SCOTTSDALE, AZ

I love it when a plan comes together! But time is running short! As we prepare for our April 1 departure from San Diego, we are busier than a bunch of one-armed paper hangers. Each member of the Global Adventure Project has a laundry list of items to compete before we shove off.

Here’s a partial list of crew activities at this time:

Yours truly:

• Work with our sponsors and PR agency to perfect their marketing programs through TGA, and have them up and running on the website by April 1. This involves many meetings, and producing one-minute promotional videos for them, plus scripting ads;
• Work with a travel visa company to complete visas for myself and crew;
• Do all sorts of paperwork to ensure smooth economic sailing for the family and me;
• Make last minute investment portfolio adjustments, although once we start the trip I’ll probably have more time to manage my portfolio than now;
• Finish getting my travel shots;
• By a new camera – a powerful Cannon digital, with at least one good zoom lense – and learn how to use it;
• Learn how to use certain portable recording equipment;
• Schedule a crew/family/friends dinner in San Diego the night before our departure. Find a minister. Or a priest. Or a rabbi. Somebody to bless us, the ship, and the trip;
• Finish getting the ship’s store and other elements of the website set up;
• Authorize and monitor purchases of endless amounts of gear and provisions aboard TGA;
• Assign a series of ongoing tasks to my assistant, Tammi Gauthier;
• Thursday and Friday before departure: Attend Thunderbird School of International Management Conference on International Private Capital Funds. Do interviews for radio show and website;
• Pack. Persuade second-oldest son to drive all my stuff to San Diego, and return car safely to Scottsdale, so I can fly over to S.D. with Lynn and our two youngest boys (who will see me off); and
• Do as much family stuff as humanly possible prior to departure.

Captain Wolf, and First Mate Rip:

• Purchase and stow drogue/sea anchor and portable generator;
• Install new navigation and charting software;
• Finish installation of various exercise equipment aboard TGA;
• Supervise installation of removable isinglass windows around fly bridge;
• Select scuba tanks and gear;
• Check status of EPIRBs (emergency location devices) and buy more if necessary;
• Fully prepare ship’s emergency bag;
• Obtain flare guns;
• Confirm that Switlick 6-person life raft is fully equipped and functional;
• Provision the boat! (Food!); and
• Dozens of other tasks of which I’m blissfully unaware!

And these activities do not include the efforts of my wife, Lynn, our PR agency Gordon C. James Public Relations, my assistant, Tammi Gauthier, nor a dozen other vendors, all of whom are equally busy making this project a success!

My first official act once we shove off will, I think, be to take a nap!
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