Made for Cruising

Cruising aboard Winnie The Pooh, or WTP, as she is called; Mark and Joyce have spent the last seven months on their custom 46' trawler that first started life as a Heritage West Indies 46 Ketch called Southern Princess. WTP is a Charlie Morgan designed cruising sailboat with a broad 15' beam and lots of interior room. Winnie The Pooh has been to the Bahamas six times, up the Tennessee River twice, and up and down the East Coast at least a half a dozen times. We recently caught up with Mark and Joyce about a week shy of their homecoming near Fort Myers, Florida, after a long trip down the eastern seaboard and exciting adventure to Canada.
Mark and Joyce have been together for the last three years and during that time it seems like most of it, has been spent on the water. Nevertheless, we thought it was an excellent occasion to meet one of cruising's happiest couples. JG: Where were you born and raised Mark?MR: Cincinnati, Ohio. JG: Where did this passion for boating come from?MR: When I was three years old my family bought a 14-foot Runabout and we all learned to ski and aquaplane. When I was a little older we bought an 11-foot sailboat, and I was sailing when I was about 7 or 8. JG: Since you been an adult have you gone through a series of boats?MR: When I first moved to Florida out of college, I moved to West Palm Beach and before I found a place to live I bought a Hobie Cat sailboat! A few years later I bought a Pearson 26' sailboat and that was my first cruising boat that I went to the Bahamas on and that was to learn what I didn't know about cruising. My next boat was ex-IRA racing boat and I did extensive modifications on that boat and I cut the keel down from 7-feet to 5-feet. And then Winnie The Pooh came along. JG: My question is how did you come up with the name Winnie the Pooh?MR: Well, our first boat was a sailboat called, "Tigger." It just seemed like the next logical name because this boat is wider, and rounder in the rear, so this boat is a Winnie The Pooh.JG: How long have you been out on this current adventure?MR: Well, our trip will be seven months when we get back from Florida to Canada and back. JG: Where do you call home?
MR: We have a home now that we bought two years ago in Ortona, Florida, which is on the Okeechobee Waterway near Fort Myers. Before I met Joyce, I built this boat and started cruising on it with my ex-wife. That trip started in 1997. JG: So you've had this current boat nine years now?MR: Yes, plus the four-and-a-half years I spent rebuilding her. The boat originally was a Heritage West Indies 46' Ketch. It was a Charlie Morgan design and it was dismasted in Hurricane Hugo down in Puerto Rico. I bought the boat as a wreck and rebuilt her as a trawler. I put a new John Deere 80 horsepower diesel in her. JG: Before you met Joyce was she a sailor?MR: Yes she has done more extensive cruising than I have and then she has crossed the Pacific Ocean. She cruised the Caribbean first and then she crossed the Pacific to New Zealand, on a trimaran. JG: So the two of you started seven months ago and where has your journey taken you?MR: Well, this trip started seven months ago and we went up the East Coast on the ICW. We traveled the Hudson River, the Erie Canal, the Oswego Canal, cruised the Thousand Islands a little bit. Then it was on to Ontario, Canada and the Rideau Canal, which took us up to Ottawa. Then down the Ottawa River to Montreal. From there it was on to the St. Lawrence River and the Richelieu Canal, which goes on to Lake Champlain. Lake Champlain dumps you in the Hudson River again and then back down the East Coast. JG: What were some of the highlights for you Mark?MR: The canals of Canada were magnificent. I just loved the people there and the small towns along the way. We stayed for nine days in downtown Ottawa on the canal wall. We went to all the museums and the nightlife there and it was just a great place to be. It is very different than traveling by car and you travel so much slower that you get to see more. Every evening is time free and if you meet somebody in the town maybe you have them over for the boat or something. It is a lot of fun that way. JG: Hi Joyce, are you anxious to get home?JR: Well, I'm kind of homesick. For men I think continual cruising is fine but for us ladies, I believe we like to have a main base connection [laughter].JG: I know you have an extensive sailing and cruising background, however, over the last seven months what have been some of the highlights for you?JR: The people we've met and seeing all the different little towns along the journey. The cruisers we've met and getting to a town and finding out where to go to buy groceries. The restaurants and all the different little experiences along the way. Every place in Canada has been enjoyable from the little parks to meeting the people. You can see the locals having a picnic or perhaps fishing. Meeting those people is one of the things that makes cruising so much fun. JG: When I have spoken with cruisers in the past they always say being on the water is great but it is the people you meet along the way that makes everything so memorable. JR: Oh yes, and on this trip that has been the case. We've gone to farmer's markets, outdoor concerts and you get to enjoy the town folks and their lives. At night time they have activities in the little town squares and we just sit down and join them and it has been so fun! That is what has made it very special to me.JG: Joyce where did you grow up and how did you get involved in boating?JR: Mark has been actually boating a lot longer than I have. He started as a little boy but for me I grew up in Taiwan. I always enjoyed being around the water. I didn't really get involved in the cruising life until about nine years ago. Before that I had only been involved in deep sea fishing and fancy cruise ships. About nine years ago my ex-boyfriend had built a trimaran and he suggested that I learn to sail. So, we took a trip to the Bahamas and I was scared to death. There was nothing to prepare you to live on a boat and listen to the wind. It was a totally new environment and I was very nervous. We spent one month in the Bahamas and I just loved the water, swimming, catching fish and lobster and it opened a different type of lifestyle to me. We came back and I returned to work and on weekends we would sail a little bit and go down to the Keys. As time went on I remembered the quiet anchorages we had been at and I missed the sunsets. Then catching something for dinner at night or getting together for another couple at sunset while telling stories.
JG: So them you started thinking about bigger adventures?JR: Yes, we left in the year 2000 and we sailed through the Caribbean. We went to Colombia and on to the Panama Canal and from there to the Marquesas Islands. Then on to the Society Islands and we were gone for three years. I sailed all the way to New Zealand. However, I left. I like the challenge but the relationship was not working out so I left. So I came home and went back to work and my lifestyle was not as fulfilling. I felt like a bird in a cage [laughter]. JG: So how did you meet Mark and how did that come about?JR: We actually met through E-mail. He was looking for crew and he had just been through a divorce and we just met through this website. We communicated through E-mail and then he started calling me every night. We talked for three months and then he came down to meet me and after we met everything just worked out. We have together over three years! We cruised until we bough a house two years ago. We spent part of last year cruising down the Tennessee Tombigbee Waterway, all the way to Nashville. JG: So the three years that you have been together you have spent a fair amount of time once again cruising. It sounds to me that you both have a passion for being on the water and outdoors.JR: Oh yes, we love it! It is just fortunate that we found each other. It has been great and we really have been enjoying this lifestyle. JG: But you are looking forward to getting home in a couple of days?JR: Yes [laughter]. We are looking forward to being home but the two of us are so fortunate because we have the best of both worlds. We live in a little community that our neighbors are all cruisers or former cruisers. So when we are at home we have a cruising mentality in our neighborhood. When we are out cruising our neighbors are keeping an eye on our place. Everyone understands and you don't have to explain anything. It is a simple lifestyle but very enjoyable. JG: Being a live aboard isn't a life for everyone but it seems as if for you and Mark it works. There is harmony on your boat.JR: It is a slower life. We enjoy seeing nature and birds up close and you don't see that from the highway. Like today we saw hundreds and hundreds of these huge pelicans diving in front of us. Then there were a number of islands connecting together in this Mosquito Lagoon we were cruising by.JG: Mark, you mentioned that you rebuilt your boat and that must have been a lot of work and a lot of fun at the same time?MR: It was a big project and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I would never want to do it again [laughter] because it was a one time deal. JG: Are you happy the way everything has turned out for you?MR: Oh, yes. I've lived on this boat fulltime for seven years until we bought the house two years ago. I mentioned that I put a new John Deere engine on it and I just turned over 6,000 hours on it to give you an idea just how much cruising I have done. JG: Now when you aren't cruising the rivers and going to Canada what is your profession?MR: Well, I do electrical boat work and I do it cruising as well as when I am home. I had a number of jobs along the way on this trip, including a one week job on a trawler in New Jersey. I work directly with the owners, usually they work with me on the boats and they learn what to do to maintain their system. They learn how it works and they help make the decision on how to wire things. There are hundreds of ways to wire a boat and which one is right for you depends on what kind of cruising you are going to do. I try to educate them as I go along with solving their problems. JG: I asked Joyce but I'm curious to get your answer. You obviously have a passion for boating and cruising, but can you explain why?MR: I not sure I can put it into words. A part of it is that I like to live in a way that is inexpensive enough that I don't have to work fulltime. I like traveling a lot and trawling by boat in a trawler is a good way to travel for long periods of time inexpensively. I really don't like the type of traveling where you jet into some place and you stay in a hotel and then you dash around to the tourist things, then fly back a week or two later. That doesn't do it for me. I need to become part of the local culture and get to know people. Instead of the major tourist attractions, I like the minor tourist attractions [laughter]. The local bar that just has the best ham and cheese grilled sandwich. Or perhaps a bakery in the little town of Chambly in Canada, which was the best French bakery, I had ever been in. We were in the town for three days and we went to the bakery six times. And in addition to the locals you always meet the cruisers and that is what always makes it such a great experience. The next time you just happened to encounter a 46-foot trawler that looks like she might have been a sailboat at one time, well, be sure and say hello to the crew. The happy couple aboard will be Mark and Joyce and they have a few stories to tell.