hen I was a kid growing up on the Chesapeake Bay, my mom and dad would charter from a guy who ran a boatyard on the Sassafras River, and the boats, shall we say, ran the gamut. My mom’s favorite was a houseboat (talk about opposites attracting). I don’t remember much about either; what I do remember was how much I loved what they both offered me—the river, the sky, the beaches, the water. On those humble boats, I began to spend what would turn out to be a lifetime chasing starlit nights and exploring new waterbound places. Those trips also gave my parents a chance to try things out, see how they fit, before they committed to buying a series of sailboats of their own (I guess you can see who won the power-versus-sail debate in our family).
