Some friends of mine have decided to get a sailboat after a few years of sailing OOPB (on other peoples boats) or chartering here and there. They are a small family that have certain needs that may or may not have been crystallized in their minds. As I exchanged emails and thought over how my sailing evolved I got to wondering what the best way to help them was and what might be the right style of sailing, for them.
On the one hand, one of the parents wanted a larger boat for entertaining and sailing; lets say over 30 feet. This boat would stay in the same area, enjoying up to week long cruises on the lake. The boat would be a fixer upper in their price range, but they could use it while they fixed it and it would be a floating condo down at the lake. The other parent thought that it might grow tiresome sailing the same lake all the time; leaning towards a trailerable sailboat up to 26 feet in length.
Of course each has its benefits and restrictions. When I bought Ventolines, that wasn’t her name, but that’s another story, I was not thinking of anything other than “I wanted to sail”. I also wanted it to be somewhat comfortable to stay on for weekends. I sailed her every day I could after purchasing her. Then due to circumstances of club membership or lack thereof, I moved her to another lake. On that lake, I sailed in every weather condition I could, learning a great deal about handling the boat and when to reef (before you leave the dock). I learned anchoring in muck is not so bad, but anchoring in a tree really sucks. After I while I learned that lakes are small, or at least the portions you can get to on a sailboat are limited.
Its at this point that I discovered chartering. Chartering boats can take you to parts of the globe that are postcard perfect. You can try boats of all types with amenities a little 25 foot lake boat dreamed of. Most charter companies make it easy to take the boat of your choice, even if its not always easy to get to it. I was hooked on it, right up until the point I realized that a few times chartering and I would have real nice down payment on the same boat.
When I was basking in the glow of credit card debt I asked why can’t my boat be in the ocean? Many answers came flooding back: 1) Trailering is hard to do for long distances… 2)You have to worry about launch ramps with the proper depth for a sailboat… 3)Getting the mast up and down is difficult with many friends, more so by oneself… But each “challenge” has a solution. Plus the prospects of taking the boat you know and saving some money are too strong to ignore. For challenge 1, I have a swing keel and trailer, with an SUV that will tow it. On issue 2), again the swing keel takes care of a low of that, and an extension on the trailer gets the bunks deep enough to float the boat. Finally, issue 3 was surmounted using the trailer winch, an old rope and a tool from catalina direct that allows the mast to be pinned without having to strain your back. The real point, is just like all other aspects of sailing, if you let your excuses win out you won’t do anything.
Because I am more often than not an inland sailor, I enjoy forays to other locales made possible by trailer sailing. I do miss the size of a 30+ footer sometimes; so I lust after the Hake Seaward 32rk. But until the lottery comes in I will work with my Catalina 25 exploring different places for a week or two at a time.
Now, what did I tell my friends? After pushing hard on trailer sailing, I just had them think about the type of sailing they want to do and where ultimately they want it to take them.