HI again folks, Thanks for the replies! I want plenty of opinions since this
is a broad topic!

So here goes, what SIZE of boat would be a maximum for 2 (healthy and late
50's) people underway. I am thinking in the 45 to 65 foot range with modern
roller furling and etc.
I have been partial to ketch sail configurations. I need good room for
visitors/family if they where to fly over and spend some time in port with
us as we go along. I may never get out of the Caribbean- but want a boat
that can make it if we want to do some extended cruising.

Thanks,
RB


"RB" wrote in message
...
Just what is a blue water boat- size- sail plan- tankage- hull material-
and so on?
My wife and I want to retire and do a circumnavigation just the 2 of us.
What should I look for in a boat?
Rick in St Louis

On Fri, 9 Sep 2005 15:16:10 -0500, "RB" wrote:

HI again folks, Thanks for the replies! I want plenty of opinions since this
is a broad topic!

So here goes, what SIZE of boat would be a maximum for 2 (healthy and late
50's) people underway. I am thinking in the 45 to 65 foot range with modern
roller furling and etc.

Electric winches go from "luxury" to "necessity" in my view at about
the 45 foot mark for two people, unless you are both 5' 10" and
unusually strong. Getting the mainsail up and down is usually the
issue, as the the height of the boom on bigger boats. More electrics,
furling, etc. equals more stuff to break...hiring crew is probably
cheaper in the long run. That being said, the maximum is what your
wallet can handle when half your assistive devices go on the fritz.
Most couples I know of stay in the 39-45 foot band, as the price of
maintenance (not to mention the price of docking, canals, etc.) is
higher with longer boats.

I have been partial to ketch sail configurations. I need good room for
visitors/family if they where to fly over and spend some time in port with
us as we go along. I may never get out of the Caribbean- but want a boat
that can make it if we want to do some extended cruising.

You have several possibly contradictory requirements. You have to
figure that YOU and your wife are the actual liveaboards: size the
boat for your capacities to sail it and your comfort in living in it,
not for its suitability as a floating hotel for visitors who may or
may not show or help in running the boat.

As for the ketch rig, while I personally like it, it is both more
tunable and more complex than a sloop rig, and they point less high on
average and are frequently found 20% too short on boats 40% too heavy.
It's a trade wind/downwind rig, really, and is good if you've got time
or find the more but smaller sails aspect attractive. I do (I like the
center cockpit options frequently found on ketches as well), but I
have no illusions that it takes more wind to get them moving and they
are a rig for comfort, not speed. If J-Boats made a ketch, then
maybe...!

Also, in the Caribbean, there's a lot of thin water. You may find a
swing keel/centerboard makes more sense, as the bigger the boat, the
deeper the keel as a rule. A Whitby 42 is a good example of a tested
Caribbean cruiser.

R.

rhys wrote:
On Fri, 9 Sep 2005 15:16:10 -0500, "RB" wrote:

HI again folks, Thanks for the replies! I want plenty of opinions since this
is a broad topic!

So here goes, what SIZE of boat would be a maximum for 2 (healthy and late
50's) people underway. I am thinking in the 45 to 65 foot range with modern
roller furling and etc.

Electric winches go from "luxury" to "necessity" in my view at about
the 45 foot mark for two people, unless you are both 5' 10" and
unusually strong. Getting the mainsail up and down is usually the
issue, as the the height of the boom on bigger boats. More electrics,
furling, etc. equals more stuff to break...hiring crew is probably
cheaper in the long run. That being said, the maximum is what your
wallet can handle when half your assistive devices go on the fritz.
Most couples I know of stay in the 39-45 foot band, as the price of
maintenance (not to mention the price of docking, canals, etc.) is
higher with longer boats.

I have been partial to ketch sail configurations. I need good room for
visitors/family if they where to fly over and spend some time in port with
us as we go along. I may never get out of the Caribbean- but want a boat
that can make it if we want to do some extended cruising.

You have several possibly contradictory requirements. You have to
figure that YOU and your wife are the actual liveaboards: size the
boat for your capacities to sail it and your comfort in living in it,
not for its suitability as a floating hotel for visitors who may or
may not show or help in running the boat.

As for the ketch rig, while I personally like it, it is both more
tunable and more complex than a sloop rig, and they point less high on
average and are frequently found 20% too short on boats 40% too heavy.
It's a trade wind/downwind rig, really, and is good if you've got time
or find the more but smaller sails aspect attractive. I do (I like the
center cockpit options frequently found on ketches as well), but I
have no illusions that it takes more wind to get them moving and they
are a rig for comfort, not speed. If J-Boats made a ketch, then
maybe...!

Also, in the Caribbean, there's a lot of thin water. You may find a
swing keel/centerboard makes more sense, as the bigger the boat, the
deeper the keel as a rule. A Whitby 42 is a good example of a tested
Caribbean cruiser.

R.

um do you remember any particulars on boat Joshua Slocum sailed around
the world in , I dont recall him looking like a body builder.

On 12 Sep 2005 14:59:39 -0700, "akcarlos" wrote:


um do you remember any particulars on boat Joshua Slocum sailed around
the world in , I dont recall him looking like a body builder.

"Spray" was 36 feet long and easily handled by a man who not only
rebuilt her from frames to be easily handled, but by a man who had
spent his entire career on muscle-powered sailing vessels.

Today's boats are very different, and today's people, as well.

R.

rhys wrote:
On 12 Sep 2005 14:59:39 -0700, "akcarlos" wrote:


um do you remember any particulars on boat Joshua Slocum sailed around
the world in , I dont recall him looking like a body builder.

"Spray" was 36 feet long and easily handled by a man who not only
rebuilt her from frames to be easily handled, but by a man who had
spent his entire career on muscle-powered sailing vessels.

Today's boats are very different, and today's people, as well.

R.

my point was that you can have a larger yacht and sail it quite well
short crewed
without having lots of modern toys like roller furling, electric
winches etc .

On 13 Sep 2005 17:33:17 -0700, "akcarlos" wrote:


rhys wrote:
On 12 Sep 2005 14:59:39 -0700, "akcarlos" wrote:


um do you remember any particulars on boat Joshua Slocum sailed around
the world in , I dont recall him looking like a body builder.

"Spray" was 36 feet long and easily handled by a man who not only
rebuilt her from frames to be easily handled, but by a man who had
spent his entire career on muscle-powered sailing vessels.

Today's boats are very different, and today's people, as well.

R.

my point was that you can have a larger yacht and sail it quite well
short crewed
without having lots of modern toys like roller furling, electric
winches etc .

I think you mistook my meaning: I don't actually approve of a lot of
"modern toys", or perhaps I should say I approve of them selectively.
For instance, I have hank-on sails. In fact, I convert tape luff
composite sails abandoned by racers because a bird shat on them or
something *back into* hank-ons...which is seen as retrograde around my
club. I also just bought a sextant, just rebuilt an Atomic 4, and just
spent a few hundred bucks on making up preventers for my boom, because
with a new spinnaker I'm doing a lot more downwind work.

So I am old-fashioned, I suppose. Or conservative. Or prudent. Or
cheap.

However, I do maintain that if your goal is more cruising and less
repair, the most sensible thing a cruising couple can do is to get as
nearly bulletproof a boat as possible, meaning one sized to their
capabilities, and to make themselves fit as possible so that they can
run it efficiently. In some cases, this means a slightly smaller boat
than they can afford (say, 40 feet), with less crap...sorry, treasured
possessions aboard, and more money invested in better gear.

For a two-person crew, roller furling is a must at 40 feet, unless the
couple in question are Olympian in size and strength. But I would
still want the ability to have a hank-on staysail for emergencies, and
the sort of roller furling where the genoa is easily stripped. By the
same logic, I don't like in mast furling.

R.

akcarlos wrote:
my point was that you can have a larger yacht and sail it quite well
short crewed
without having lots of modern toys like roller furling, electric
winches etc .


True enough, but apparently you also forgot that "Spray" was a very old
wooden boat ballasted with loose rocks, and that while Slocum did manage
to sail around the world in her, he was also lost at sea in her.

Modern gear is better. It isn't necessary, of course, but much of it (if
intelligently chosen & properly installed) makes life while
sailing/cruising SAFER as well as more comfortable.

Fresh Breezes- Doug "Throw A Brick At A Luddite Today" King

You know there=B4s all kinds out here and it depends on what YOU want
and WHERE.

I=B4m currently sailing in the Beagle Channel. One couple we sail
alongside has a lovely steel vessel, 38=B4, they built themselves.
Cutter-rig, 18HP diesel. Sounds a little underpowered, but they=B4ve
been out for 18 years. Everything is manual except for the furling
headsails. They get everywhere they need to go and don=B4t spend all of
their time making repairs. We have two ferro-cement sailboats down here
that prove the fact that good construction can do alot. The average
=A8pleasure=A8 vessel (lots of charters down here that don=B4t count) is
probably between 45 and 55 feet. But remember, this is an extreme
environment and high-latitude vessels are a tad different from their
tropical counterparts. Modern equipment is great, but things can freeze
up down here. The lanolin-based greases solidify as our friend aboard
Sula discovered. I think most people down here in the extreme south
like modern, electric when possible, but with a good manual override.
When you want to bring in that sail or reef, you may want to do it
quickly. But if it breaks, you want to be able to handle it easily.

On a transocean passage it=B4s not much different. If you get hit in a
squall, you don`t want to spend your precious energy messing about.
Just get the sails reefed and hunker down.

On Tue, 20 Sep 2005 08:05:25 -0400, DSK wrote:


Modern gear is better. It isn't necessary, of course, but much of it (if
intelligently chosen & properly installed) makes life while
sailing/cruising SAFER as well as more comfortable.

Absolutely. Slocum probably didn't have lifelines, but probably *did*
rig preventers, etc.

I have no argument against modern equipment: modern materials
(Spectra, carbon fibre, etc.) are clearly superior in almost all
respects excepting price G. But there are multiple cut-offs, in my
opinion, between modern and useful and modern and (potentially)
dangerous gear and ideas in the bluewater yacht world. One such
break-point, for me, are assistive devices like electric winches or
windlasses: if you are older and/or weaker and/or short-handed, and
the only way you can handle that big beautiful boat is via such
devices, you are pretty well stuck if they break. You want options in
sailing, and not bringing the entire contents of a modern condo with
you on a voyage is easier than having to get a bigger boat with bigger
gear to run it.

I am rather more distressed, if not surprised, at the lack of basic
seamanship in said bigger boats than I am worried at expensive and
possibly superfluous gear that breaks. We hear more and more of
GPS-piloted boats running onto reefs, of crew unable to stop the boat
to do a MOB, with subsequent loss of life, of bozos with zero
knowledge yakking to their fellow bozos on VHF, etc.

Watching the news last night, for instance, I saw several shots of
nice big yachts in (presumably) the Florida Keys, riding out Hurricane
Rita at anchor.

Fair enough. But under what part of basic seamanship do you leave a
foresail on a roller-furler or a mainsail on a boom (in one instance
unlashed and with the sail cover already shredding and straining the
rode)?

This month's Ocean Navigator has a "future of voyaging" section which
is in parts a bit pessimistic in this way: it's not terrorism or high
fuel prices that will cut back on voyaging, it's the unwillingness of
a lot of cruisers to learn the basics of navigation and boat-handling
because they are focused on the gleaming saloon or the wonderful
washer/dryer in the forepeak...G

R.

"RB" wrote:

HI again folks, Thanks for the replies! I want plenty of opinions since this
is a broad topic!

So here goes, what SIZE of boat would be a maximum for 2 (healthy and late
50's) people underway. I am thinking in the 45 to 65 foot range with modern
roller furling and etc.

Our boat is called a CSY 44 and is really closer to 50 if you count
the bow pulpit with the anchor and the dinghy davits and solar panels
on the stern.. That's plenty big enough IMHO for two people to sail.
She can be single handed, but not easily.

We have a cutter and all three sails are roller furled and can be run
from the cockpit. The cutter is nicer than a sloop IMHO.

We don't have either electric winches or an electric windlass. I can
only furl the staysail all by myself because the other sails are too
big for me to handle, but I'm older than you and not as strong. Bob
managed to unfurl and furl the sails himself even though he was in the
process of having a heart attack, so I'm sure a healthy and more fit
person could manage.

I have been partial to ketch sail configurations. I need good room for
visitors/family if they where to fly over and spend some time in port with
us as we go along. I may never get out of the Caribbean- but want a boat
that can make it if we want to do some extended cruising.

There are (since we've modified her a bit), berths for 6.5 (one
smaller person). Enough that children and/or grandchildren could come
and visit. We took out one double and made a single out of it.

We have two heads and a separate shower. This is important.

It is a center cockpit boat which I prefer, although our boat isn't a
walk-through which my husband would prefer.

The boat was built for the Caribbean bareboat trade, and does very
well there as it has lots of ventilation (which I think more modern
boats are lacking) and lots of storage. Ventilation, storage and lots
of handholds are very important IMHO. Don't pay too much attention to
'light and airy saloons' if there's nowhere to hold on in a seaway.

It is a very heavy boat which makes her a bit harder to handle in
strong wind and current, and also somewhat (IMO) underpowered.

HTH


"RB" wrote in message
...
Just what is a blue water boat- size- sail plan- tankage- hull material-
and so on?
My wife and I want to retire and do a circumnavigation just the 2 of us.
What should I look for in a boat?
Rick in St Louis





grandma Rosalie

S/V RosalieAnn, Leonardtown, MD
CSY 44 WO #156
http://home.mindspring.com/~gmbeasley/id1.html