Plan B Forum

An extremist religious family with two small children have been rescued after being lost of sea for nearly three months when they attempted to abandon the U.S. in a small boat and sail 3,300 miles to the Polynesian island nation of Kiribati.

The Gastonguays from northern Arizona set sail from San Diego in May with their newborn infant and 3-year-old daughter after deciding to 'take a leap of faith and see where God led us.' They believed that they needed to flee the nation because of what they see as government support for homosexuality and abortions and restrictions on their religious freedom.

The family were almost immediately beset by storms that overwhelmed their small vessel and their limited nautical knowledge. They drifted for months and were running law on supplies before they were picked up by a passing tanker.

On Friday the family landed in Chile and are expected to be flow home today on flights book by the U.S. State Department.

The months-long journey has been 'pretty exciting' and 'little scary at certain points,' 26-year-old Hannah Gastonguay told The Associated Press by telephone on Saturday.

She said they wanted to go to Kiribati because 'we didn't want to go anywhere big.' She said they believed the island to be 'one of the least developed countries in the world.'

Kiribati is a group of islands just off the equator and the international date line about halfway between Hawaii and Australia - more than 3,000 miles from the U.S. coastline. The total population is just over 100,000 people of primarily Micronesian descent.



Hannah Gastonguay said her family was fed up with government control in the U.S. As Christians they don't believe in 'abortion, homosexuality, in the state-controlled church,' she said.

'We were in the thick of it, but we prayed. Being out on that boat, I just knew I was going to see some miracles.'Hannah Gastonguay, 26, on being lost at sea with her two children

U.S. 'churches aren't their own,' Gastonguay said, suggesting that government regulation interfered with religious independence.Among other differences, she said they had a problem with being 'forced to pay these taxes that pay for abortions we don't agree with.'The Gastonguays weren't members of any church, and Hannah Gastonguay said their faith came from reading the Bible and through prayer.'The Bible is pretty clear,' she said

.The family moved in November from Ash Fork, Arizona, to San Diego, where they lived on their boat as they prepared to set sail. She said she gave birth to the couple's 8-month-old girl on the boat, which was docked in a slip at the time.In May, Hannah, her 30-year-old husband Sean, his father Mike, and the couple's daughters, 3-year-old Ardith and baby Rahab set off.

They wouldn't touch land again for 91 days, she said.

Hannah Gastonguay said her family was fed up with government control in the U.S.

On Friday the family landed in Chile and are expected to be flow[n] home today on flights book[ed] by the U.S. State Department.

rubato wrote:No no no. That's part of the miracle. Say "amen" sister.

Crackpot wrote:I seriously doubt they could string together a coherent enough thought process to that would make any sense in literary form.

MajGenl.Meade wrote: probably true for most..... others get the upward elevator