In YouTube time, the Slow Boat and its crew Linus and Daly, our beloved salty dog (RIP), are still in the Marquesas with two more episodes in that remote archipelago. There will likely be twelve total vlog episodes in the Marquesas in season 2, which I believe is a record for any sailing channel. That puts our backlog at about 1.5 years and climbing. S2E15 in Nuka Hiva is due out next week. Anna should be aboard for two to three more episodes before Janna and Sophie join the boat in Tahiti and Moorea.
Season 3 has been already filmed and is likely to have over a dozen episodes similar to season 1. (The 3,500 nautical mile offshore passage meant season 2 was longer than seasons 1 and 3). We have a sneak peak of season 3 in Tonga out, but the first episode likely won’t be released until we start filming season 4 in May through August 2019.
Because of the relative success of the channel’s coverage of the most interesting sailors in the world (who are not on the Slow Boat) and sailboat cruising news, I have no plans to go to two vlogs a month to clear up the backlog. The vlogs are actually some of the most difficult videos that I edit. They typically have 100 to 200 clips. While we aim to put out high quality videos, success in the very crowded market for sailing vlogs is based not just on great editing and exotic locations, but also on escapism and dreams of young women attired in swimwear. In that market, we will never compete. Instead, you’ll see a middle aged skipper struggling to get his boat to the next port west about the world.
If it were easy everybody, would go long distance cruising. A lot of channels pay lip service that they are sailing around the world but few actually do it. We make westward progress every season, but it looks like we will not be getting back to our home port of New Orleans over a decade from departing in 2016. Since I estimated in my book the typical successful circumnavigator (most of whom are not skipping half the cruising season) take about 6 years to go around the world, twelve years seems a good guess for the Slow Boat crew sailing part-time.
The season 4 plan is to sail from Tonga to Fiji, Vanuatu, and New Caledonia. We plan to haul out in New Caledonia. The plans for seasons 5 and 6 is to sail to Australia and cruise its north coast and pass through Torres Strait to the Indian Ocean.
SLOW BOAT SAILING 