Home Schooling Fail

Sail on sailor: Maia learns to fly the spinnaker

When we were crossing the Pacific Maia had a homeschooling segment on explorers and navigators. I was really into it. While we had modern navigation tools at our disposal, Cook had a sextant, chronometer and lead line. While we had paper and electronic charts, he was making the charts. I found it fascinating to anchor where Cook anchored and explore the route he explored. To say I was impressed at his skills doesn’t begin to cover it.

Sleepy but sweet: 1770

Maia, however, was less than enthralled. By about Tahiti she was ready to move on. By Australia her reaction to Cook was similar to that of the Aboriginal people who encountered him in Botany Bay; they ignored him and told him, “Warra warra wai” (go away).

Visiting 1770 in Queensland (Cook’s first landing point in Queensland) didn’t change Maia’s disinterest. While she chuckled (halfheartedly) at the recollections of the local aboriginal people who found Cook & co a bit daft for getting themselves stung by ants and poisonous caterpillars, and for collecting up useless plants, I’m pretty sure she would have liked to have banned all talk of Cook on our ‘let’s hike where Cook hiked’ hike. Actually, she suggested we ban him.

Happily for Maia, as I was trying to rouse her interest in speculating about which 33 plants Banks may have collected on his walk, she noticed butterflies.

And then more butterflies.

Within a few minutes it was pretty clear that as cool as Cook was—thousands and thousands of blue fluttering insects beats history.

It turns out the Blue Tiger butterfly breeds up here. Come spring they’ll migrate south to Brisbane and as far as Victoria. For one enchanted walk though, they were all ours. Their wing beats sounded like a breeze blowing through the canopy—and in places it was impossible to see the tree trunks

for all the butterflies that clung to it.

I mentioned to Maia that it would have been cool if Cook had arrived during butterfly season and asked her what she thought his journals would have said.

She ignored me.

Sewn Souvenirs Part Deux

We’ve learned so much while out cruising. I don’t just mean the things you’d expect to learn: offshore sailing, local history, how to say ‘where’s the bathroom’ in smattering of foreign languages or even how to husk a coconut. No, we’ve learned all sorts of cool things we never even knew were out there to learn: how to custom dye fabric, how to set up a slack line, why that weird looking fish is doing what it’s doing…

Cruisers have some of the most diverse skills and backgrounds of any group of people we’ve ever met. We’ve met botanists and biologists, astronomers, engineers and IT guys, doctors, lawyers and investment bankers, jewellery makers and stunt drivers, and the guy who invented the forth squeeze for orange juice.

And from so many of them we’ve learned things. Real things. Useful things—like which leaf makes a poultice that can help heal wounds, and how to find constellations in the new-to-us southern sky and how to take that huge coin collection and turn it into beautiful keepsakes.

Lauren girl from Pico was our jewellery maker in the Pacific. Lauren’s grandmother taught her to make gorgeous embroidered bead jewellery, and she passed on her skills and knowledge to Amanda from Britannia, who also makes stunning embroidered bead jewellery, and Amanda kindly passed on some of her skills and knowledge to Maia, who aspires to make wonderful embroidered bead jewellery.

Amanda and Lauren's work as inspiration

 Maia is actually doing really well with her new found skills. Her first piece caught the eye of the kids on Viatrix (a lovely French Canadian family we’ve been spending time with) and they asked to learn so she invited them and the girls from Dorénavant (another lovely French Canadian family we’re spending time with—in fact there are currently six Canadian boats here in Brissie, the most we’ve encountered in one harbour since Mexico) over for a jewelry making class.

The class was both a French lesson (Maia can now swear and threaten to eat small children) and a jewelry making class. And as the kids sewed and giggled and Maia struggled with the ‘r’ sound in Merde! while the other kids tried to keep their beads even, I thought about how far this lesson had traveled: from Lauren’s grandmother to her, and then across oceans and cultures. And soon it will spread even further.

Sewn Souvenirs

With vibrant fabrics like these available it's hard not to want to take some home. The fabric.

 "Oh, mum! Do we have space?”I heard it over and over. In every market. In every country.

Sailing to new and distant shores is one of those things we want to hold with us. Not just by memories and photographs (though those are #1 and 2) but having tactile things—a hair stick carved in the Marquesas to wind my hair up out of the humidity, serving dishes from Mexico for fresh salsa—keep the memories that much closer.

But we don’t have the money, the space, the need (you name it) for so many of the beautiful things we see. So we search out small things—a hand woven basket to replace a plastic crate, a mask to add to our wee collection. But mostly we admired the pretty things and move on. Fabric though—fabric we can use. Or so I thought as we loaded up on gorgeous South Pacific prints.

We have a big beastly sailrite, but when it came time to make the little girl dresses I used to love to sew (or teach the little girl to make them) the sailrite was a bit cranky. A lot cranky. So recently we bought a cheap light weight machine, called it Maia’s and let her pull out some of her lovely Fiji fabrics and start learning to sew.

Fiji fabric gets a new look

 I can almost smell the frangipani.

The Transit of Venus, Cook and Us

In 1769 Lieutenant James Cook traveled to Tahiti to observe the transit of Venus which occurred on Saturday June 3 rd:

“This day prov'd as favourable to our purpose as we could wish, not a Clowd was to be seen the Whole day and the Air was perfectly clear, so that we had every advantage we could desire in Observing the whole of the passage of the Planet Venus over the Suns disk: we very distinctly saw an Atmosphere or dusky shade round the body of the Planet which very much disturbed the times of the contacts particularly the two internal ones. D r Solander observed as well as M r Green and my self, and we differ'd from one another in observeing the times of the Contacts much more than could be expected.”

The goal was to take measurements that would be used to calculate the distance of Venus from the Sun--which would then lead to knowing the distances of the other planets from each other. Unfortunately the instruments of the time were not fine enough for the effort and the measurements were too rough to be useful. But Cook’s voyage of discovery continued and he continued on in search of the “Terra Australis Incognita” in the South Pacific Ocean and discovered and charted the east coast of Australia.

 We learned this (and much, much more) after making landfall at Point Venus in Tahiti, anchoring where Cook did. It was part of what Maia called, “Sleeping where Cook slept. Can we stop now? Cook is getting on my nerves… I’m ready for a new topic.”

Point Venus though intrigued her. The low, sandy peninsula covered with ironwood is where Captains Wallis, Cook, Bligh (and us!!) landed after anchoring their (our!) ships behind the reef. Cook built a platform on the black sand beach near where a creek cuts the peninsula in two. It was here that he waited for an inky spot to glide across the sun. Small, dark, almost perfectly round, it was no ordinary sunspot—it was the key to measuring the size of the solar system. Or so hoped the Royal Academy, which sponsored Cook’s Voyage.

These days Point Venus is a park. And its highlights also include Tomb of King Pomare V and the phare (lighthouse) that was built by Thomas Stevenson, one of Scotland's famous lighthouse engineers and father of the author Robert Louis Stevenson. The park is steeped in the kind of history that’s impossible not to feel and not easy to shake off.

Point Venus

 And it came seeping back when we learned that Venus is transiting the sun, tomorrow. Not as dramatic as an eclipse—but much more rare, perhaps the best reason to watch the transit is a historical one. Already I can recall the heavy scent of tiare flowers, the weight of warm humidity, the feeling of black sand between my toes and that mysterious feeling of being linked to a memory I can’t quite recall.

Tomorrow is the transit of Venus. Check it out--just likeCook did 242 years ago. If you miss it the next one won’t happen until 2117.

Finding The Sweet Spot—Cruising with Kids

Maia began circus when she was six--it has consistently stayed her dream and passion

How old? How long? What works? What doesn’t? I get asked variations of these questions all the time when it comes to cruising with kid(s). My favourite—which we’re asked more than you would think—is, Did we bring Maia with us for the trip?

When we say that yes, indeed, our seven, eight, nine, now ten-year-old (how the heck did that happen?) is along for the ride the question inevitably goes back to one of the ones above. And the oft spoken assumption is pretty soon she’ll be a terrible teen who will rebel against our lifestyle and will want to go shopping in the mall—and what will we do then?

First let me say this—cruising kids come in all ages. We’ve met folks cruising with newborns (many born along the way) and people cruising with their young adult ‘kids’.  The bulk of the kids fall between the ages of five and 12 though—and with good reason. Cruising with kids under five is a whole bunch of work—it can be fun work, but it can also be isolating (you don’t get invited to as many parties or on the longer excursions) and exhausting (night watches take on a whole new level of complexity when you know you have a busy day ahead).

If you asked her what she misses most about life before sailing she would tell you she misses the circus

Teens are a totally different challenge—but not for the reason you think…

Rebellion, we’re told, is seldom the issue. Excessive maturity is.

Most parents when they plan to cruise with their kids have this hazy idea that while sailing together will promote family togetherness it will also give their kids a chance to evolve into their best selves without the pressures of peers, the excesses of westernized life and the limitations of schools that teach to the test.

And it works.

They often pass through this sort of seamless childhood—confident, clear and certain about what they need and want in their lives. And that’s where the teen years get tough—because sailing isn’t always what they need and want. But unlike typical teens who maybe don’t want to go on that annual summer sailing trip because they’ll miss their friends—it’s a bit more complex.

Maia visited two schools and four classes before deciding to audition for a performance troupe--she sees it as a step toward her future career

 There is something that happens to kids when they are part of a family that works to buy a boat, quit jobs and head off in pursuit of a dream. They grow into people who believe in their own dreams. We’ve met kids who wanted to stop sailing so they could pursue musical goals, apply for early admission to college, have better access to powerful computers or rejoin a sports team. And as parents we’re sometimes faced with a sudden and very difficult question:

Whose dreams take precedence?

School--From the Boat to Brick and Mortar

How is my boat-schooled kid going to do in school? A school in a foreign country where she needs to wear a uniform and where we don’t even really know what grade she should be in? Is she going to be picked on? Find it too easy? Too hard? Too boring? Too strict? Is it going to damage her adventurous spirit and teach her to think like an automan? Is it going to turn me into one of those hovering, nervous mums who keeps trying to fix things for my kid?

Oh, the uncertainty…

heading up the dinghy dock

 We’re beginning week two of our new routine. We had mixed feelings about Maia giving up home schooling for school here--but she has great memories of grades k-2 and has been looking forward to all the things a brick and mortar school has to offer.

Evan and I were a bit more hesitant. We’ve been sailing without much of a curriculum the past few years—deciding that the excellent BC provincial curriculum, which we used the first year, was a bit too constricting for our lifestyle. We wanted the option to focus on where we were travelling and what Maia’s interests were—and we didn’t want to be sending work in and trying to rendezvous with new books every few months.

The result of our geography based curriculum (we focused on projects) seemed great to us—Maia is intelligent, articulate and most importantly interested in almost everything—but we weren’t sure if we were missing the odd essential here and there. And we were a bit concerned that all the confidence and independence she’s gained through travel would be damped down in a school setting.

The arguments in favour of school won out though and we settled on the same school the other cruising kids in the area go to. The principal there explained that as a small urban school with a mobile, international student body they have a very diverse group of kids and their turn over rate is high—so they’re practiced with being flexible about kids coming in with a wide range of knowledge and backgrounds.

 After some hemming and hawing Maia’s now in year six (she’d be midway through 5^th grade at home). She’s studying the expected lessons plus a few exotic seeming subjects (she takes Mandarin, gets swimming lessons for PE, plays water polo for ‘sport’ and she’s joined the garden club—so she can raise chickens…) And it seems like we didn’t miss too much—though math is being taught differently than Evan taught her and she really has no idea what the capital of Australia might be…

What we’re also discovering is that as a home schooled kid she takes her education (and the fact that she has an important role in it) very seriously. She’s irritated by busy work but tends to plunge full force into things that seem to have value to her. Most importantly though—she seems happy. So I’m happy.

off on her own to school

 So we’re both learning.

Tahitian Music

Maia ran her fingers over the instrument’s carved wood body and plucked the strings. It rang out with a sound not unlike laughter or a waterfall. The owner of the shop took the little lute from her and his fingers started to fly. “So you like the Tahitian Ukulele,” he said as he played one of the songs that I’ve come to associate with French Polynesia.

Finding an instrument is not unlike finding a husband. Or so I’ve been told. You can spend your entire life moving from flute, to piano, to guitar yet never find the one you’re meant to play. And as a boat schooling kid Maia has a few extra challenges when it comes to making music—she needs find a mobile instrument that’s small enough to fit on the boat, that’s tough enough to withstand the conditions and that’s easy enough to learn without constant instruction.

It also needs to have the right cool factor.

But the ukulele, with its image problem (it sort of brings to mind oversized men in flowered shirts and silly hats strumming on toys—sort of like a tropical Shriner’s convention with music rather than motorcycles), never even entered my mind as an option. Yet here we were—learning how this cool little electric guitar-shaped sibling to the traditional ukukele is made (by hand of local wood) and played (very fast).

As John played (we were in the shop long enough to exchange names and life histories) and showed us the variations between instruments, Maia’s mood shifted through giddy excitement to something approaching awe.

This was our third, or maybe our forth, stop on our hunt for a ukulele. The ubiquitous instrument, which originated in the Marqueses and only vaguely resembles its Hawaiian cousin, is one of the top souvenirs in Tahiti (up there with pearls, tikis, tapa and pareos). And like most souvenirs it comes in a few different levels of quality: there are the kind you buy on the street then take home to hang on the wall and the kind you buy from a master craftsman that you play for a lifetime.

I was sort of hoping for something in between the two options. I wanted an instrument Maia could learn to play and take to shore for jam sessions with fellow cruisers (many of whom use cruising as a time to finally learn to play an instrument). But I wanted something affordable.

As we wandered and strummed we kept returning to Pedron music. The floor model uke was available and John—who has not only taught all over the world, but has also worked with a bunch of cruising kids (several who still email him) had space in his lesson schedule.

 Maia was ready to commit. And as she learned her first four chords and played through her first song I saw a small smile peak out from behind her concentration. And on the bus on the way home she said she couldn’t wait for tomorrow, and her next lesson.

Surfing Mexico

We’re usually really good at follow-through. If we say something is going to happen—we do it. Which is why Maia’s surfing lessons have being weighing heavily on my mind.

 She’s been dreaming about learning to surf since Crescent City, CA. Back then (she seemed so little!) she watched the surfers day in and day out and asked when it could be her.

 So we promised her surfing lessons for Christmas that year—but even down near Newport Beach the water was still too chilly. Then we planned to do it in Mexico—and while there have been surfers all around us this past year, we never got it done.

 But yesterday we grabbed Tim (who’s also been wanting to learn to surf) and Carolyne (who was more reluctant but was told it was her home schooling gym class) and joined Coral and all her friends for surf classes in Sayulita.

 Everyone got up on their boards and had a blast. Especially Tim, who may have been in 15-year-old-boy-heaven, in his surf class with four bikini-clad teenaged girls.

Life in La Cruz

 It’s lovely how easy it is to step back into life in La Cruz. I guess it’s because out of the past 14 months in Mexico, this has been the town we’ve called ‘home’ for more weeks than any other. We pulled into our old slip, were greeted by old friends, and slipped into the lively pace of life here without a second thought.

Today is ‘kid’s club’ a new organized playgroup put together by Tammy on Andiamo 3. And today was also the first day in a series of Huichol art classes where a local artist, Alvarez Ortis will be teaching us some of his traditional beading skills.

In case you’re not familiar, the Huichol people are one of Mexico’s indigenous groups. They live in the mountains—mostly as subsistence farmers—but over the past several years their intricate bead and yarn work has become a favourite tourist souvenir. The art itself is spiritual in nature—and reflects the Huichol people’s relationship with their deities: the trinity of Corn, Blue Deer and Peyote, the eagle, and the Sun God, "Tao Jreeku".

Alvarez explained this to us in a slow gentle Spanish that even I could mostly understand. He told us how their art is for the most part unaltered—that while they have switched from natural seed beads and plant-based dyes to crystal beads and nylon string, what they create is still culturally authentic and spiritually relevant.

I’m not sure what I expected from our first class—but I did sort of hope I’d get to stick beads into bees wax and create a masterpiece. Instead Alvarez had us start at the beginning—making basic necklaces—giving us no direction other than to create what moved us and listen to our own inner music.

Mine wasn’t much of a masterpiece. But at the end of the 90-minute class I felt incredibly peaceful, which Alvarez told us while we packed up, was the first lesson. Next week though we get to do designs!

Turtle Release

 Some of our favourite cruising experiences are our encounters with wildlife. And last night’s olive ridley turtle release at the Marriott Casamagna was no exception.

The olive ridley is classified as Vulnerable according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN). The reason is multi-faceted: The turtles have been used for food, bait, oil, leather, and fertilizer. And while the meat is not considered tasty, the eggs are highly prized and can fetch a good price. And then there are the problems with habitat destruction and the fact that the swimming turtles often end up as a shrimp fishery bycatch.

the turtle hatchery nursery

collecting newly hatched turtles

 The olive ridley nests between about June and November. Traditionally the female turtles arrived in mass numbers. Called an arribada, thousands of turtles would congregate on a beach and lay their eggs. Historically, there were several arribadas in Mexico, yet only the one at Playa Escobilla in Oaxaca is considered to come anywhere close to the historic events…

 The Marriott in Puerto Vallarta is one of the older resorts in the area and has one of the longer, lovelier stretched of beaches. About 15-years ago the hotel realized it could play a role in turtle conservation—so they hired a biologist who teaches guests to retrieve the nests and move them to a nursery (the resort has become so well known for their role that they now get nests from all over the bay). 45 days later the hatchlings emerge and are returned to the ocean.

lining up to release the turtles

 Every evening at 6pm from August-January locals, school children, guests and passing tourists congregate on the beach for a quick lesson in turtle conservation. Then, we are each given a turtle to release.

The newly hatched babies, with sand still clinging to their half-opened eyes, are about the size of a cookie. Which is how they must look to seagulls and hungry fish. So the idea is to place them on the sand just as the sun is dipping below the horizon and their predators are grounded for the night. Then the little hatchlings follow the setting sun into the ocean. As they make their way across the sand they imprint on the beach as home—and return when mature, 10-years later.

 I always imagined the little turtles tumbling down the beach, caught by the first wave and carried out to sea. Instead the process is marathon long, and heart-wrenching to watch.

The first time the little turtles hurried down the sand they were picked up by a wave and they began to swim their little hearts out. Moments later the wave dumped them back off, further up the beach than where they started, tumbled on their backs and disoriented.

 The second and third time this happened we sighed and smiled. By the fifth and sixth time we wondered how they would ever make it into the sea. Each wave seemed to take one or two of the little creatures, but as the ones that were left behind grew more tired and less enthusiastic in their stumble seaward—we wanted to help.

 But our role was done. All we could do was hope for the little turtles who ventured seaward and make sure we share their story to support their continued recovery. And eventually the sun set on a beach empty of little turtles. And the next part of their journey began. Now they will swim for 5-days, not stopping not eating, trying to get to safe open water.

The Office

 It was while I was in my office of the day (beachside palapa with free wifi and $1 Margaritas) that I came across a story in the New York Times about the value of play for children. And how, between lessons and organized sports, play (defined as activity initiated and directed by children) has become crowded out of the average kid’s schedule.

 The timing was kind of interesting. Over the past few weeks we’ve received dozens of Christmas letters—and each one described a dizzying number of activities and events that each of the kids were involved in. And with each letter—as they described piano and language lessons, art and ballet classes, soccer and swimming meets, girl guides and choir—I started to wonder if Maia was losing something irreplaceable by not belonging to enough stuff.

 I only went to a few organized activities when I was growing up. Most of the time we sort of just roamed the neighbourhood—making our own fun, while occasionally getting into trouble. I loved the groups I belonged to—but most of my memories are of the worlds that were created when we played on our own: the forts and treehouses, invented games and theatrical events.

 But as I watched the kids of friends get older, organized activities started to take the place of neighbourhood play. Keeping kids busy keeps them out of trouble, was the mantra. Then it became even more intense—why not involve our kids in lessons and teams, and give them the opportunity to learn as much as possible while they’re still young, and have the time?

 The answer, we’re learning, is kids need to play. They need to roam in feral little packs and create amazing worlds for themselves. They need to imagine and explore and sometimes get in trouble.

  And so, thus reassured, I settled into my beachside office and worked, while Maia did the work of growing up: play.