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Perspective
I was raised in part by a half crazy Irish Tinker who hauled me about the Cariribean and the Keys on a 48' Dutch leeboard schooner, (Now would you calculate her "Stability factor" with the lee leeboard hard on the lee or flopping away to windward with your granda yelling that you had not hauled quick enough?). Those intriguing Carribean storms were a favourite sailing window for him, something to do with the clinking cargo he made his living at.
I never lost my sealegs going thru various boats, racing in the Lightning class to really give me an education. Later lived aboard & cruised a Tripp 30 that is possibly the most solid fiberglass boat ever built. No hull deck joint! None, NADA! Two major thwartships complete bulkheads and fiberglass cloth so thick you bought thru hulls designed for wood. STIFF!! You jump on the deck and there was ZERO flex. Modified full keel heavily ballasted and low 5/8 masthead rig. Stability factor? LOLOL!!! Whats the score for righting herself from turtle? I swear she could!
I am ashore briefly and thinking of a boat. My playground will be the Carribean with possibly a trip some day to EUROPE. My wife and I will at times live aboard when we come up to the states, but basically we will be coastal to the northern coast of SA and island hopping in the lower Carribean. So if I want a crew, I need a boat with a high liveability quotient, a low initial capital quotient, reasonable seaworthiness, and resalibity. Oh, and no damn leeboards!!
Speed is not the driving issue here....were it there is a 26 foot bilgeboard scow for sail that I swear could upwind a few Hobies!! Now that would be a laugh!! Those ironing boards with masts are fast!
Heavy weather is not the issue either. Oh I certainly know all about rogue storms, I swear Granda could actually predict them! But due diligence also dictates the skipper prudently limit his passages to the capabilities of his boat and crew. In other words, on the hook in a protected harbour is a fine way to ride out a storm, my cargo doesn't clink...instead my cargo would curse me in fiery Spanish if I had her out rolling from rail to rail. I seriously doubt she would accept the role of self propelled ballast, no matter how many roses I brought her.
So I am looking favourably at the OI41...with all due diligence and with my eyes wide open to her faults. As someone said, any boat is a compromise and every boat has it's place including that crazy tub of my Granda...She had an 18" draft!!... Something about unloading cargo privately in strange places.
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