In the beginning of April, the four of us left Austin.  For once, we really tried to stick to the
plan.  Our one goal was to find a
suitable catamaran to live and travel in. 

Still in Texas, we stopped
in Corpus Christi,
to look at a Wildcat.  This would give us
a first feel for catamarans.  The poor
boat was in awful shape, but we were not willing to give up yet.  During the day, we mostly drove and at night,
we slept in our tent in one of the State Parks or National Forests.  We prefer the forests, because camping is
cheap or free, it’s pretty quiet, and the dogs love it.  Sleeping was pretty tough, though, since the
small dome tent barely fits all of us, and the ground was hard.  After a week, we finally invested in a hand
pump so we could use our air mattress.

We managed to get a few sights in as well.  New
Orleans was a great stop.  We were surprised to see no remnants of hurricane
Katrina in the touristy center. 
Everything was cleaned up well. 
From the moment we left the city to the east, though, the area was still
devastated.  Houses were severely damaged,
the fields were full of debris, every yard had a travel trailer in it, and
boats were spread out over the land.  We
visited Charleston
briefly and explored the Outer Banks a bit. 
Camping was very expensive there, so we promised ourselves to come back
by boat one day.  By coincidence, we
ended up in Fredericksburg,
Virginia, which happened to be a
pleasant surprise.  The four of us
enjoyed strolling around the colonial –but touristy- town and relaxing on the
grass.

The two catamarans we checked out in North Carolina were nothing to write home
about, and by that time, we were starting to give up on the Wildcat brand.  Although we do like the lay-out a lot,
research and looking at them taught us they are poorly built. 

The next big boat destination was Annapolis. 
The only affordable campground to be found was located in Greenbelt NP,
in the Washington DC area. 
This is a great spot to be. 
Camping under the trees (shade!), clean bathrooms (with hot water), a
lot of hiking trails, wildlife and pretty close to the capital.  While we had cheated during rain storms and
extreme cold before (by staying in a Motel 6 once in a while), this was
seriously unaffordable in the DC area, so we had to deal with getting wet.  Luckily, our awful experience in a Texas
State Park, where we got soaked in the tent, floating in water puddles (and had
to spend the night on a dirty floor in the restrooms) didn’t repeat itself.  Mark and I both liked to be back in Washington DC.

In Annapolis,
we saw our first Fountaine Pajot, a French built catamaran.  Not bad, but we were still not
impressed.  We became friends with Tommy
the yacht broker, who showed us another FP that wasn’t on the market yet.  This one had potential.  Through Tommy, we also met Tony, the owner of
a farm and lots of land, five minutes from Annapolis. 
Tony invited us to stay at the farm, so we left the Greenbelt and moved closer to the water.  The tent was still our house, and the car our
closet, table and shelter, but it was getting old.  Taking sun showers every day and cooking one
pot meals, who wants to do that forever? 
We lived another three weeks on the farm, and became interested in the
last catamaran we had seen.  The
communication, inspection, and change of ownership started, but nothing was
final yet…