The best laid plans.....

Outline plan: 

Rob leaves work towards the end of October 2014. Jo leaves work March 2015. Rob and Jo sail away for approx. 6 months from the end of March 2015.

Slightly more detailed plan:

Rob uses free time between October and March to redecorate the house from top to bottom; Rob ruthlessly goes through possessions and sells / disposes of stuff as appropriate; Rob plans sailing trip to Baltic; Rob gets additional work if possible to top up cruising funds.

Reality:

Rob leaves work 22nd October 2014. Jo hands in notice and will leave work March 2015. Rob decorates the bathroom, sells a car and downloads Navionics charts for the Baltic to HUDLs and a phone.....

Excuses:

If you install new bathrooms every working day, a fortnight is probably all that's needed to totally gut and refurbish one. If, on the other hand, the last time you attempted the job was in 1998, you need more like 3 months! Huge tiles may look the business, but will they fit easily in your (borrowed) cutter? No. And how many tiles can you actually use without cutting? Very few. And how vertical are your walls? Not very, so tiles going into the corners have to be cut to different widths at each end. And why did I think a bath with a wider shower area would be a good idea - meaning the toilet had to be moved? And why did I think it would be a good idea to clear excess tile adhesive from a central heating pipe with a chisel and wholly predictable results (thanks for coming to the rescue Jim!)?....

Revised plan:

Rob and Jo will sail away for approx. 6 months from the end of March 2015 - even if we're still getting Cyclone sorted on route. The house (along with all its contents) will be looked after by friends and neighbours in our absence. That way we'll have somewhere to return to and, if we decide that spending 6 months each year on the boat is not for us, we won't have burnt all our bridges (funny how easy it is to justify failure...).

We've joined the Cruising Association and are looking forward to their Baltic seminar on Valentine's day. Our route planning will start in earnest thereafter. Camilla and Sam (of Kalessin of Orwell - another Westerly Storm) have kindly lent us charts of the Baltic and we'll be studying the blog of their trip before we go too!

We've got charts, passports, EHICs and credit cards. We'll be fine.