It’s been seven years now since we bought Eoti, our Moody 46. Seven years since we first saw her sitting in a boatyard in Charleston, South Carolina, looking like someone had given up. She was rough, to put it kindly. Her windshield had been shattered by the yard, she’d taken a hit during Superstorm Sandy, and while the repairs had held up well, it was obvious the previous owner had reached the end of his rope. He told us he was selling the boat so he could buy a trawler. His wife had other ideas—right before the deal closed, she told him there’d be no trawler in his future. She wanted an RV instead.
We’d spent almost nine years looking for the right boat. Boat shows in Annapolis, Miami, and Chicago. Walking the docks until our feet hurt, climbing aboard countless boats, stepping over thresholds, feeling the sway beneath us, and imagining what it would be like to call that particular hull home. We knew what we were looking for—a boat that could take us across oceans, give us enough room to live comfortably, and, most importantly, keep us safe when the weather turned.
We thought we’d found it in Eoti. We were right—eventually.
The Purchase
The survey was… well, it was a mess. The broker recommended the surveyor, and that was mistake number one. If there’s one piece of advice I can give to anyone buying a boat, it’s this: never use the surveyor the broker recommends. They have a financial interest in getting the deal done, not in making sure you know exactly what you’re getting into.
We didn’t realize how much had been missed until later—after the papers were signed, the money transferred, and the keys were in my hand. But that’s how it goes. The excitement of finally getting the boat you’ve dreamed about clouds your judgment. You tell yourself it’ll all work out. That you’ll fix what needs fixing. That the surveyor probably didn’t miss anything too important.
That’s how you end up scraping diesel bug out of your fuel tank in the middle of nowhere.
First Sail
After signing the paperwork, it was just me. Sydney and the twins, Simon and Stuart, were flying in later, but for now, I was alone. Solo. Standing on the deck of my new boat, wondering what the hell I’d gotten myself into.
I cast off the lines and motored out of the yard. My first time single-handing her. She was sluggish under power, but responsive. Getting out of the yard wasn’t the problem—getting to the dock was. I had a reservation at the Mega Dock in Charleston. They directed me to pull into the non-floating section.
“We’re not ready for you,” they said.
I was confused. Not as confused as the dockhands, apparently. I brought her in bow-first, gentle as a whisper. The bow line carefully placed so a dockhand could easily reach it and help me land her. The dockhands tied her off hard—too hard. No slack to swing. I opened my mouth to say something when the starboard navigation light hit a piling and launched into low orbit. I think it’s still out there somewhere, drifting toward Jupiter.
I might have yelled. The dockhands loosened the lines. Suddenly, a better slip was available down the dock—on the floating section this time. I backed her out, swung around, and slid her in cleanly. No drama. No more damage. I was figuring her out already.
Cleaning Her Out
Sydney and the boys arrived a couple of days later. I picked them up from the airport and hit Target and Walmart for supplies—trash bags, gloves, cleaning supplies, the works. I wish I could say we were over-prepared, but nothing could have prepared us for what we found.
Sixty. That’s how many trash bags we filled in a single day. Sixty bags of garbage pulled out of the bowels of that boat.
Old clothes, shoes, books, rusty tools, used sanitation lines, half-empty bottles of oil and teak treatment, random bits of wire and plumbing. A gallon-sized Ziploc bag full of seasickness meds—no idea how old. Moldy life jackets. Expired flares. Expired fire extinguishers. Eyeglasses with lenses too scratched to see through.
We found diesel bug in the tanks and slime in the water lines, but that came later. That first day, it was all about triage—get the trash off the boat and start scrubbing.
We went at her with bleach and vinegar, wiping down every surface, tearing out rotten bedding and disintegrating upholstery. We replaced every piece of safety gear—life jackets, flares, signals. If it was meant to save our lives, it wasn’t worth the risk of trusting the old stuff.
The First Passage
Three days in, we had a weather window. Nothing spectacular—We had a schedule and that is mistake number two. Never sail to a schedule. Choose where but not when. The when will always get you into trouble. As we pointed the bow south the wind freshened on our stern and Eoti surged ahead.
Did I mention five minutes after we left the dock, we were boarded by the USCG? A full tactical team? And thoroughly searched. When I told them we had just bought the boat, they were like, “Yeah, right.” Cue a deep sense of foreboding. Did I mention that I had just left a job working with the deputy commandant of the USCG? If we got arrested, he was going to be my first call. Then I pulled all the paperwork out and showed them. The team suddenly became a lot more friendly. When they asked to see the y-valves, we were like.. Ok? Sydney said let’s go for an adventure and find them together. The newness of the safety devices impressed the officers, the pictures of the bags of junk impressed them more, and the fact we already had life jackets (inflatable harnesses) on sealed the deal. They wished us luck.
We motored out into the Atlantic with a stiff breeze from the Northwest. I was at the helm. Sydney was trimming sails. The boys were watching everything eagerly, probably wondering what kind of insane midlife crisis had driven their parents to this.
Eoti heeled over in the wind. She dug into the swell and surged forward. This boat with a clean bottom, full sails, and a crew with no sense is a rocket ship. The deck hummed beneath my feet, and the salt spray caught in my hair. For the first time, I felt her come alive.
We weren’t ready for a big passage yet—not even close—but there we were. The boat was sound. The hull was strong. The rigging would hold. The sails were in better shape than we’d hoped.
Sydney and I sat in the cockpit that evening as the boat crested ever larger waves, watching the sun dip toward the horizon. The boys were asleep below. We were exhausted, but it didn’t matter.
We were finally doing it. We were living the life we’d dreamed about for almost a decade.
The Reality of Cruising
Living aboard a sailboat sounds romantic. Sunsets over calm water. Dolphins in the bow wake. Drinks in the cockpit while the anchor sets. And yeah, there’s some of that.
But there’s also the other side. The nights when you lie awake in a storm, wondering if the anchor will hold. The times when the engine won’t start, or the rigging let loose at night, or the watermaker clogs, or the head backs up at the worst possible moment. The long, hot days spent covered in grease, with scraped knuckles and bruised shins.
That first night sailing south, the expected 2 to 3-foot seas rapidly became 5 to 7-foot seas. I looked at the weather again and again. I listened to the weather on the VHF, but the rollers were getting larger, and we had 12 to 15-second periods and then 20-second periods as the waves hit 12 feet. I read the chart with my penlight, wondering what the heck I should do next. Less than three days of ownership of a boat, and I was feeling very much like I had seriously screwed up.
Then the inner forestay with the staysail attached let go at the deck. The pin had fallen out. I decreased sail rapidly and went to the bow. The deck was going up…. Then up… then up.. then down. Yeehaw. After I wrangled the furler back onto the deck. Got it tied down I looked at the pin. It had been put in backward. Waiting for an opportune moment. The mast pumped. The pin slid in. The cotter pin was placed correctly. I was tired. And we started south again.
Living aboard a boat means solving problems every day. Big ones and small ones. It means learning to live with less. Less space. Less comfort. Less certainty.
But it also means more. More connection. More self-reliance. More awe at the raw power of the sea.
It means standing on the deck at night, surrounded by nothing but stars and ocean, and knowing that you got yourself there. No one else.
Lessons Learned
Seven years in, we know Eoti like the back of our hands. We’ve rebuilt the plumbing. Rewired the electrical. Replaced the standing rigging. Overhauled the engine. Fixed leaks and cracks and systems that never should have broken in the first place.
We’ve sailed tens of thousands of miles. Faced storms. Lost sails. Caught fish. Made friends in anchorages from the Bahamas to Baltimore. Said goodbye to too many of them.
Sydney’s been through more than her share of storms—on land and at sea. Cancer’s no joke. But she’s tough, and so is Eoti. They both keep going.
Would we do it again? Probably. Knowing what we know now, maybe we’d negotiate harder on the price. Maybe we’d have skipped that first survey. But the truth is, this life isn’t for everyone. You have to want it. You have to be willing to bleed for it sometimes.
But when the sails are full, and the horizon stretches out in front of you… there’s nothing like it. We made it to the seven-year itch. Will we make it to the ten-year mark?
Suggested Reading
If you want to understand the highs and lows of life at sea, pick up Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World. Slocum was the first person to sail solo around the world, and his story captures the mix of courage, madness, and stubborn resolve that defines life on the water.
