere else, but groceries call!

This is easily one of my fav spots in the Abaco. If the winds are on your side! It’s quiet, nice beach walks, rays and sharks. You need the right conditions as any E/N/W wind and swell and it’s very bumpy. But with a few days of south / south east it’s flat and pristine.

Boat at dock, board jumping waves.

Little romantic weekend

Rushing across with NW wind unfortunately a bit too behind us for decent speed. But a few hours ahead of schedule and looks like we’ll get into TC by tomorrow lunch or mid-afternoon.

Very consistent 10kt from the NW. Doing 8.5kt with full screeched and main. The new sails are sweet!

Reproduced the “stationary” bug. Hrm.

My 3rd year, and fastest at 42hours. Chill time with great crew.

Charter with friend for 2 weeks. Was windy, the upwind eastern routes were bumpy with 20-25kts each day. Loved speaking French with everyone!

Took the kids here in 2015 and was one of the nicest fam trips yet. We were living in Australia at the time so it wasn’t that far. Was windy, 25-30kts each day but there’s huge reef and lagoon all around New Caledonia. We didn’t see a lot of other boats, but the sea life was magnificent. Can’t wait to visit again at some point. So much more to explore.