A Sign of Life – and a New Boat
Dear friends, family and readers of this blog,
You’ve probably noticed that things have gotten pretty quiet here over the last two years. Don’t worry, that doesn’t mean I’ve given up sailing. On the contrary, I’m enjoying it more than ever.
The radio silence has two reasons:
- I was pretty busy with BoatHowTo and KlabauterShop
- I’ve been traveling much slower lately than at the start of my journey. And over the last four years, sailing life has become “normal” for me. That doesn’t mean my life is boring now. But it’s no longer so new that every anchorage is worth a blog post.
That’s why I will continue this blog in a different format from now on. Fewer travel reports, more general thoughts on sailing, entrepreneurship as a digital nomad and life on the road.
But first I would like to briefly bring you up to date. After a late summer 2021 in the north of Sardinia, I spent the winter in Cagliari, in the south of the island.
The next summer we sailed via the Egadi Islands, along the northern coast of Sicily to the Aeolian Islands. Then through the Strait of Messina, along the sole of the Italian boot and then from Crotone to Greece. Ahora spent August, September and October in the Ionian Sea between Kefalonia and Corfu.
At the end of October 2022, we hauled the boat out in Preveza. That was also my last trip with the “old” ahora. Because it was now clear: I needed a bigger boat.
When I bought Ahora in 2016, the plan was to sail around the world on a shoestring budget for 3-4 years. 3-4 years later I had “only” sailed around Europe instead of the world. But in the meantime I founded two companies. This had the side effect that my travel horizon has expanded from “as long as the money lasts” to “as long as it’s fun”. Sailing has turned for me from a journey to a way of life.
As much as I had taken the old ahora to my heart, it was a bit too small for me to live on board permanently. No standing headroom, no door to the toilet, no shower and no running water were no problem for a temporary phase. But in the long run I would like to have a little more comfort in my floating home.
And so I spent a large part of the winter of 2022 looking for the perfect new boat. And finally I found it on Leros, a Greek island on the Turkish border. It’s a Malö 39!
Hopefully soon I will explain why a Malö and why I can’t imagine a better boat for comfortable sailing trips in a separate post.
If you’re interested in sailing updates, check out my Instagram or Facebook pages. There I (irregularly, depending on my mood) post stories about my life on board.
Greetings from the new “ahora”!
Jan
P.S.: The old ahora has ended up in good hands! The new owners have sailed the boat to Montenegro and I am sure they will take good care of the old lady.