The future of the sailing world. Why are there so few young people cruising??

[chall03]

Originally Posted by smackdaddy

By the way - here's a great example of what the "youth of today" you old farts are being critical of can pull off with a junked out Hunter, some tools, lots of ingenuity, and a rudder made from a 2X12.

Shoestring Hunter Adventure

or condensed here...

Shoestring Hunter Adventure

Absolutely!!

And here is a link to two Gen Y Aussie's sailing A wooden 29ft boat from Halifax, Canada to Sydney. Australia via the Northwest Passage, Siberia, Micronesia and PNG. Not much time for Guitar Hero I would say.

Teleport Expeditions - Chris Bray & Jess Taunton

I could send you links to at least another half a dozen Gen Y's doing something cool in boats.

Sure these anecdotes don't speak to an entire generation, yes we are all probably doomed to eat ourselves silly while watching MTV while the world cripples around us, but hey if the grumpy old men get to pull out the "my neighbours friend knows a no hoper kid who still lives with his mum" crap then some Gen Y BFS wouldn't hurt this thread either

[bljones]

Originally Posted by smackdaddy

+ freakin' 1. Take all the PRWG pontificating back to The Hole. That stuff is ridiculous.

If more people understood one simple thing (apart from the adventure maxim) a lot more of them would be sailing. And that's this...

It's not that big a deal. If, as a newb on a sailing forum, you learn anything - learn that.

You can easily find an old, but perfectly "sailable" boat under 30' for between $1K and $5K. It will need love, but it will sail. With that boat you can have a freakin' blast exploring your bay, coastal hopping, or whatever. Here's over 160 of them:

(Sail) Boats For Sale

And here's a specific example of a Catalina 25 for $1950. Sleeps 4-5, looks like it's floating, looks like it has a pretty good outboard, has roller furling, etc.



View Boat Photos - YachtWorld.com

If it is floating, has no serious structural or hull damage, the outboard works well, and the sails are at all usable - this is a freakin' steal. Regardless of how crapped out the interior might be. You could easily make way more than the asking price just parting this boat out. See? You don't even have to "start out with a small dinghy to learn to sail correctly". You can have a small cruising boat like this that you can anchor and spend the night on with a few friends. Then you can even race it if/when you want. How cool is that?

The key is to find a boat that is ready to sail - now. Don't blow all your time and money "fixing it up". That's not nearly as fun as sailing it. Trust me.

Remember, it doesn't have to be perfect, it just needs to be able to safely and reliably get you away from the dock, sail around, and get you back. And as long as you are conservative about when, where and how you sail as you learn - you'll be fine. Just be safety conscious.

And here's the other thing: When you're thinking about picking up sailing for the first time - it DOES look and sound complicated as hell. And, yes, there is A LOT to know.

BUT, it's not that hard. Seriously. You DON'T have to have a stack of certifications to go sailing and have fun.

So, just find a cheap boat that fits your budget (after researching the main things to look out for), buy it, and get someone who knows what they're doing to go out with you a few times and show you the ropes. It's really pretty easy.

I know because this is exactly what I did. I'm still alive, I haven't killed anyone, my boat is still afloat, I haven't had to call in the CG, and I haven't had a single collision or serious grounding.

So just do it already - while these other knuckleheads keep psychoanalyzing society.

and all of this would be relevant except that to paraphrase the question posed in the thread topic wasn't "how?" but "how come?"
Totally different head. Totally.
Wanna see more Gen Y sailing? invite them sailing. hell, invite eveyrone sailing that you know-
guests= booze.win-freakin'-win.

[peterchech]

Originally Posted by chall03

And here is a link to two Gen Y Aussie's sailing A wooden 29ft boat from Halifax, Canada to Sydney. Australia via the Northwest Passage, Siberia, Micronesia and PNG. Not much time for Guitar Hero I would say.

Teleport Expeditions - Chris Bray & Jess Taunton

Wow, most people out building junk rigs are hardly in gen Y lol good on them!!! Seems to be a good argument for using them in the northern/polar climes (think Mingming and Jester as well) where you can seal up your cork of a boat and control everything easily from the cabin.

[smurphny]

Geeeez Chris, pre-internet? I remember pre color TV!

[Jeff_H]

What does it mean that I remember pre-TV, (perhaps before they even invented dirt)......

[Jgbrown]

What's the point in getting a license if you can't afford the car/insurance/gas/parking/license renewals to go with?
It's a bit different than your generation.
You could buy a huge TV, video game console, a ton of games, and a nice laptop for just what I paid for liability only insurance the last year I had a car here.



Going "out" costs money, other than going for a walk, but what's the fun in walking around suburbia? About as interesting as watching paint dry.
Sit in a park and you are either:
a)Loitering and going to get told to move along.
b)harassed ceaselessly for spare change/smokes etc.

Assuming you can find a park to sit in that is, and a way to get there.

Complaining about the next generation won't ever go out of style I suspect, but that's how it goes.

The comparison to Japan from a previous post is quite accurate I think. I see similar sentiments among many people my age. They know the game is rigged, and they don't really want to spend the time playing it.

Originally Posted by chrisncate

A person can't deny the obvious differences between the generations that remember the pre internet days, and the ones that do not. I believe that viewing this "new world" we now live in via technology in the same old way: "oh, every generation thinks they know more than the younger ones coming up" is just not accurate anymore. Technology is changing the way people are, and where I live (and probably you as well) it's undeniable that kids don't go outside anywhere near like they did when we were young. As a whole, this is not an "outside" generation at all, even if there are exceptions here and there.

Cate has a very large family, and she has nieces, nephews and cousins in the late teen/twenty something set. I am always stunned when I ask them "got your license yet?" only to get the inevitable "no", with no explanation whatsoever as they check their device (Facebook I assume)... My neighbor in fact, right next door has a 20 year old daughter and 18 year old son. Neither ever leave the house that I have observed in any kind of social way (other than to go on their back deck to smoke), and neither drive cars. At that age being inside and home all the time is something I cannot even begin to relate too, it's so weird.

Kids today play the "guitar hero" game and think that is talent and actually playing guitar. Kids from my era actually started bands with musical instruments, you know what I mean? It just isn't the same anymore. Who knows, maybe soon they'll make some new game that has a winch and a wheel as the controllers, and you can sail/cruise "virtually"... (no thanks, I'm good... have at it though)..

It's never a good idea to generalize one person of course, but when judged as a generation overall, Y's/millennials really seem to very often be oversized, oddly shaped, terrible at human interaction/social graces and are quite shut in and glued to a screen or device (I attribute the odd shapes to what we feed kids these days, but that's clearly another topic..).

Huh, now that I think about it - I don't trust anyone under 30...

[chrisncate]

Originally Posted by smurphny

Geeeez Chris, pre-internet? I remember pre color TV!

What the heck is a "television" exactly? Is it some kind of primitive video phone that once had a black and white screen?

[chrisncate]

Originally Posted by Jgbrown

What's the point in getting a license if you can't afford the car/insurance/gas/parking/license renewals to go with?

That's the problem right there. WITHOUT me sounding like a conservative, if you want a DL you get yourself a DL. You have internet service, clearly you can afford the one time DL fee.

It's a bit different than your generation.

Yes, it is - as it was for my generation at your age (I'm a Gen X). The only real difference? Your generation was coddled like soft little eggs and always given a 1st place trophy just for showing up, whereas my generation was constantly getting the crap kicked out of it.

You could buy a huge TV, video game console, a ton of games, and a nice laptop for just what I paid for liability only insurance the last year I had a car here.

Insurance is expensive. So is Comcast internet. What means more to you? Driving and being mobile so you can further yourself, or sitting home typing on your $160 per month bundled cable package bitching about not having enough money to drive... ?

Going "out" costs money, other than going for a walk, but what's the fun in walking around suburbia? About as interesting as watching paint dry.
Sit in a park and you are either:
a)Loitering and going to get told to move along.
b)harassed ceaselessly for spare change/smokes etc.

Well, in my day here I didn't walk as I had a job at 15, and the money to get my DL the very day I turned 16 (literally), as I had been checking off the days for my entire 15th year on earth till I was 16.

A- Loitering. Assert your civil rights the next time you are harangued, I would. If you aren't committing crimes or hanging on private property, you can tell anyone to take a hike.

B- Vagrants hassling you. A quick "F**k off with a hard look right in the eye of the offender usually does the trick. If not, a quick pop in the chops works well also. It's called having a pair..

Assuming you can find a park to sit in that is, and a way to get there.

You said that already.

Complaining about the next generation won't ever go out of style I suspect, but that's how it goes.

The comparison to Japan from a previous post is quite accurate I think. I see similar sentiments among many people my age. They know the game is rigged, and they don't really want to spend the time playing it.

Complaining about prior gens has always been around, this new technological era has not. That's a variable you cannot predict by past history and a game changer.

[night0wl]

chrisncate - you're being overdramatic. You're gen-x and did *NOT* have it hard. For gods sake, college was cheap, there were surpluses at the federal level, the dot com explosion made many of you millionaires, the housing boom made even more you wealthy...so I'm not buying it.

These millenials started with 9/11, went to college in an era where tuition is rising at 15-20% annually, graduated in an era where there are *NO* jobs even for college graduates. Not to mention that *THEY* have fought and died in 2 major foreign wars. What was your generations major war? Desert Storm? Kosovo?

Please...those were video games compared to what the Millenials have experienced in Iraq & Afghanistan.

Gen-X is the generation that had almost as easy as the Baby Boomers...

[Jgbrown]

Originally Posted by chrisncate

That's the problem right there. WITHOUT me sounding like a conservative, if you want a DL you get yourself a DL. You have internet service, clearly you can afford the one time DL fee.

I would have got my license at 16 too... Except my parents wouldn't sign for it so I had to wait until I was 18 to sign for it myself, at which point I'd been working for several years. Then when I did buy a vehicle to commute to my job with(12 hour rotating shift in a factory), I was invited to leave, or get rid of the vehicle. So I slept in my Jeep until I scraped up enough to rent a room.

160$ a month is about 4x what I pay , since I only have the internet and a cell, just as I've always had since I was invited to move out, but you could get the expensive package if you wanted I suppose.


Getting licensed cost me closer to 500$, but it's less to renew.
Liability only insurance runs about 1600$ a year for my '86 diesel golf, more if I want comprehensive. The last year I had it I only got broken into once, and the damage cost under a grand to fix.
Other parts(brakes, muffler, clutch etc) cost me about a grand that year too.
Parking near my work runs about 250$/mo for the cheapest area, and there are no permit free street parking spots.

550$/mo not including fuel... I'll pass on that for now thanks.

I'd rather spend than on my Alberg 30. 6 months of car operating costs would cost me more than the 60 hour week Brian(Mitiempo) and I put in re-wiring my Alberg.


I rode my motorbike to my SECOND job last week. After my 7 hour shift in the boatyard(retrofitting a holding tank into a Catalina 27) on a Saturday.
I parked in the motorbike parking area, for 8 hours to work that job(where I am now as well). There is a generally agreed upon space for motorcycles to park in, 20-30 bikes there every day. The parking people prefer it, since it frees up car spaces.
Well some new parking guy ticketed it, I've parked there 6 months no issue and even asked parking guys about it just to be damn sure I never had problems. 2 minutes later(at 11pm at night) it was towed away.

Faster than I can get a cop when my door has been split down the middle and my house robbed(they came next day). Faster than I can get an ambulance to the boatyard for an injured worker who is in serious pain(one hour).
200$ and another couple hours extra work later I made it home, back at the boatyard 6 hours later to help launch a boat.




What exactly about that sounds fun?
The bike is a 79 CX500 and I pay 1550$/yr for liability but parking is free, so long as you aren't getting towed.

I haven't had a day off in a long time, my days off from my main job I put in a 9 or 10 hour day in the boatyard, and a bit of time working on my boat if I can squeeze it in at the end.

Yes, it is - as it was for my generation at your age (I'm a Gen X). The only real difference? Your generation was coddled like soft little eggs and always given a 1st place trophy just for showing up, whereas my generation was constantly getting the crap kicked out of it.

Yup. That's definitely how I grew up. All those times I was going hungry to make sure I paid my rent, or pay for the parts to rebuild that Jeep I had bought to make it the 4x4 I could travel around the world in. Or when I sold the vehicle I'd spent a year rebuilding myself piece by piece to have enough money to make a start at going back to university so my girlfriend and I would have enough to live on while we studied and worked to pay our tuition.

Good thing I was so coddled, through all the factories and jobsites I worked in. That must've been why they lied to us about some of the things we worked with, some of which left the veins in my arms black for 6 months after I wised up and quit one factory. The coddling sure helped with the ongoing issues I have with my lungs and back from some of them too...
I never got screwed over by putting duty and work first and letting go of the things I wanted to be doing instead.

Insurance is expensive. So is Comcast internet. What means more to you? Driving and being mobile so you can further yourself, or sitting home typing on your $160 per month bundled cable package bitching about not having enough money to drive... ?

I rode my CX500 to Panama last year. 8 months on the road, one of them in California rebuilding her to make the rest of the trip.

Not sure how driving your car town around furthers anything. I let go of having a car when I grew up enough to realize I didn't need the toys and could get by with less.

Well, in my day here I didn't walk as I had a job at 15, and the money to get my DL the very day I turned 16 (literally), as I had been checking off the days for my entire 15th year on earth till I was 16.

I did the same thing, I had a little calendar above my lathe, at the woodturning shop I spent my weekends in working alone.
I was so excited to start driving to work even then. Sure was disappointed when I found out my parents had to sign off for me to get it.

A- Loitering. Assert your civil rights the next time you are harangued, I would. If you aren't committing crimes or hanging on private property, you can tell anyone to take a hike.

B- Vagrants hassling you. A quick "F**k off with a hard look right in the eye of the offender usually does the trick. If not, a quick pop in the chops works well also. It's called having a pair..

B: Only so many times you can do that in an hour before you get tired of it.

You said that already.

Sorry, I'm halfway through a shift at my second job of the day(already spent the morning cutting and installing new plexi windows in a Catalina 27, the one I did a holding tank in last week).
Guess I'm a bit tired, since I didn't get home from the boatyard until 11pm last night, after 12 hours there, and 2 hours getting home, including enough panhandlers without needing a park. Including one begging right on the bus, and a drunk hassling us. I was back there again at 9am this morning.
On my lunch break now, so I'm making sure to not double up what I say for you.
Better?


I choose to live without a car now, I enjoy the Alberg 30 I'm slowly fixing up more than a car. Maybe you know a bit about that feeling, simplicity over complication?

Complaining about prior gens has always been around, this new technological era has not. That's a variable you cannot predict by past history and a game changer.

They said that about your generation too(genX). So yes, it applies.

Now I've wasted my lunch break on this crap, when I should know better. I'm off to finish up my receipts and hours for the boatyard, and do a few more useful things before I get back to work.

I'd like to think that this post was just a miss-step on your part, and a lack of understanding. It didn't come across that way, and as I have worked hard and struggled for everything I've got, and to provide for others in my life it didn't sit well with me.