by Lisa Hinton-Valdrighi
When most folks retire, they look forward to relaxing, maybe even taking a leisurely trip.
But Aubrey and Terri Smoot of Ditchley aren’t most folks. They weren’t content to travel to a tropical island and sip fruity drinks on the beach.
“We thought, how else in this era and phase of life can you find an adventure?” said Aubrey. A lifelong boater with an inherent adventurous spirit—passed down from his grandfather who drove from Delaware to Alaska in the 1960s before there was GPS navigation or cellphones—Aubrey wanted more from his first year of retirement.
The couple, along with their 4-year-old vizsla, Yudee, went on a year-long adventure and joined an exclusive club of boaters completing the Great American Loop. Their’s actually was a little longer than most looper voyages courtesy of a custom-built Aspen named Shorebilly Too!, which allowed them to go where others couldn’t. They traveled 8,239 miles through three countries in 363 days.
“We were able to see so many….
