SisterShip Watches ...
By Amy Alton
Sailing Avocet Marissa Neely balances a lot in her life. She’s been with her husband, Chris, since they were 15, and immediately moved aboard Avocet, their Cheoy Lee 41 after graduating from college. Between boat projects in preparation for their cruising adventures, sailing trips around southern California, and operating two businesses, Marissa and Chris create sailing videos for their YouTube channel, Sailing Avocet. A testament of what you can do with big passion and drive, Marissa shares some of her experiences living the cruising life. Amy: You’ve been sailing and refitting your boat for a few years now. What are your plans going forward? Marissa: We bought Avocet in 2018, moving aboard when we were fresh out of college and a couple days into our marriage. We knew she was a project boat going into it, but sheesh if only we knew what we were really in for! In addition to the planned renovations and refits we also completed a handful of
unexpected projects. It has been a long time coming but we are finally at the short end of our project list, happy to tackle the small ones that pop up knowing the brunt of the bigger ones are behind us. COVID kind of shook up our plans (just like many other cruisers) which delayed our splash from the boatyard and further pushed our cruising date. It was a humbling experience losing control like that, but we made the best of it and did what we could. Ultimately it was a good thing that our plans got pushed because had we left when intended we would have never met some of the cool people that we did this year and may have missed out on some incredible opportunities! Our tentative marina departure date is the spring of 2022 where we will be enjoying the Channel Islands before heading south to warmer waters. Amy: Right now, Avocet is only the tip of the iceberg! You have three boats currently, Chris comes from a sailing family, and you and Chris started sailing by racing together? Marissa: Chris comes from a sailing family growing up on San Francisco Bay sailing a Mason 43 (still in the family). His brother Jon SisterShip 12
