December 30, 2008 - Hudson, Ohio, USA

Sometimes this blog pays unforeseen dividends. This week alone it has enriched our lives three times. First, we spent a wonderful day in upstate New York, visiting Sten's relatives, who, thanks to their regular visits to this blog, know us much better than they would otherwise. That sense of familiarity makes it so easy to drop in for a day and visit. Then, we received an email from a reader who might be interested in buying our boat when we return. And finally, we had an awesome visit with a long lost friend from high school and her beautiful daughter, all because she stumbled across our blog and dropped us an email. The way I figure it, currently the blog's return on investment is much healthier than that of my 401K.

Looking at a wonderful old photo album with Sten's grandmother

We blew back into Hudson late Saturday, just in time to have a late Christmas with my parents and sister on Sunday. The big hit of the day was a laser temperature probe, which my folks gave Sten, ostensibly for checking whether meat is cooked; but, in Sten's hands, it is the perfect tool for diagnosing engine problems. On Monday we drove all over Northeast Ohio in a last ditch effort to find some of the parts on our list and stock up on some can't-live-without-em American food items, including maple syrup and Hellmann's mayonnaise. On Tuesday we finished our packing - a process of sorting everything we've purchased over the past six weeks into ziplock bags, stuffing and padding, weighing, reorganizing, and weighing again and again until everything was packed into three big bags weighing 50.6, 49.9, and 50.2 lbs, and one backpack, which was bursting at the seams. As we diligently made sure that everything breakable was well padded, I suddenly understood why families flying back to India, Pakistan and China always seem to be traveling with hard-sided luggage. Unfortunately, there is no room to store anything that bulky onboard Mata'irea.

Some of my sister's beautiful and delicious Christmas cookies

December 25, 2008 - Newport, RI, USA

Happy Holidays!

Thank you all for being a part of our journey these past two years. We look forward to sharing our adventures and, if history serves as a guide, misadventures with you this coming year as we make our way across the Indian Ocean towards South Africa.

Best wishes for a joyful New Year,

Danika and Sten

December 22, 2008 - Newport, RI

This trip home has been a bit different for us than last year. We are now halfway through our trip around the world, both in terms of miles and in terms of time. And although we are very excited about the destinations coming up in the year ahead, we are also starting to consider where we want to settle when we return home to the States and how we want to live our lives when we return. Eighteen months from now we're going to be looking for work, looking for housing, and trying to start a family all at the same time. Well, maybe not simultaneously, but you get my drift.


As we've traveled around the States these past few weeks, visiting friends and family in various cities in the Midwest and Northeast, we have been paying a lot of attention to how they live their lives, and particularly how they juggle working and raising families. Some of our friends raising children work part-time, others full-time. And still others are able to have one person stay home with the children, which strikes us both as a full-time job in and of itself. Conversations like the one we had last Friday night with our friend Sarah, who, together with her husband, works full time while raising two children, provide us with a lot to think about. It seems to us that there are trade-offs to be made with every approach, and each family has to find one that works for them.


We recently realized that renting, rather than buying a home, when we first return from our trip would give us a lot more flexibility, financially and geographically. So, when Suzy mentioned that seventy of the 18th and 19th century houses that have been restored by the Newport Restoration Foundation, which was founded by Doris Duke, were available for rent, we promptly downloaded and completed an application. The waiting list is several years long, so we got ourselves down to the office today and submitted our application. Hopefully something will become available before the first frost of Winter 2010.


A few hours later, on the way home from dinner with friends in a frigid, under-insulated restaurant in Jamestown, we were both wondering what we could possibly have been thinking, planning to move back to a place that is so cold for so much of the year. But, we'll cross that bridge when we sail under it.

December 21, 2008 - Newport, RI, USA

Experimenting with the new camera in the Coast Guard Cut

We wanted to spend some time up in Boston while we were in New England. But the weather just wasn't cooperating. Our plans to head up to visit friends on Friday were scuttled by a snow storm that swung into New England, bring with it heavy snows. So instead, we made glögg, a traditional Swedish mulled wine, spiced with cardamom, cinnamon and cloves, and studded with golden raisins and blanched almonds (see below for the recipe), and trimmed the Christmas tree.

That night, while shoveling the driveway for the second time in as many hours, I experienced a "perfect moment," as described by the late, great Spalding Gray in his book Swimming to Cambodia. As Sten and I pegged each other with snowballs, my whole awareness focussed on just that instant in time. Nothing from the past and no thoughts about the future intruded on my attention. I was completely in the moment. Laughing with Sten, as we tried to hit the little bit of skin exposed between the top of the other's coat collar and the bottom edge of their hat, there was no place I'd rather have been.

The next day we hit the snow-covered roads, in the old rearwheel drive Volvo wagon. We should have put some weight in the rear; but we didn't, so we fishtailed our way north to Boston. But the scary drive was worth it to spend some time with our friends Jay and John and their baby girl.

The next morning the snow picked up again as we drove back down to Jamestown, RI to have an early Christmas celebration with Sten's father and his fiance. That night, arctic temperatures dipped down to engulf Southern New England, and the roads were covered with black ice. But luckily we'd borrowed Suzy's new 4 wheel drive vehicle, and the going was a lot easier than the trip to and from Boston.

Swedish Glögg

3 whole cardamom seeds
8 whole cloves
1 stick cinnamon
1 4-inch strip orange rind (orange part only)
1 1/3 cups water
1/4 cup blanched almonds
1/2 cup golden raisins
1 bottle Bordeaux (or substitute Cabernet Sauvignon)
1 bottle port (ruby rather than tawny)
1/2 bottle cognac
sugar to taste

Tie cardamom seeds, cloves, cinnamon and orange rind in a cheesecloth bag (or in a teaball; we tripled the amount of spices called for in the recipe above). Place in water (in an enameled cast iron pot if you have it) and bring to a boil. Simmer, covered, 10 minutes. Add almonds and raisins and simmer 10 minutes longer. Add Bordeaux, port and cognac and bring to a quick boil. Remove from heat immediately. Cool and store, covered, overnight. At serving time, remove spice bag. Heat glögg but do not boil. Add sugar to taste. Serve in heated mugs or glasses, with a few almonds and raisins in each glass.

December 18, 2008 - Newport, RI, USA

This past week has been a whirlwind of visits with friends and family. In between meals with some of our favorite people, we've been running around to all of our favorite marine vendors. I'm sure that there are other places with such a high concentration of excellent marine services, but we happen to know this place and the people here, which makes it so delightfully easy for us to get things done.

Jeff at Rigging Only in Fairhaven, Mass. spent over an hour with Sten, designing our new running backs and coming up with a custom solution to our outhaul problem. That very night, at Salvation Cafe we met up with Paul and Sonya off of Event Horizon and their friend Amy. Paul was able to point us to an off the shelf product at North Sails that would do the same thing for a bit less dosh.

$3 Margaritas. What's not to love?

The next morning we were able to check a bunch of items off of our checklist at Newport Nautical and Armchair Sailor. The second best part of this excursion was that we didn't spend a cent. Between money in our consignment account at Newport Nautical and a gift certificate to armchair, we were able to get some necessary items without draining the bank. The best part of this outing actually occurred the next day when Chris from Newport Nautical called to tell us that we'd left our notebook with our all important parts lists and measurements at the store. In his words, "You guys were the only ones in here yesterday who could have had such an extensive worklist." We must be doing something terribly wrong.

New dinghy engine parts were easily sourced that afternoon from the guys at Tony Marine. New pads for the swim ladder came from the Shipstore at New England Boatworks. At a 50% sale at Team One Newport we were able to get Sten some new shorts (to replace those in this wardrobe that are so stained that they look more like a Jackson Pollock than an article of clothing that should be worn in public). Is it any wonder that we love this town?

The only thing better than $3 margarita night at Salvation Cafe:
cardamom rolls fresh from Suzy's oven.

December 12, 2008 - Newport, RI, USA

We had to time our departure from NYC late enough in the day to miss the worst of the traffic, and early enough to make it to Defender, our favorite discount marine outfitter, with enough time to work out a warranty issue on our dinghy before they closed shop for the day. We had just enough time to also stop at a dive shop to pick up a new pair of fins for Sten and the outlets at Clinton Crossing, and still make it home in time for dinner at Sten's mom's house.

We weren't sure what kind of a reception we would receive from Lenore, our kitty cat who never took to cruising. She has, however, really taken to living with Suzy and Ingrid, Sten's mother and sister. A house that sits still, stools positioned in front of her favorite windows, lots of wet food, several laps to sit in and a small dog to boss around - what's not to like? So it is understandable that she is a little suspicious of our motives.

Okay, kitty. We promise, with all of our blog readers as witnesses, that we aren't going to make you live on a boat again. Now, can we stop with the evil eye?

December 11, 2008 - NY, NY, USA

Signs that you've been away from American culture too long:

"Who's performing?" I ask into the crowd of people standing across the street from Rockefeller Center.
"Katy Perry," responds a man standing near us.
"Who's Katy Perry?" I ask.
"You know who she is," the guy says.
"No, I really don't." I respond.

At this point, our friend Kati (no relation to the singer, despite the phonetic similarity of their names) steps in to explain that Ms. Perry sings a very popular song called "I kissed a girl." Not that that helped us.

Most people come to New York for the restaurants, the Broadway shows and the amazing shopping. We're not really Broadway show people, but we do like to eat and shop. Kati (not Perry) and her husband Chris (also not Perry - although it would be cool to be friends with an NFL player, if only for the free tickets and possibility of seeing him shoot himself with an illegal weapon in a nightclub) indulged our love of American beef steak and arranged for a babysitter so that they could join us for dinner at Morton's.

After much red meat and a few bottles of wine, we all waddled a few blocks north to meet up with Bill, another Newport friend, for an after dinner drink. Strong cocktails seemed to be the order of the evening. After one fully leaded nightcap, it was time for us all to call it quits.

The next day, while Kati and Chris juggled two kids' school and activity schedules, Sten and I made our way down to B&H Photo and Video, a mecca for shutterbugs. This photography superstore is a full city block long and is filled with knowledgeable salespeople. Sten lucked out and found a lens that he's been wanting at their used shop.

On our way to B&H, we stopped at Gray's Papaya for the Recession Special. Two anemic hot dogs and a juice drink (heavy on the corn syrup, light on the fruit) was $4.45. Although a deal by NYC standards, the Gray's Papaya dog couldn't hold a candle to the Ben's Chili Bowl half-smoke that we scarfed down in DC. In fact, after sampling hot dogs in Chicago, D.C., and New York in a relatively short time frame, we can now report that the best dogs are to be found in D.C. Shocking, I know.

December 8, 2008 - Philadelphia, PA, USA

Our stop in Philly was a great chance to catch up with our friends Matt and Monica and to visit with my Grandmother and cousin Chris. But it was also a stark reminder of how soft we've gotten after two years in the tropics. During the drive up from Philly, the snow falling, slick highway surface, and speed of travel were causing us a bit of stress - conditions that wouldn't have phased us at all two years ago. Once we were in town, we didn't want to leave Matt's house. It was just too cold to venture out doors.

Matt and Monica did coax us out a few times to visit the gastropubs in Matt's neighborhood. And we were glad they did. The food at Johnny Brendas, which just happens to be managed by one of my college roommates, and N. 3rd was great. But since we'd already seen the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall during my college days in Philly, and since we were maxed out on museums after 3 days in DC, we were really content to hang around Matt's and watch Firefly, Joss Whedon's absolutely brilliant, prematurely canceled, sci-fi series. When we'd overdosed on space cowboys, Matt took us back to the wild west via a screening of The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, a classic featuring John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart. Watching these sorts of things with Matt is a terrific education for us as he patiently explains to us what makes them important facets of our popular culture.

December 6, 2008 - Washington, D.C., USA

After a wonderful Thanksgiving and birthday with my folks and sister, Sten and I hit the road on Wednesday. Washington D.C. would be our first stop on a loop that will take us up the east coast to Rhode Island for Christmas and then back to Ohio in time to fly back to Singapore on New Year's Eve. We stayed with our friends Jar and Cara in their new home in an old D.C. row house. Sten and I love old houses and we were blown away by the original details in their home.

Jar and Cara gave us the low down on what was new in town, so we spent our days visiting museums that had recently reopened and newly opened exhibits. Our timing was eerily perfect on both days of touring. We kept wandering into museums just as their complimentary highlights tours were beginning. At the recently reopened American History Museum, we loved hearing the history of the first Washington Monument, a gaudy thing with George's head slapped on Zeus's body. At the Natural History Museum, we were fascinated by the docent's description of the taxidermy methods used in the state of the art Mammals exhibit, and by a tiny vial of diamond dust that we would have overlooked entirely, but which, at 4.6 billion years old, is the oldest known material on the planet earth.

We were less impressed by the new Capital Visitor Center, which cost $621 million to build, which was more than $350 million over original projections, and is basically just a large air-conditioned waiting room. Before the CVC opened, tourists would wait outside in the sticky humidity of summer, or the bitter cold of winter, to enter the rotunda and see the original Senate chamber. Now, we can check our coats, wait indoors, and see an inspirational film before taking the tour. The space is very nice, but seemed like an odd thing to spend that much money on.

The American economy is currently sucking wind. As a result, there are amazing retail bargains to be found. These past two weeks we've had a great time shopping, restocking on t-shirts and skirts to wear in the tropics at bargain basement prices. While we've been taking advantage of the low prices and recession specials, the US auto manufacturers have been trying to convince Congress to bail them out. After being ridiculed by Congress for flying down to D.C. from Detroit on three separate corporate jets to beg the American taxpayer for money, this time around they drove several prototype green vehicles down to D.C. from Detroit. We kept seeing them parked around town.

Our first day in town we had to go to Ben's Chili Bowl for our lunch break. After munching down a half-smoke covered with chili, while surrounded by Secret Service Agents, we were refreshed and ready to do some more museums. Our second day we revisited the American Indian Museum for lunch and had a really good meal of burritos and tacos from the Meso-American counter.

Each night, after they got home from work, we would catch-up with Jar and Cara over dinner. Our first night in town they took us out for Ethiopian. Neither Sten nor I have ever had it before, and after reading Camilla Gibb's Sweetness in The Belly, I was really excited to try injera, a sour bread, and inky dark Ethiopian coffee.

On our last morning in town, we caught up with our friends Graham and Eryn, with whom we stayed during our visit to D.C. last year. It was fun to see the progress they've made on their home in the last year and to hear about their new jobs.

November 30, 2008 - Hudson, OH, USA

Sten and I are both still jet lagged. Our first evening back in Hudson, I passed out before my sister made it home from the airport. The next day, Sten fell asleep in the middle of the Off 5th outlet.
All this napping causes us to be awake at very odd hours. The past few days, I've gotten up obscenely early, made myself a short pot of Kona, warmed up one of Alena's sticky buns, and sat down at the computer.

I've gone back through our blog posts and labeled them. Part of the motivation was to make the blog more usable as a resource for those following in our wake. For example, if someone is looking for information on Beveridge Reef, rather than having to dig back through the archives to find relevant posts, all they have to do is click on the link on the right side of the screen and all our posts about Beveridge will pop up on one screen. I also know that there are people out there that love the stories about Sten's fishing exploits (Sten refers to these folks as "his readers"). Those folks can now click on Fish Tales, and go right to them, without having to read all my blather about cocktails and provisioning.

The first questions we always get from new non-cruising friends are almost always fear-based. "Aren't you afraid of pirates?" Not so much (at least not since we decided to skip the Gulf of Aden). "Have you ever run into any bad weather?" Yup, follow the link to the Bermuda Triangle. But what really keeps us up at night are more mundane concerns about running into stuff or other boats running into us. Read all about the riskier moments of this trip by clicking on the Too Close for Comfort Link. As you'll see, French charter boats strike much more fear into our hearts than pirates.

Even the deer came for the Thanksgiving feast

November 24, 2008 - Chicago, IL, USA

"When you wake up in the morning, Pooh," said Piglet at last, "what's the first thing you say to yourself?"
"What's for breakfast?" said Pooh. "What do you say, Piglet?"
"I say, I wonder what's going to happen exciting today?" said Piglet.
Pooh nodded thoughtfully. "It's the same thing," he said.

On Saturday morning, while the guys were still sleeping off the night before and I was nursing a pot of coffee at the dining room table, Deb headed to the gym. When she returned, she was loaded down with bagels, cream cheese and lox. Angel! One of Sten's and my strongest cravings after a year overseas was for a bagel and lox sandwich. For the next few mornings - after the party/ping pong tourney at Dan's studio that went until 4am and the late night of sushi take out and Lost episodes at Kate's house - we would roll out of bed (in my case, usually only 3 hours after falling into it - damn jet lag) and soothe our tummies and cravings with bagels and lox.

But after 4 nights and 3 days of partying, and no lox left in the fridge, there was only one thing left to do: brunch. So, on our last morning in town, we headed over to the Bongo Room with Kate, PJ and Rob. Weaving through the tables on our way to our booth at the the back of the room, I was shocked at the amount of food on the plates we passed. We ordered judiciously, or so I had thought, but we still wound up with a huge amount of food on the table. American portion sizes really are bigger than anything we have seen anywhere else. But where else can you have a breakfast consisting of omelettes, hash browns, breakfast burritos, and pancakes with pears, caramel and vanilla flecked whipped cream, or peanut butter chips, bananas, and white and dark chocolate, or pumpkin, carrot, and cinnamon spice topping? We've been in a breakfast rut on board Mata'irea lately (it has been too hot to make anything but coffee and yogurt), but after brunch at the Bongo Room, we're full of inspiration for new things to try when we return to the boat.

We had a great visit to Chicago. We didn't see any sights or visit any museums. We were having too much fun catching up with old friends, like Bob and Krissy who drove up from Indiana on Saturday, to venture out to see how the city had changed in our absence. When we realized on Sunday night that we hadn't taken any pictures in a few days, we looked around to see that the only ones who were still bright-eyed and bushy-tailed were Lucy and Zoe, who both have four legs and wear collars. The rest of us all looked like we had been on a three day bender, and nobody needs that documented.

November 21, 2008 - Sweet Home Chicago

Our trip back to the States got off to a fairly rocky start when Sten, wearing an old pair of shoes with no tread on them and carrying a 50lb piece of luggage, stepped off the boat in the pre-dawn dark, onto a wet dock, and slipped and fell, whacking his head on Mata'irea's stainless steal rub rail. We checked for blood, and since the wound was only slightly sticky and Sten could still tell me who the President was, we headed for the airport, rather than the hospital. And we decided that our first order of business in Chicago was to get the boy a new pair of shoes.

Singapore's airport consistently wins awards for being the best airport in the world. It is spacious and clean. The lines move quickly. The trams come immediately (we happen to know this because Sten and I are completely incapable of starting a long trip in the correct terminal). They provide free internet terminals throughout the airport, some of which are stationed right at the gates. If you have a long layover there, you can go watch a free movie or check into a transit hotel to catch some shuteye. It is easily the nicest airport we've ever been in.

Our layover in Tokyo was a let down after Singapore, but we were entertained by the Japanese cultural experiences offered to travelers. You could sit down with a little old lady and learn how to do origami, or join a slightly younger woman for a traditional tea ceremony. We were also entertained by the bizarre foods available at the duty free shops.

Who's up for a green tea Kit Kat?

But the most entertaining thing was looking out the windows of the terminal and seeing the sun setting at 4:15. The last time we saw the sun set before 6pm was when we were home for the holidays (back in the high latitudes) last year. In the tropics, there is no long sunset or sunrise. The sun drops out of the sky like a coconut falling from a tree at the same time every day. In the morning, it rockets back out of the sea. Only poets living in the high latitudes would write verses about Dawn's rosy fingers traipsing across the sky.

We flew through the night, and arrived at Chicago O'Hare in the middle of the afternoon, 20 some hours after leaving the boat. We were picked up at the airport by our good friends, Kate and PJ, and taken back to their house to hang out for a few hours while snow fell outside, before meeting up with some more friends for 'ritas and burgers. When we got to Deb and Mike's house, they showed us to our room for the weekend and handed us a cell phone to use while we are town. I can confidently say, we have the best group of friends in the whole world. It is good to be home.

When we planned our trip home this year, we decided to stop in Chicago for a few days on the way to my parent's house for Thanksgiving, rather than visiting our friends here over New Years, as we've done the past few years. The reasoning was two fold:

1. If we want to spend some time cruising Malaysia and Thailand in January before pushing on to the Andamans in February, we need to get back to Singapore earlier rather than later, so we're flying back on New Years.
2. We were really jonesing for some of Rick Bayless's Mexican cooking. Every time we've come to Chicago for New Years, Rick's restaurants are closed for their seasonal holiday. So by showing up in November, we actually get a chance to eat in our favorite restaurant.
   

If there is one thing that you can't get outside of Mexico or a few cities in the US with big populations of Mexican immigrants, it is excellent Mexican cuisine. We've found that we can find pretty good sushi, Italian and Chinese anywhere in the world, but good Mexican is something that can only be found in the Western Hemisphere. I'm not talking about TexMex here, which is what most people around the world equate with Mexican cuisine, as that is what is served at the few Mexican restaurants we've encountered around the world. Anyway, when we are overseas, or even in Boston, we get serious cravings for Mexican food, which can only be satisfied by a steak taco night at our place (wherever that happens to be at the time) or a trip back to Chicago.

In the summer of 1997 we decided to move to Chicago over margaritas at the bar at Frontera Grill. Our love affair with this fantastic city and Mexican food began that night. It has been years since we've been to chef Rick Bayless's fancier joint, Topolobampo, which happens to be one of the Obama's favorite restaurants (click here for a mouthwatering audio slideshow of Rick Bayless preparing one of our favorite dishes; there are rumors circulating that Rick is going to be tapped as the new White House chef, but he is denying them), so we decided to make some reservations for our first afternoon back in town.

After hitting Nordstrom's to buy Sten some shoes that will not cause him bodily harm, we battled our way through the freezing blast of Chicago's winter wind to get to Topolobampo. The temperature display on one building we passed read 25 degrees. Our faces and lungs hurt from the cold air and we realized how soft we'd gotten in two years in the tropics. But our first bite of guacamole made it all worth it.

Halfway through lunch my jetlag caught up with me (I'd been up since 3am) and by the time we got back to Deb and Mike's it was all I could do to shrug off my coat before falling into bed. Sten sacked out on the couch until Deb and Mike made it home from work. Later on, Kate and PJ, Rob and Jodi, and the infamous Sid all came over for some beer and pizza, Euchre (it is statistically impossible to have 3 or more Ohioans in a room and not play Euchre) and Xbox Rock Band.

Xbox Rock Band - the most fun I've ever had sober. Oh wait, I wasn't sober.

At 2:30am we decided that we were so good that it would be a shame to keep our talent to ourselves. We headed to the local karaoke bar, only to find it shut. Then we grabbed some cabs to the next joint, only to find it closed as well. As Kate said, "I haven't been this young in years." At that point we decided to take the hint and call it a night as we had plans to reconvene at a bar in a few hours for the Ohio State - Michigan Game.