|
|
|
|
|||||
|
||||||
Subject: RE: [world-cruising] New Member pt 3
From: Rick H Kennerly (rick@XXX.XXX)
Date: Sat Apr 05 2003 - 08:17:32 EST
Finally, decide on which cruising camp you will inhabit and which sailing
community you will join. These decisions will inform every other decision
you make. As you will come to understand, these decisions will also be
informed by your pocket book. I suggest you sample a bit of the writings of
both camps as well as from the middle.
The extremes of the cruising camp spectrum are the writings of two cruising
couples: Lin & Larry Pardey and Steve and Linda Dashew.
The Pardey's have been cruising together for nearly 20 years or more. They
build their own boats of wood (Seraffyn (24 ft) and Talisen (I think about
30 ft)), they've circled the globe about three times, now, and crossed
dozens of oceans, all without jobs, an engine, or an electrical system
(except a solar panel for a disc player) while using a bucket for a head.
Their mantra is "Go Small, Go Simple, Go Now." Good advice, but a bit
Spartan for most tastes (I've actually come to pity the Pardey's a bit
because they're trapped by their public, which would howl if they were to
ever put anything modern on their boat--like roller furling. I still
remember the angry, betrayed letters in the sailing rags when an 70 year old
blind Eric Hiscock broke down and finally put a furler on Wanderer). Of the
Pardey's writings I'd recommend: The Cost Conscious Cruiser, Self-Sufficient
Sailor, The Care and Feeding of Sailing Crew, The Capable Cruiser, Storm
Tactics, and any of the earlier Seraffyn books (Med or Oriental adventure or
Cruising in Seraffyn).
Steve and Linda Dashew, on the other hand, are the epitome of high tech blue
water passagemaking. They not only write cruising books but also design &
build their own line of metal sailboats, the Deerfoot series. These boats
are big (60 ft plus), high tech, and equipped with every modern convenience
from electric heads to washers and dryers. Needless to say, the Dashew
outlook is 180 degrees out from the Pardey's. But they have produced some
amazing books: Offshore Cruising Encyclopedia, Mariner's Weather Handbook,
and Practical Seamanship.
Somewhere in the middle between these extremes you'll find almost everybody
on this list. Writers in the middle of the spectrum that I think you should
pay attention to are: Beth Leonard: The Voyager's Handbook; Following Seas,
Sailing the Globe; Sounding a Life; Don Casey with his Sensible Cruising:
The Thoreau Approach and This Old Boat; and Daniel Spurr: Spurr's Boatbook
and Offshore Sailing: 200 Essential Passagemaking Tips.
And, in case you decide that passagemaking really isn't for you, I offer Tom
Neale's book All in the Same Boat. I've come to the conclusion over the
years that 99.9% of all would-be cruisers concentrate too much on what they
think they might want to do some day ( including buying and equipping a boat
that will probably never see it's visionary purpose) while ignoring the joys
of living a vagabond life in extreme comfort afloat.
As for sailing communities, you'll have to decide between slower deep draft,
full keel, heavy displacement coral crushers or light, fast, twitchy
cruiser-racers, auxiliary sailboats or motorsailors, and mono hull vs
multihulls. Your reading, research and advice inform by your basic nature
and opportunities will define these choices for you.
Because so many people on this list have seen this list, I'm a bit reluctant
to post it again. However, since you're new I offer you:
Rick's Rules for boat buying and ownership:
1. A small boat and a suitcase full of money beats
a big boat tied to the Bank every time.
2. Cruising boats are bought by the pound, not the foot.
3. You gain more live aboard space for every foot of
beam added than for foot in length purchased
(there are some older narrow CCA-style boats that are 50ft long,
but with less usable interior space than our Westsail 32).
4. While boats are linear, their maintenance,
time and equipment costs are exponential (it costs three times as
much to maintain a 40 footer than a 30 footer).
5. The view of paradise is exactly the same
from the cockpit of a small boat as that from a goldplater.
6. Any fool can sail a 45ft boat downwind in nice weather.
On the other hand, it is very easy to buy more boat than a
couple can handle during a blow on a lee shore. (I've added this addendum,
however: modern equipment can make a larger boat practical for a couple to
handle in a blow--roller furling and in-mast or boom furling, self tailing
winches,
electric windlasses, big engines,
7. Pay attention to the basics--hull, engine, rigging, sails--rather
than to amount, quality or age of gizmos; a few grand held back at
purchase can replace (or add) GPS, VHF, wind and depth instruments,
and creature comforts--cushion covers, propane stove, etc. On the other
hand,
a bum engine, a rigging failure, or a bad case of blisters can easily set
you back three
or four times that amount.
8. Charter fleet boats were designed for two or three couples living out
of duffels and eating ashore most of the time, not live-aboard and cruising
--you'll be offered hundreds of badly used former charter boats at very
attractive
prices but you can't afford them.
9. Go simple, go small, go now. L&L P
10. Finally, always purchase a boat in which you will be proud to be seen
arriving.
Rick NH2F
Westsail 32 Xapic
Cabo San Juan, Puerto Rico
www.mouseherder.com/xapic/sleep.html
www.westsail.org
Sail like a Kiwi
Anchor like a Canadian
Live like a Texan
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
FREE Cell Phones with up to $400 Cash Back!
http://us.click.yahoo.com/_bBUKB/vYxFAA/i5gGAA/A1TolB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
world-cruising-unsubscribe@XXX.XXX
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
|