The last entry in the Urios Visitors Logbook:

Judy Lin
Urios Around Crew

December 29, 2003: English Harbor, Antigua
17 degrees, 00 minutes North; 61 degrees, 45 minutes West
to
November 20, 2004: Noumea, New Caledonia
22 degrees, 16 minutes South; 166 degrees, 26 minutes East

10,087 miles of the Ultimate Progressive Sailing Adventure

Mark Twain said: "Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

Reading these words again that so inspired me then, I find myself amazed and extremely proud to have literally lived the quote this past year. As I sit in front of my computer, back on solid ground and poised on re-entry into the “real world,” last year sometimes feels like it was a wonderful dream that couldn’t have really happened...

It’s amazing how quickly it all comes rushing right back to you – a life where wireless internet, 24-hours stores and washing machines are completely normal and having a hot fresh water shower anytime I want isn’t as indulgent as it was a mere month ago. Life was definitely different! Being away for over a year puts things in perspective in so many ways. As glamorous as sailing around the world sounds, it wasn’t just a vacation, it was also just life. Don’t get me wrong, there was plenty that made it a vacation in the most indulgent and escapist of ways. We had sunny weather, amazing scenery, new things to learn and experience every day, no obligations except to the boat and our crew, and all the time we wanted to ourselves. There were the days when you can’t imagine ever doing anything else, but there were also plenty of days when you wonder why you ever left home. While I love the image of me sitting on deck in white shorts daintily sipping ti-punch on a gently swaying boat, more often then not, I was wet and salty and trying to winch a sail on a rocking boat in the blazing sun. However, it was the real change of pace and lifestyle, the new experiences, and the shift of priorities that made it a life-changing journey and not just an extended sailing trip.

You go on a trip like this thinking that you’ll come back a totally different person. But, an experience like this probably doesn’t change you outwardly that much or give you answers to anything outright. I think it just gives you a greater sense of perspective and better sense of self. You see other ways of life which make you appreciate what you have and realize the beauty of simplicity. You learn to be more patient and focus on the moment you are in rather than worry about the future or the past. And, you come to expand what you consider to be “normal.” It is then when you get back to your real world that the change in you becomes more obvious – consciously or not, you know who you are, you trust your own instincts and are more confident about making choices, and you want a simpler life that’s based on the right priorities. At the end of the day, I’m the same old Judy, someone who has lots of decisions to make about a career, lifestyle, city, etc. and who is still wondering how it’ll turn out. I have yet to figure it all out, but if I’ve learned anything in the last year it’s that things work out the way they’re supposed to if you have a little faith. I’m completely comfortable with the fact that there is more in life to figure out!

While I was always within 30 feet of another person 24 hours a day seven days a week for almost a year straight, I surprisingly had a lot of time to myself. There were at least 50 nights at sea where it was just me and my thoughts out on a big ocean. That’s a lot of hours in the dark. As much as I dreaded it at times, the best thing about those long hours was that it was just time for me. For the uber-multi-tasking-Type-A person that I was, not always doing something or being productive on watch like reading or writing was a challenge at first. But in the end I learned the important lesson of how to just “be.” To be able to just sit and do nothing because you can, and because you should every once in a while. Peinard, tranquille. So, I did. I sat and thought a lot about everything and a lot about nothing...

- I thought about cargo ships and fishing boats. No matter how much I have learned about navigation at night and being able to judge distance and threat by angles and colors of mast lights, as soon as I see any glimmer of light on the horizon I still get nervous. Once I even woke Greg up because I swore that a tiny red light in the distance was getting bigger too fast and I thought it was a cargo bearing down on and about to crash into us... Another glance as Gregory was quickly flipping on mast lights, and it ends up it was just the moon rising on the horizon. Oops!
- I thought about a friend who just started his own sailing adventure. How excited I am for the things he is going to see and experience and how much I am looking forward to the time when we’ll be able to sit down and share stories.
- I thought about my grandfather who passed away while I was gone, and how he lived a long full 95 years of life. He left this world surrounded by his 9 children who were together for the first time in 58 years. Grandpa left an amazing legacy of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren who will always think of him.
- I thought about dolphins and how it really feels like winning the lottery when you see them!
- I thought about Apparent Wind, which is pretty much Sailing Lesson #1. If you’re sailing exactly upwind at five knots and there is ten knots of wind, then it feels like there is 15 knots of wind. If you’re sailing downwind at five knots and there is ten knots of wind, then it feels like there is five knots of wind. This simple concept is a fundamental principle of sailing, but somewhere in there is probably a good lesson about life. There is the way things really are and there is the way things feel/seem to be to you – knowing the difference between the two is necessary to navigate and get to your destination. Another take on it is that when you’re fighting the flow you really feel the resistance, but when you’re going with the flow then you sail in comfort and with ease. I think it probably applies somehow to your calling in life... Something more to think about.
- I thought about how I got here. It was a series of decisions and actions that came together to form a path. It’s not worth trying to analyze it too much though because really, it’s just life. I just consider myself lucky to be here.
- I thought about all the people that I’ve met and how everyone has a story. We all physically may have come to the same place at the same time, literally, but everyone has gotten here because of their own unique series of decisions and actions. There really is no use in comparing lives or timelines because everyone’s story is distinctly their own.
- I thought about a farewell lunch I had with a friend in Atlanta and the conversation we had about doing what makes you happy. Life is too short and I think I lived life a little bit more in everything I did on this trip. I had to because this wonderful person didn’t have enough time on this earth.

In September 2003 I quit my job, sold my car, and went sailing. I knew that I didn’t want to live where I was living anymore and I knew that I needed a break from the job I was doing, but I honestly didn’t know what I wanted from a 3-6 month trip on a sailboat. Last year was full of unexpected surprises. I found courage I didn’t think I had and learned to do things I didn’t think I could ever do. I saw and experienced things that I’d never even dreamed about. I gained a sense of adventure and ease that I only could have gotten by completely breaking away from the life I knew. I met incredible people that will be lifelong friends. I guess getting out there and doing the real thing was the only way for to do it, even though it seemed like a pretty crazy thing to do at the beginning. So, thanks to a little bit of luck, a little bit of courage, and a whole lot of joie de vivre, a thirty-something-city-dweller-landlubber became a salty-ish sailor. It’s amazing what can become of a tiny idea that you have in the back of your mind! I have to always remember that.

13,000 miles and 14 months later, my grand adventure is over and this is the last blog entry for your inbox. It’s been such an amazing ride! Thank you so much for reading along, keeping up with me (or at least trying to), and for all your wonderful support. Every message and all the good karma meant so much to me! I hope that my stories will inspire you to go and meet the friendly people of Samoa in person or see the untouched world of the Galapagos Islands for yourselves. Or, at the very least, I hope you felt like you were there with me... At the end of it all, I didn’t miss a single thing while I was away except you all – my friends and my family.

They say a picture says a thousand words, so the 8,223 pictures of my grand sailing adventure must say it all (to see my "Best Of" collection go to www.xinimages.com and choose "pictures"). I’m so lucky that Urios, Gregory, JB, Martial, Petra, Shirley, Erin, Antaeus, Salamandra and so many other interesting, amazing and inspirational people that I met along the way were part of my year of journey and discovery. They made it the year that it was... a year that counted.

Judy Lin

Epilogue:
I opened my long-unused “real world” wallet the other day, and found a little slip of paper folded up and tucked into a corner. It was a fortune cookie fortune from a long time ago that I had saved. I must have liked what it said:

“You will soon be crossing the great waters.”

To see this now, especially after the year I just had, left me in a state of awe. I never ever doubted that taking a year off to sail around the world was the right thing for me to do, but if I ever want confirmation that it was meant to be... then this must be it!