To Off- Season or not to Off-Season?

Sailing around in the Caribbean, Med or elsewhere is generally envisioned as idealistic weather, lots of drinking, spending raucous amounts of money on activities, getting a great tan and seeing all there is to see. Sound Perfect? Yup, sounds pretty good to me... but this is normally a two week thing. Can it really be a long term lifestyle? I personally think not and here in I think defines one of the key differences between 'sailing' and 'cruising'. The difference in fact between visiting and living somewhere, in it being a holiday or a lifestyle. When 'sailing' becomes long term there are a lot more options and factors to look at when choosing where to go and when to go there. For us there was no question about the 'where'. But the when? Now that was more difficult.

For anyone who has decided to vacation in 'off-Season', you will know there are at times large differences in this and at peak times. Sailing is no different. When you go somewhere in-season you will find the following :-

• The services at each spot to be open more frequently (or at all)
• The weather more pleasant and predictable
• A more active community of sailors to interact with
• Higher amount of events, festivals etc to see/do

There are always exceptions but generally this is what we have found to be the case. However you will also find the following when sailing in-season:-

• Higher Marina/Mooring prices
• Less friendly local people (after seeing a thousand and one tourists, you can understand)
• More densely packed anchorages – sometimes there is no space at the inn!
• Hiked up prices for activities and boat repairs
• People, LOTS of people which makes finding that desert island a lot harder

Clearly there are pros and cons for each option and I think in part this depends on what type of sailor you and and what kind of experience you want to get. For us we wanted to maximise seeing everything possible, experience places the way the locals do and to do all of this at as low a cost as we could. (Plus we didn't want to break our tradition of always sailing in the most *e-hem* exciting weather). Therefore it seemed to be a combination of these reasons that we in the end chose to leave when we did and go 'Off-peak'. Yes this got us to arrive in time for the start of hurricane season (probably the biggest reason not to sail at this time) but if you are smart and take the necessary precautions/back up plans etc, I see no reason why this should affect ones cruising experience.

So far we are happily loving our choice. Although a few mis-starts in getting to where we are – Yes we are talking about you Bay Of Biscay. But since we got far enough south that the butter started to melt everything has gone in our favour. We have been to so many places that we would have otherwise had to foregone in peak due to amount of anchorage space and with such fewer people we have met some amazing people happy to talk to us. The best bit though has been the chance to be able to do everything we have on the budget we have. In the end we are only just starting our in life in our 20's and yet have got to see this spectacular world. For us it's 'off-Season' all the way!!

Tia and Jarvis, Over and Out!