"Peter Bennett" wrote in message
news.com...
On 25 Apr 2005 12:48:32 -0700, wrote:

A number of months ago I began my search for a sailboat. I am an upper
Chesapeake sailor who, a few years down the road, will do some coastal
cruising. I am looking for a boat that I can sail solo (I want to sail
solo - if I wanted to hook-up with crew, I would have taken up golf),
but that can also confortably accomodate three adults for a weekend
cruise.But the principal criteria is its ease/security in solo sailing.

I single-handed a Yamaha 30 for many years - it is a fairly light
racer-cruiser (or perhaps cruiser-racer) - it performed well, and I
found it easy to handle. I don't think I'd want to go too much over
30 ft for single-handing coastal cruising (ocean cruising may be
another matter). For coastal cruising, you will frequently be raising
and lowering sails, anchoring, picking up a mooring, or docking at a
marina - all things that are harder the larger the boat.

I found the Yamaha very easy to handle, both under way and around
marinas (I had less trouble getting it into a marina slip than I do
with my present 28 ft trawler, and much, much less trouble than with a
26 ft twin stern drive planing boat I had between the Yamaha and the
trawler)

--
Peter Bennett, VE7CEI
peterbb4 (at) interchange.ubc.ca
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We just had a scary situation with our Y30. One of our skippers was out on a
day sail, and as she came around the breakwater, a large plume of white
smoke started pouring out of the exhaust. Fortunately, she was able to get
to the dock pretty quickly. Turned out the bolts on an exhaust flange must
have vibrated loose and allowed seawater to get into the top of the engine.
Fortunately, the water just got into the head not the engine itself. A
couple of $$ and it was fixed.