​Embrace the Weather, Embrace the Adventure
It's a truth universally acknowledged that we can't control the weather. No matter how much we might wish for sunny skies and gentle breezes, Mother Nature often has other plans. But while we can't control the weather, we can control our attitude towards it.
Sailing, for instance, is a sport that thrives on unpredictability. A perfect day on the water, with steady winds and calm seas, is a rare luxury. More often than not, sailors face challenges like no wind, strong winds, scorching heat, or pouring rain.
Yet, these challenges can be transformed into opportunities. A calm day can be a chance to practice boat handling and navigation. A stormy day can test a sailor's skills and resilience. And a rainy day can be an opportunity to relax, read a book, or simply enjoy the quiet solitude of the boat.
The key is to embrace the weather, whatever it may be. By adopting a positive mindset and focusing on the adventure, we can turn a potentially frustrating situation into a memorable experience.

it is      "How can a regular person become a sailor?.....
    A regular person will never become a sailor!"
This is absolutely true, you must be a little bit crazy to live on a sailboat. It is more like a camping on a water, there is a little bit of place for everything. Like a house what has shrunk. Tiny kitchen area with tiny sink, tiny beds, tiny toilet, tiny space everywhere, but you have the whole ocean! 
​However most sailboats have a really nice storage place. Under the bunkbed, the sink, under the cockpit, under the floor etc... The only problem when you need to find something in a seconds u will make such a huge mess to take anything out from the storage. I personally arrange everything that way that whatever I won't use often that item is in the darkest deepest storage. 
The most important thing is to take as much food and water as you can. For some reason when I'm at sea I always want to snack. 
      Cooking on the boat!  Cooking on the boat is like a special art. I am not talking about cooking while at anchor or in a marina but when you are under way and the boat is healing or rolling.   Most Sailboats have some type of alcohol or gas burners that usually move with healing so the food always stays on the top of the stove. Most of the time when we are under way we will cook some fast and easy food as it is not an easy task to stand when the boat is healing.  If the weather is too rough then we eat just snacks.  But when we reach the anchorage we will celebrate with a nice meal and a glass of wine! 
      Sleeping!   Personally I never had problem with sleeping on a boat. There are bunk beds that might be small and uncomfortable a bit but you are on a sailboat! Sleeping in a marina can be a little bit hot or sandflies can bite but outside at an anchorage is just perfect. No bugs, nice breeze. Most of the time we like to go to bed from sunset to sunrise. One of the most beautiful things to do on a sailboat is to wake up early and watch the sunrise, have a fresh coffee with a nice breakfast. This is something that you cant put a price on. 
     Before I purchased my boat I've seen many magazines with sailors dressed in nice white shoes, white pants, nice shirt etc... After the first anchorage I sadly realized it is possible only in the magazines. When you pull anchor there is a lot of mud on the chain so no white and fancy cloths on a boat.  Most of the sailors don't like shoes onboard, I do agree with that.  Boats are kind of delicate, a shoe can easily scratch or leave marks on the deck.  Also the cleaning is never easy on a boat. 
       Seasickness is absolutely normal if the weather gets rough. I do get seasick sometimes. We always try to avoid bad weather but if it does get rough we eat a lot of food and may take a pill. If I get seasick I just try to deal with it and I know next day will be better. 
 Living in Belize over 10 years we learned that the weather can be crazy unpredictable. You never know what you will get, but you decide what you do with yourself.  Have a glass of rum and lets go swimming! 
      I think most boaters will agree with me that life on a sailboat has  some negative parts but this is one of the most unique way of life and you have a crazy amount of freedom.  That is what Belize Sailing Adventures is all about, to show you this crazy and amazing lifestyle for a few days.  You never know its might will change your life as it did ours...

    We had a guest from Europe and they really wanted to see manatees. We ware sailing for two weeks all around Belize, we anchored at many mangroves where you can spot manatees but unfortunately nothing. 
Every time when I could spot one  they missed it.  I kept talking to them how cool it is to see manatees and what amazing animals they are but sadly they couldn't spot any.
They were just laughing and kept telling me that "manatees don't exist".
       In the old time sailors reported to see mermaids all around in this waters.
As we know now most probably it was a manatee what they see. But again sailors did add a lot of rum to the water to kill bacteria. A mixture of the time spent at sea and a lit of bit alcohol might make things look different a bit.
     In Belize  we have the West Indian Manatee. This is the largest of all manatee species. Between 800-1200 lbs. They are vegetarian gentle giants. It is really hard to spot them as they can hold they breath up to 20 minutes. When they come up for air you will just see they nose for few second and they are gone again. It is all about your patience and time and a little bit of luck. One of my favorite anchorage is the Sapodilla lagoon, that is a great spot to see manatees and other wildlife. Nothing can make your morning better when you wake up and there is a manatee family around the boat.  I think most of the tourists  miss a lot just because they follow the plan that was done before the arrival. Just want to go to "point A" to "point B" and tour companies really happy to do that. Fast and done, get the next ones.  When you are on a sailboat one thig what you will not do is hurry and I think  that's why we always see amazing wildlife and cool things on our adventures. If we don't see manatees, don't be sad, for sure we will see something else maybe a mermaid... you never know:)

Dolphins are everyone favorite! We all love to see them playing around the sailboat while we are on the way or at anchor. Luckily in Belize we see often dolphins many times big group of dolphins come and play around the boat and we can watch them for hours. 
There are some different type of dolphins in Belize:
Atlantic bottlenose dolphin
Atlantic spotted dolphin
Spinner dolphin
Rough tooth dolphin
However most commonly seen are the bottlenose dolphins. 
When we have a day with a light wind sailing nothing can highlight the day more when the dolphins are coming. We see them from far away we know that they will come and check us out. I was always wondering why they are coming? What is they purpose? I can see how they are watching us as we sitting the side of the boat.  I believe that they are the same way interested about us as we interested about them. Often we can already recognize them by they fin so maybe they also can recognize the boat and they just came to say hi.  Dolphins are super intelligent when you start learning about them it is scary that they have a higher more advanced communication level as we do. I feel that we humans don't give them enough respect, we treat them as just an other animal in the sea.  In many countries still kill them or keep them in captivity for entertainment purposes. Just makes me sad.
I hope when you are sailing in Belize with us we will see dolphins along the way and we can share with you this great experience!  

       I'm sure many of us have seen barracuda while snorkeling, it is very common fish all around the seas. As we are not scientist we will just talk about personal experience. No facts.
 My guest often asking me what they should be careful with,
sharks, barracuda, any poisonous fish around? My answer always that, nothing really can harm you around Belize just do not touch anything just look. We don't swim where are crocodiles and sharks don't really attack people. Not like I have seen any shark ever in Belize waters. But barracuda, you can see a lot. I use to be terrified when I see one. I totally don't like them. Its not because they can harm me, it is really rear that they would attack humans but what scary about them, that a barracuda is not scared from you. Most of the time they just looking into your eyes and sometimes start following you. What is a normal behavior from a barracuda as they think we are a bigger predator and they are hoping for a free meal. Snorkeling many years in the sea I got kind of ok with them I keep a safe distance and admire they beauty and power.  
Most of the time the danger what can happen with us while we snorkeling it is only in our head... 

   Our First sail ever with "Mira" was absolutely nice. The day was sunny no clouds at all  10-12 knots wind, just really pleasant.   We arrived to Punta Gorda, Belize where we checked in. The checking in wasn't so smooth as never easy with the Belizean customs, especially when I was importing a sailboat to Belize. Anyway we did it lets start back to Belize city. We sailed about an hour, than the wind just died. We started the engine, then about an hour the engine died. I had no idea what to do with the engine, luckily i had a book on board so i started to read it and pull apart the engine. Few hours later the engine fired up and we were on our way again. Just some dirt in the fuel line. Few hours later the same thing happened. Fixed it again, than back on the way. Unfortunately still no wind. super calm. the sea looks like a mirror. We couldn't wait to reach Placencia to anchor down and take a swim as it was crazy hot. Finally I could see Placencia, than suddenly the engine stopped again. Out of fuel... Later on I find it out that the ridiculous amount of smoke was because the engine was set badly and used way much fuel as it should be. Before start I counted that the fuel should be more than enough till Belize city and we are not even half way. 

        Finally we arrived to Placencia.  Anchored down, had some rest and a lot of fun. Placencia is a very touristic place in Belize. Great location, has beautiful sandy beaches, great restaurants, perfect place to spend a vacation.  Unfortunately we had to leave as the custom officer give us few days to reach Belize city to do the rest of our paperwork. 
      The wind picked up, big waves as usual for Placencia.
As we start sailing after few nautical miles our steering system broke. What he hell! I put on the emergency tiller and go back to the harbor.  Next day I fixed up the steering system and finally ready to go. 
     We lost a lot of time so I knew that we will have to sail true the night to be in Belize city on time.  Unfortunately the wind shifted to north as we ware going to north I decided to use the engine. The night came and the wind picked up and soon i noticed a really nasty black cloud on our way. The sky got pitch black and I could see the lightening starts. I said to myself its ok we will just go thru that storm. I wasn't scared I know  that the boat can handle only thing I wasn't sure about my engine.  The storm came the waves was pretty big as its normal for the north wind. The waves ware splashing over the boat we was doing only 2 knots at the time. It was pouring rain, crazy wind but we passed it safe. 
      I was really happy to see the lights of Belize city, finally we arrived in the marina.
The engine made it! The oil was leaking all around in the engine the hull of the boat was black because the crazy among of smoke and we are soaked but ok.
I think I can say it was a really adventurous first trip, we got it all...

The first splash was a scary moment. After two months work "Mira" was seaworthy again. There are many question running thru the head in that moment when they lifting up the boat and putting back the water. Did I check everything? All the seacock are ok? Will it float or sink? Everything was fine. She was floating and smoking. The engine was having a ridiculous amount of black smoke as result that the marina didn't do the job what I payed for but we had to leave. All the paperwork was destroyed on the boat so I had a special arrangement with the customs so we had to take "Mira" out from Guatemala and bring it to Belize.  


The first night out.

We ware really exited. This was something new and amazing experience. I think we felt really proud around so many beautiful sailboat and we own one. 
Rio Dulce, Izabal in Guatemala is a hurricane hole. Many sailors going there during the hurricane season. A lot of  marinas, restaurant and shops around the city.  If you need to work on your boat that is a good place. 

Next day we made our way down to the beautiful Rio Dulce. 
The "Sweet River" is and absolutely breathtaking place. If you travelling to Guatemala its a must place to go. 
It is a long way to Livingston the last town in  Guatemala, where we have to check out, so we decided that we will do it in two days. Most sailors stop at half way a place called "Texan Bay" A man  Mike from Texas came there long time ago and opened a bar there. Mike's place is a really cool place, he delivers a great atmosphere. I'm not surprised  its a favorite stop for sailors. 

Finally we arrived to Livingston. The last stop in Guatemala. Livingston is a really small but very pretty Garifuna town. The checkout was relatively easy and fast.  All the paperwork was in order, we weigh anchor and started to our adventure back to Belize. The way was more adventurous  than fun.  We had it all...

People say there are no Small jobs on a boat. Yes they are right, I had to learn that in a hard way and I payed the price for it. I put it in my mind to get out from the hard as soon as possible and get back to Belize. It was a big mistake! I finished the boat approximately two months. Too fast job is not a good job. I cut a lot of corners, missed some spot,  tried to save some money. Later I payed that price, double work and double money. I had to learn and now I remember "There are no small job on a boat". When first I looked at her I never even know where to start. So I just grab a sanding machine and started to work. I did as I could. I wish that I had learn about this jobs before I started. After two months the "Mira" was ready outside. As I never ever had a diesel engine I had know nothing about it. So I asked the marina to fix it up for me. I payed for it but unfortunately the job was never done. I didn't know that time I had to find out on the way home. Since than I don't trust nobody with my engine I learned how to fix it and so far its working perfect.  Pretty much when you purchase a boat you sign an agreement with her that you will work on her all the time. The job never ending. If somebody says, I have nothing to do on my boat its a lie! There is always something to do, painting, varnishing, fixing engine, etc... and all this comes not just time but money and more money. That is the thing what no seller will tell you. As soon we realized this we had to came up with something. That is when we decided we will make money with the boat. That is also a fact that you never can really make money with a boat.  This would question me if I don't make money why do we have a boat and why do we do it? We make something way more valuable than money, memories!

How we got our sailboat? Definitely we did not planned to have a sailboat as I just sold my power boat because it was too much money to keep it. We always believed that only rich people can have a sailboat. I do love boats so we went for a vacation to Guatemala and we stayed for few days on a sailboat as a surprise from my wife. She was not too much fan of it because there was a big storm in the night. (She is a storm magnet) Next day I went for a walk and I've seen an advertising for a sailboat. It just catch my eyes, the boat looked beautiful and the price was really low. Unfortunately we had no time to check it out as we ware going to continue on our trip. After our vacation less than a week I already owned that sailboat. I purchased without seeing it. It was a big gambling but I feel I did really well. We ware a proud owners of a sailboat! 
First time seeing her.
I travelled back to Guatemala to check what I got into myself. 
I arrived to the marina and there was she a beautiful Triangle 32 ketch.  (that was my first view) Than I went closer and I seen the reality. She was abandoned for many years and everything was wet and nasty on it outside and inside. I didn't got discouraged, this was a long time dream for me to have a sailboat. So as soon I  could I started to make her seaworthy....