By littlenySTOCK @ Shutterstock.com

Your Survival Guy’s looking forward to getting out on the boat this weekend, cruising from Newport, RI, to visit family in Mattapoisett, MA. You know I advise the island life for you because it’s the island life I love for me. I eat my own cooking.

That being said, thank you for sticking around. I know you might be getting sick of hearing from me every single day. It’s a bit much, even for me, hearing from Your Survival Guy. It’s like, “OK, enough already.”

Here’s the deal, Your Survival Guy’s boating so far this summer? Zippo. It’s my fault. Sure, I can blame it on the rain, but when is boating ever an endeavor just for perfect weather? It’s not. You never know when you’re going to be swallowed by a fog bank.

This week, the skies over Newport have been mixed. You may have read about the massive fires out west. Well, they’re here, with smokey skies above, yet another reason why I like having a boat and living on an island. It’s easy to escape.

But, I’ll admit, having a boat can add pressure to “use” it. It’s a discussion I have regularly with myself and with my boating clientele. Conclusion? I’m always glad to have it when I hit the water. It’s a sunk cost. One I don’t beat myself up about. It’s like keeping track of how many days you ski during a season. It becomes mentally exhausting racing to get to the mountain or the dock.

You can break a boating trip into sections: anticipation, loading, leaving the dock, setting your course, etc. My favorite part is threading the needle between neighboring superyachts and kamikaze launch boat drivers, to get to some open space. After that, it’s rounding Castle Hill to port, cruising to Buzzards Bay, seeing Ned’s Point, and approaching the harbor. I throttle back, gliding through the channel of that one particular harbor I know so well from when I was a kid. Who said the fountain of youth doesn’t exist?

Action Line: The weather will be here Sunday. We’ll get a car ride home, pick a good day next week and get back on the water to cruise back to our island home. Thank you for riding along with me and for living your best island life.

Originally posted on Your Survival Guy.