Newbe with no experience buys big boat - Page 19

SailingStNick · #**181** 02-09-2013

Enjoyed the book, Glenn. Great to see the author trading banter with forum members!

glenndamato · #**182** 02-09-2013

Thanks SailingStNick! Banter is always good.

Smier · #**183** 02-09-2013

My freshly printed copy of your book arrived yesterday, and I just finished reading it a few minutes ago... Well done, I had trouble putting it down, and even laughed out loud a bunch of times! Thanks for sharing your experience, and especially for hanging out the past couple of weeks and discussing it with us. Truthfully, I probably would have never bought it if it weren't for the conversation here. I hope that many others buy it and enjoy it as much as I did! I will gladly give it a positive review over on amazons site also!!!

glenndamato · #**184** 02-10-2013

Smier, thanks for your support! It gives me great pleasure to know that people like the book.

Best regards,

Glenn

ShoalFinder · #**185** 02-10-2013

Hi Glenn,

I've followed this thread since it first popped up. I just finished your book and I want to tell you how much I thoroughly enjoyed it.

You have a real gift for giving life to your characters. Even now, I chuckle every time I picture a beer-swilling Burt Reynolds. Joyce is someone I can relate to very well. I have known a number of Joyces in my time. I don't know what you could have done any better with Megan. The girl just can't take a hint, apparently.

You're a tough son of a bitch, Glenn. Your entire trip basically sucked and you sucked it up and kept going. Good on you. You sell yourself pretty short, and I don't know why. You demonstrated some very good problems solving and got yourself out of some real pickles by thinking on your feet. I appreciate that you just put yourself out there, warts and all. I found it refreshingly honest.

I left a review on Amazon where I got my Kindle version. I enjoyed the book very much and thought it was worth leaving a review. I buy a lot of books but I don't ever leave reviews.

Best of luck to you in your current and future endeavors. Please let us know if you get another book published. I'll buy it.

glenndamato · #**186** 02-11-2013

Thanks ShoalFinder! I probably would have kept going south and looked for crew in Acapulco and Puerto Vallarta but that boat had a fatal flaw that was impractical (albeit possible) to fix: the hull-deck joint. At sea everything below would get soaked in any kind of heavy weather. That alone made the vessel suitable only for dry coastal cruising.

Thank you for your support on the book! I am writing another in 2013, this one a novel.

Best regards,

Glenn

ShoalFinder · #**187** 02-11-2013

For sure, there's no way I'd have continued in that boat. That must have been beyond miserable. Total show-stopper.

Bene505 · #**188** 02-11-2013

Why'd you have to be such a nice guy on here? Now I'm going to have to read your book. (And I have an e-reader here that I got in a trade-show raffle. Was going to sell it on eBay...)

Regards,
Brad

upshift · #**189** 02-11-2013

Nice read, Glenn! Your extreme honesty is greatly appreciated and the line about the giant baby in the cockpit had me laughing. We have a lot in common, although I am definitely a weaker man and would have busted out a bottle of tequila and sadly took Meagan for a ride…

Anyway, I have a question to ask you, or anyone else on here with knowledge, about why your survey didn't catch the leaky problems with the boat. I would have assumed that for the money you paid for the boat that it would be in better shape than it was, or at a minimum your survey should have showed that it wasn't in decent shape. What I am getting at is, shouldn't a saturated deck or weak hull/deck joint be found in a survey?

MedSailor · #**190** 02-11-2013

Quote:

Originally Posted by upshift

Anyway, I have a question to ask you, or anyone else on here with knowledge, about why your survey didn't catch the leaky problems with the boat. I would have assumed that for the money you paid for the boat that it would be in better shape than it was, or at a minimum your survey should have showed that it wasn't in decent shape. What I am getting at is, shouldn't a saturated deck or weak hull/deck joint be found in a survey?

Surveys aren't all that great. My boat came with 2 old ones when I bought her and I hired the most recommended surveyor in Seattle to do a 3rd. Hold the three up to the light and practically nothing matches.

I'd like to say that if you know nothing about boats then they can be really helpful, but based on some of the things they missed on my boat, or just got wrong, or the things that the REALLY missed on my wooden boat, it's not true that they'll save the newbie from trouble.

If you are not already very wise in the way of boats, then get as many experienced opinions as you can. Get a survey, have experienced friends look at it, and also check online for your make and model of boat and find their flaws.

With the advent of the internet, unless it's a brand new boat, odds are that many others before you have already found and dealt with your prospective boat's flaws. I bet you could figure out exactly which years Catalina got their Catalina 30 right and which years to stay away from just by using google.

MedSailor

PS My anti-surveyor sentiment comes at a time when my insurance company wants me to haul out and have a surveyor go over my boat. I already know exactly what's wrong with the boat and what's right with it. I'm not happy about paying a $urveyor to get it all wrong and write it up for the insurance company...