The? COVID-19 pandemic came as a huge stressor - it triggered a plethora of fears and uncertainties, threw our regular lives out of gear and also cause unprecedented loss of life.?Around the world schools shut down, the healthcare system was overwhelmed, people lost their jobs and companies faced bankruptcy.?
However, there was also another aspect of the lockdown. A lot of people had more time on their hands, so they discovered new hobbies, talents, employment opportunities, spent time with their families and fulfilled dreams that had been on hold all these years. It's worth noting that all of this comes with a certain level of privilege some of us might enjoy.
For a Hungarian family, the pandemic became a legit excuse to do something they had been itching to, for a while.
According to reports,?a Hungarian household of four utilised the summer time to fulfil their dream of cruising across the globe in a 50-foot boat referred to as 'Teatime'.
They left a Croatian port in late June 2020, and have since sailed around Italy and Spain; they stopped for a while on Cape Verde before crossing the Atlantic.
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After having spent Christmas on Martinique, they¡¯re now anchored in Marigot, on the Caribbean island of St. Martin, ready to sail in the direction of the Panama canal.
"For me it is a fantastic experience that I can spend a lot more time with my kids, instead of getting home late from work totally exhausted," said 48-year-old Domonkos Bosze, who set up a home office on the boat. He works in the IT sector.
"Our route is fairly flexible: basically the weather defines which way we go, as the hurricane and cyclones seasons set the limits for sailing each region."
He and his wife Anna, who have been sailing for more than a decade, had planned the adventure long before the COVID-19 pandemic.
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While the pandemic presented them with the dilemma of whether this was the right time to go, in the end their determination overruled all worries and risks.
They follow the changes in coronavirus rules in each country, took tests and went into quarantine as and when required.?"When we arrived in Martinique, we told authorities that we just spent 16 days on the open seas and they accepted that as quarantine," Bosze said.
Nonetheless, the boat is filled with enough food for a month. And they catch their own tuna or mahi mahi (dorado), much to the joy of their 6 and 8-year-old daughters.
The two girls do remote learning and will be enrolled in local schools if possible, to get familiar with different cultures.
Domonkos said that a discussion with Jimmy Cornell - the legendary Romanian-born British yachtsman - had a great influence on their thinking when they planned the trip.
While being together all the time in a confined space posed some difficulties in the beginning, now everything goes like clockwork on 'Teatime', named after the family's habit of sitting down for tea and chatter.
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Anna said the trip has given her a lot of freedom, even though she cooks regularly besides handling the sails if needed.
"We saw dolphins jumping at the bow of the boat and swimming with us, with the sea totally calm, so we could see them clearly under water," she said, smiling.
Depending on COVID restrictions, they plan to sail on this year or next year towards the Pacific, and now they say their trip could last another 5-6 years, stopping for extended periods in the southern Pacific and on the Indian Ocean.?
All Inputs Reuters