How hard could it be?
How hard could it be? Boy, how many times have we said that to ourselves since we started down the cruising path? This time however, we weren’t referring to anything nautical like reefing sails or installing watermakers. We were instead considering how tough it might be to select 7 posts from our blog. Sounds simple, right?
Recently, we were nominated by our friends on Kaleo to participate in Tripbase’s 7 Links Blogger Challenge.
“This shouldn’t take you long to do – don’t over-think it!”
That is what they say. Perhaps they weren’t thinking that someone might have two and a half years and 863 posts to go through to make the selections. As much as I thought this was a cool idea, I procrastinated a bit in attempting it, even trying to get our Dear Readers to make the picks for us. Alas, just like any other chore on our never-ending to-do list, Rebecca and I finally just had to suck it up and do it. We spent well over an hour together, scrolling through the countless pages on our blog. Surprisingly, we actually had some fun doing it. There are so many things that we have written about, and pics that we have posted, that we’ve forgotten about. It was fun to relive those memories.
Anyway, here are the 7 posts that we selected.
- Our most beautiful post: Sacrifices
There were a couple of ways to take this category. We could have chosen the easy way and went the pretty photo route but that in itself would have been tough as we’ve come across some seriously breathtaking scenery. As recommended by some of our readers, I instead opted to choose one of my most heartfelt posts. To be honest, I still get emotional when I read it.
- Our most popular post: Blast Off!
I guess people were just happy that we were finally going to have some real-world stuff to write about instead of all the theory and prep work that we’d been posting prior to that day.
- Our most controversial post: To beg or not to beg
I don’t know if this is controversial but people certainly did have opinions on the subject and were nice enough to share them in their comments. Fortunately most of our readers feel the same about it as we do.
- Our most helpful post: The anchor drill
Given the anchoring silliness that we’ve been witness to, I humbly think this should be mandatory reading for newbies.
- A post whose success surprised us: Sundowner etiquette
Who would have thought that a post about drinking on other people’s boats would be all that interesting? Some people obviously thought it was though as it was republished on a couple of different websites. Weird.
- A post we feel didn’t get the attention that it deserved: Tools for lock transiting
This is a funny one for me because I had several to choose from for this category. Just as sometimes I write about silly things that really catch people’s attention (see the above category for an example), other times I write about things that I think are important that get little mention. Oh well… such is blogging.
- The post that we are most proud of: Confidence is King
Again, a toughie. Although tempted to choose one of my many posts relating to head repairs and poo cleaning, I decided to take the high road and go the more cerebral route. 🙂
ZTC and Kookabura at anchor at Hog Island.
You’ve made so many good posts, I couldn’t chose. But I think your selections were very good.
Blogger has a “stats” tool that records page views (subtracting the author). In the past year…
* 2514 Yo-Yo Fishing
* 1432 Drogue and Parachute Sea Anchor Testing
* 1221 Climbing Gear for Sailors
* 516 Trip Report – 2010 Delmarva
* 384 Solar Panels
* 385Winter Sailing
There are always surprises. The yo-yo fishing post was just a quick thing; I’m guessing it’s more fisherman than sailors. The drogue article must be popular because there is so little out there. The climbing gear article was a surprise, but I guess plenty of folks are sick of marine pricing.
I tend to go back and correct and up-date the posts that get read a lot, particular those (climbing gear) that have safety implications. I guess that’s because I’m not cruising and my daily life is not often good sailing blog fodder. I had a good bike ride this morning–62 miles at a sharp pace–and I could fill a page easily enough with bits and pieces of interest, but that would be the stuff of a bike weenie blog.
Keep up the great work!
What you haven’t shared, or I’ve missed it, is where are you headed next? Inquiring minds….
I’m pretty sure that I can’t search stats like that, or at least don’t know how to. Those are all good posts that you listed.
Where are we heading next? Ummm… Carriacou. But I assume you mean after H-season, not next week.
Thanks for Getting back. The Privilage 39′ we are dreaming of is less than ten mile From St george on the hard at grenada marine. We are ready to make an offer on her,but are Quit nerves about it all because of the distance involved. What we have been told is: it is a two owner boat. First a conductor (? Music ) and the current owner who with his wife Charted as captian & firt mate. The wife now deseased. So I’m told.
We are not right by Grenada Marine but I think I know people who are. Let me know what you want to find out about the boat (pics perhaps?) and I’ll see if I can make it happen.
OK, here is what our friends said (they spent an hour on it yesterday checking it out):
“I hope your friend is handy cuz the boat is a project. Cons first: Headliner falling down at one pt and re-glued, but not professionally. Interior joinery showing its age. Helm station exposed. Bimini inadequate.
Pro’s: Well wired, beautiful. Fairly clean. We spent about an hr. on the boat and won’t be putting an offer in as we’d be taking a step down to match what our boat has now for cruising.”
I really enjoyed reading the 7 posts you selected! I follow you on facebook but don’t always have time to read when you post something new. Tonight I had a few minutes, and it was time well spent. I hope someday I can use what I learned in your sundowner etiquette post!
Your guys are an inspiration.
Thank you.
Those are some beautiful bracelets that you produce!
Mike, I seriously started back through the posts, and just couldn’t choose in ANY of the categories! I think the choices you and Rebecca made are spot on. Congratulations.
Thanks Helen. Yes, it was tough even for us to make the choices.
Good choices. I wanted to help out, I really did, but I am back at work so don’t have a life anymore.
Work? Boooo!
Mike,
For your stats, go to the Design tab at the top of your blog page when you’re logged in. Then click on the Stats tab, then on the Posts tab, then on the All Time tab and it will list them in order from most visited to least visited. Your choices were spot on. I would love to participate, but unfortunately our site isn’t visited that much yet!
Deb
S/V Kintala
http://www.theretirementproject.blogspot.com
Hi Deb
I believe you are referring to a blogspot feature. We use wordpress which has no such tab.
[…] mind is wandering away from work and back out to the water this morning, we suggest taking a break to read seven posts from the blog Zero to Cruising. We’ve found the adventures of cruisers Mike and Rebecca (not to mention their fantastic […]
Of course reading this blog years after the fact leaves me in no position to suggest posts but I was thrilled to see you chose (one of them) confidence is king. That is the one post I’ve permanantly bookmared and one of the posts that I gave to Holly as a “must read”!
Glad you felt that it was worth reading.