ZEELAND, Mich. — A family living in Zeeland is about to go where few have gone before.
According to Discover Boating, only 150 people do what this family is about to do every single year.
Some people call it crazy. They're calling it the trip of a lifetime.
"Has the reality sunk in yet— what your family is about to embark on?" I asked them on Wednesday.
“No," said eight-year-old Gwynnie, the youngest member of the Major family.
Her brother, Ewan, who is ten years old, and her parents Chris and Alison all cracked a smile, almost as if to agree with Gwynnie.
Their upcoming journey is so bold, even they can't believe what's ahead of them.
With the last name Major, it's very fitting this family feeds off adventure.
Their biggest one yet is just a few weeks away.
"It's going to be [a] very different stage of life," Chris said.
Both Chris and Alison grew up in West Michigan but never really spent time on the water. They come from more of a camping background.
After one of their friends introduced them to sailing, everything changed.
"[We] thought, 'Oh, this is something that we could do.' That's when we kind of got bit by the bug," Alison said.
The Majors bought their first boat in 2019. Quickly, they fell in love with life on the water.
They spent a week around Mackinac Island and even lived on a boat for a month last summer.
Just like their last name would suggest, they wanted something bigger.
"You see these stories of people who just live on their boats full time, and we thought, 'Well, what could we actually do? What's something tangible for us?'” Alison explained. "I had come across America's Great Loop, and thought, 'Okay, this is something we could do.'"
The Great Loop is a 6,000-mile continuous waterway that takes you up the Atlantic, through the Great Lakes, down middle America, across the Gulf of Mexico and around Florida.
They decided this would be their next nautical adventure— one their friends think is a bit crazy.
"Usually there's this moment of pause," Chris said. "You can just see that they're processing...'Wait, you're gonna do what?'”
"This isn't normal," he admitted, "but that's so okay. What's important is what we want to do and what we want to achieve as a family and as individuals. It's great to have a challenge. It's great to have something that will stretch us. I think we're all going to be different when we come back, which is really exciting.”
A 43-foot Beneteau 423 named Fika will be their home for the next year.
According to SwedishFood.com, "Fika is often translated as "a coffee and cake break", which is kind of correct, but really it is much more than that.
Fika is a concept, a state of mind, an attitude and an important part of Swedish culture. Many Swedes consider that it is almost essential to make time for fika every day. It means making time for friends and colleagues to share a cup of coffee or tea and a little something to eat."
On Saturday, April 15, the Majors will drive to Virginia where the boat is docked.
Then, May 5, they set sail.
They feel nothing but excitement for everything in their future— well, almost everything. “I’m definitely not excited for the drive to Virginia," Gwynnie joked.
Even though their life is about to change, in many aspects, the way they live will stay the same.
"The boat has all the things that we're going to need, like any other space would, it's just going to be much smaller," Chris said. "We have to manage our resources much differently than we do in the house. Here, we can plug things in or turn the faucet on. We think nothing about it. When we're on that boat, we do have to be thinking about those things.”
One other thing to consider— seasickness! Even this family isn't immune.
“It's something that you just deal with," Alison said. "You have to decide, is that something worth dealing with? Or is it something not worth it to you? For us, it's worth it.”
The Majors will be away from West Michigan until May of 2024. There's a lot they will miss, but there's even more they look forward to.
“We do love land life, and the things that it affords us, and the community we have here," Alison said. "But there's a really cool community out there for boaters that I think we're excited to experience too.”
You can learn more about their journey, and follow along, by visiting the family's website.
