Victoria Bradford

Author archive

FAQ #3: Night Watches

Q: How about pulling watch all alone with the family below… How is Victoria handling the watches… how long are you on deck for at night? Are you clipping in? How are you staying awake? What was the sea state like? A: My  first overnight passage was from Monterrey to Morro Bay California, early on […]

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Where I Need to Be

Other than Tucker not going to work it seems like our day to day routines are really normal. Tucker wakes up early with the kids and makes me coffee before he gives me my wake up call. We make a breakfast or two and get dressed for the day. We go about our day doing […]

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Where are you going?

There is a time for departure even when there’s no certain place to go. Tennessee Williams It’s getting pretty obvious that Convivia is going somewhere.  We’ve added a big anchor, a new Quickcover for our main, a life raft, a Monitor Windvane, and most recently four solar panels.  People are now asking us where we’re […]

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Ten Years Ago Today—Launching The Dream

Ten years ago, with just my passport and a carry on, I hopped on a plane from San Francisco to St. Thomas, USVI. Tucker had arranged a flight and a ten day bareboat charter in the Caribbean. What an amazing way to spend my 25th birthday! We sailed out of Red Hook Bay, St. Thomas over […]

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Nautical Craftiness aboard Convivia

Years ago I stenciled a sailboat and an anchor onto shirts for Ruby and Miles. I wanted to make updated shirts for them one day so I ended up moving onto the boat with a stamp carving kit and some fabric paint. I planned to carve an anchor onto my stamp so that I could […]

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It Is In All Of Us

More than a year ago, when we had bought the boat but hadn’t moved aboard yet I found this print while reading Kind Over Matter. It says, “it is in all of us to defy expectations to go into the world and to be brave; and to want, to need, to hunger for adventures; to […]

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Sails for Sale

Our boat came to us with 11 sails.  Since we need to keep people on this boat some sails need to go.  We’re keeping our main, our 153 genoa, our new 110 genoa, our #3 jib, a 3/4 oz drifter, a nice striped spinnaker, and a heavier excellent spinnaker. I can’t figure out how we’ll […]

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Childhood Experiences… Missing

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how the kids’ childhoods will differ from their contemporaries as a result of this wild adventure we’re about to embark upon. Ruby understands that there are many things we will be giving up to go sailing around the world but I don’t think she’s got the context to […]

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About our boat

Warning: the following treatise is a rather dry and detailed accounting of Convivia’s specs and equipment. If you’re not interested in this type of thing, may I suggest one of the following: Why I love boat life, But Planes are Faster, or maybe even hellO 2011.

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Courage & Sparkle

“Mom, can we read a story about someone who knows something is scary or hard and does it anyway?”  Ruby and I have been reading from “Bringing Out Their Best: Values Education and Character Development through Traditional Tales,” by Norma J. Livo.  The book is organized in groups of stories about love, responsibility, compassion, cooperation […]

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