Have you reached escape velocity.........but don't know to where or how? Try the islands of the trade winds — any islands, really, and any winds.

After ten years in aerospace IT, I peddled my systems engineering skills overseas. Now I've had four decades' experience living, working, writing and speaking in countries of Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. Along the way I studied 7 languages, and have used 4 well enough to make a living on local economies. I lived aboard my sailboats and cruised between jobs in the Baltic, the North Sea, English Channel, the Mediterranean and the Caribbean. By 1979 I had settled into cruising the myriad islands between Florida and South America. If you want to escape, I can tell you how.

The younger, freer America where I grew up haunts my visits home. Many long term expatriates, even those living in truly poor countries, find it hard to return home and stay. They can no longer cope as a tiny cog in a big machine. They got used to living freely, without every step insured or hobbled by cat's cradles of regulations and government programs. Living without ever-present signs of "NO smoking", "NO fishing, swimming, loitering, littering, entry, passing, parking in the park ... NO!". On visits home. I find myself longing to escape to the America of my youth, and I usually do the next best thing — I go sailing. Of course, if you're a U.S. citizen, you continue to pay your taxes!

Books by Bruce Van Sant
Tricks of the Trades -|- Gentleman's Guide to Passages South -|- Cruising and Watersports Guide to the Spanish Virgin Islands
MARGARITA CAT
"— a unique, often hilarious perspective of what happens
when Middle-America escapes by sea —"
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Day of the OVNI

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