ABSTRACT
The motivational profile suggests extreme importance of the oceangoing sailing community, especially for women, with strong social bonding occurring. Sailings globalized way of life contrasts with the independence and physical isolation in visiting some of the most remote places on earth. Self-sufficiency becomes possible because of technology, and skills traded within the sailing subculture. The author posits that oceangoing community and social bonds are often greater than land community because of the intensity of the experience and living in the flow of the moment. The cruising lifestyle, slow paced with minimal regulation, represents the antithesis of societal emphasis on rigidity and formal structure that constrains adventure. Certainly, for many of the small number of participants, ocean sailing for pleasure is the ultimate mobile lifestyle, simultaneously occurring within a super-networked community, well linked to the shore side world. Technological advances aside, the skill requirements, and danger, restrict this immersion to a limited number that accept the risks.
