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From: Kenneth & Jane McKelvie (no email)
Date: Wed Jul 04 2001 - 10:07:34 EDT
After reading some of the comments on Catamaran Live and resisting
commenting, I had to add my two pence worth:-
We have lived on board our second Prout Catamaran now for 6 years in Hong
Kong and have sailed from here to the Philippines during that time so have
offshore experience on her. Prior to this we had a Jeanneau 42 on which we
did the same passage several times. Our long-term plans are to cruise on
her when we retire.
I would not swap a catamaran for a monohull now. Sailing is much easier we
find on a cat than a monohull and two of us manage a 50' with no problem at
all. In storm conditions everyone shortens sail and adjusts sail to suit
the conditions. We loved our time on the Jeanneau 42 but did find storm
conditions very difficult esp when it came to being on watch in the wee
small hours (call us old and unfit if you must!). Going on deck for the 3am
watch in 40knots of wind and large seas I know which boat I'd rather be
sailing.
We have two dogs and an18 year-old on board our Cat and have learned to make
the most of our space. There is a "his" and a "hers" hull, the dogs and our
son seem to fit in happily somewhere in between or on his windsurfing board
if not on the computer. Prout did admit to us as we were having the boat
built that they have had two hulls which have turned turtle. BOTH were due
to the skippers' inexperience and both skippers and their crew survived to
tell the story. They had too much sail up for the conditions.
If I have anything to say against Cats it is the motion. A monohull will
"slot" into the conditions and the motion is almost predictable. A Cat has
a much more square motion which is not so easy to predict. The thing we
learned when we were looking for our liveaboard was to check which Cats are
insured for long distance offshore voyaging and which are not. When we were
looking a lot of French Cats were not insurable 100 miles offshore.
As everyone says, there are pros and cons to everything and the boat which
suits one person will not suit another.
Happy sailing!
Jane
S/V King's Ransom
Hong Kong
Prout 50.
P.S. We have a large typhoon due here tomorrow and Friday, the monohulls are
in for a much rougher time than we are though the wind whistling between our
hulls is another matter!
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