[NegotiatedDreams]

so I have read several books and countless blogs and articles on the internet searching for the elusive "perfect boat". what I have gathered is, buying a boat is about finding not THE but MY "perfect boat". Ill be looking to buy in June I think (im planning my mid life crisis in my early 30’s because im impatient)
let me answer a few questions I see yall commonly ask when one of these posts go up.
• my intentions to circumnavigate in 2016-2017
• my budget for the boat/gear/journey/supplies/fuel etc. every penny I have to spend on this adventure is 160K
• I need a boat that the two of us can sail so im thinking in the 38-48 foot range. I understand that most boats this size if set up and handled correctly are safe so for lack of a better word I want a boat that is comfortable in seas. one we can cross 2 oceans in and we will still be a couple afterwards.
• age is not nearly as concerning to me as condition. although id prefer not to look at anything much before 1980.
• Speed is fun but im not looking to race, im looking to cruise so in the speed department ill take what I can get but its low on my list of wants.
• I have been told at least one bathroom with a dedicated shower(separate room from the head/sink)
• I am open to a fixer upper as well as a turnkey however my time to work on it will be a total of around 35 full days so even a fixer upper for a good deal I will probably have to contract out most of the work.
• I don’t like a pilothouse. Prefer aft cockpit.
• I prefer a deck material I can run around barefoot without burning the bottoms off my feet
Ive read all of the top picks and the lists upon lists. Here are a few of my favorites (I think?) yes, I know a bit eclectic of a list!

Cabo Rico
Fantasia
Tayana
Hylas
Hinckley Bermuda
Baba
Rival
Trintella
X-Yachts

just had the idea if I tried to give some personal specifications maybe id get a majority of votes for one, a few reasons or questions I have yet to ask myself or a few other models I hadn’t thought about….. Cheers!

 

[denverd0n]

...about finding not THE but MY "perfect boat".

Good that you understand that.

• I have been told at least one bathroom with a dedicated shower(separate room from the head/sink)

This will DRASTICALLY reduce the boats that qualify. A separate shower is relatively rare on boats in your size range. You can probably find at least 10 different boat models without this for every one that has it.

I would ask if this is really an absolute "must have." Maybe you should charter a boat that has a combined head/shower and see if you really cannot live with that arrangement.

A good place to find a lot of particulars on a lot of different boats is sailboatdata.com. You can start looking through various boats there, and compare the layouts, as well as almost all of the basic design parameters.

Good luck.

 

[tdw]

Hi and welcome to Sailnet.

Obvious question .....

Do you already sail ?

If the $160k is for the boat, her refit and the voyage you might need to come down a bit in your size expectations.

 

[Donna_F]

Hmmmm, are you trying to find a way to blame it on the boat if this doesn't work out?

one we can cross 2 oceans in and we will still be a couple afterwards.



Welcome to SailNet.

 

[Bill-Rangatira]

not sure why you are discounting 70's boats and including early 80's boats
early 80 fg boats had issues with sprayed fg and resin content

 

[capecodda]

Hey Negotiated,

I think we can help more if you tell us more about your sailing experience. What have you done, why did you like it, anything about it you didn't like.

 

[NegotiatedDreams]

like I am always told everything is a compromise. this is not an absolute but she has never showered on a boat before and doesn't like the idea of the combined bathroom. may take quite a bit of convincing

 

[Faster]

Welcome to SN and best of luck on your future plans...

but I'm thinking that anyone who still calls the 'head' a bathroom is unlikely to be ready to circumnavigate in a couple of years... It sounds to me like you are both currently non-sailors, but I'd be happy to be corrected on that.

Your budget, as mentioned, is more appropriate for a 35-40 footer than what you're thinking now. Which, btw, I think is just fine for a couple. More manageable, keeps costs down considerably.

 

[bljones]

I'll wait another page or two before chiming in. welcome aboard, NegotiatedDreams. I think you'll like this place, most of the other people here are quite nice.

 

[NegotiatedDreams]

so I just wrote up a nice long reply and my internet explorer crashed when posting! *Sigh

~DenverDon
like I am always told everything is a compromise. this is not an absolute but she has never showered on a boat before and doesn't like the idea of the combined bathroom. may take quite a bit of convincing

~TDW
I "Learned to Sail" in 2007 when I lived/worked in St. Croix. I along with many friends were weekend warriors on a buddies 49' Beneteau. I caught the bug but was entirely too poor to stop working....so when I came back to the states in 2009 my time on the water was limited to the occasional holiday trip around the Gulf and a weekend here and there on the lake.

~White
in fact I have honestly been liking at late 80s models on for that exact reason, however when I am searching I always like to set parameters a little bit broader than what I am looking for.

~cape coda
as I mentioned above my experience level would be somewhere between novice and useful enough to earn my dinner. the majority of my time behind the tiller has been in my dreams.
lets tally it up:
time spent in blue water - 0
time spent owning my own boat - 0
time spent single handing - 0
certifications currently held - 0
unwavering desire - 110%
I have spent more than half a decade saving my nickels for this adventure and I cant wait any longer....come January I want to wake up living in my dreams!

 

[GeorgeB]

At first glance I would say you are undercapitalized by a factor 2-3. What is your intended route? Via the great capes or the coconut run? Why only hold your relationship together for only two ocean crossings? Why not for the entire trip? Given your entire budget, a separate shower stall is academic as you most likely won’t have the fresh water to spare for showering anyways. Where are planning to start out from? Cali? We might be bumping into each other either in Mexico or Tahiti. You may also want to consider a Nordic 40 (or 44), J40, Sabre 409/42 or the Farr designed Beneteau 40.7.

 

[NegotiatedDreams]

~Faster
I had typed "head" initially in my first post and I decided to rewrite it using "bathroom" as not to confuse the use of the term "Head" for my meaning bathroom and not actually just the toilet itself. it is tough to explain the shower being in a separate room from the toilet if I refer to the bathroom and the toilet as both "the Head". as you see below I used "head" to refer to the toilet in my post. clear as mud?

I have been told at least one bathroom with a dedicated shower(separate room from the head/sink)

 

[Faster]

~Faster
I had typed "head" initially in my first post and I decided to rewrite it using "bathroom" as not to confuse the use of the term "Head" for my meaning bathroom and not actually just the toilet itself. it is tough to explain the shower being in a separate room from the toilet if I refer to the bathroom and the toilet as both "the Head". as you see below I used "head" to refer to the toilet in my post. clear as mud?

Ahh.. but I'm pretty sure that asking for a boat with a head plus a separate shower would have got the job done - esp amongst this knowledgable crowd - without you sounding like a rank newbie

I have been told at least one bathroom with a dedicated shower(separate room from the head/sink)

So be it... however as a 'priority' for a capable offshore boat, that has to be at or near the bottom of an otherwise rather long list..

Have you and your wife ever done a even a short strait crossing (say 25-30nm) in snotty weather? In a boat such as you're considering?

I applaud your goals and ambitions, I really do, but at this point I don't see it happening in your time frame.. not successfully anyhow. By all means buy your boat, tweak it, sail it, live it... and go when your confidence and experience allow - don't wait til you're truly 'ready', that may never happen .. but don't put yourself on a schedule at this point.

 

[tdw]

Yep ... agreed Fast. With that kind of budget the boat is going to be a fixer upper, at least to some extent. To get the boat up to speed and sailing skills to an acceptable level is probably going to take more than a year.

 

[bljones]

I "Learned to Sail" in 2007 when I lived/worked in St. Croix. I along with many friends were weekend warriors on a buddies 49' Beneteau. I caught the bug but was entirely too poor to stop working....so when I came back to the states in 2009 my time on the water was limited to the occasional holiday trip around the Gulf and a weekend here and there on the lake.

lets tally it up:
time spent in blue water - 0
time spent owning my own boat - 0
time spent single handing - 0
certifications currently held - 0
unwavering desire - 110%
I have spent more than half a decade saving my nickels for this adventure and I cant wait any longer....come January I want to wake up living in my dreams!

NegotiatedDreams, I have the answer to every sailing question you will ever ask.
Ready?
"It depends"

No matter what question you ask, that is going to be the answer.

i admire your tail wagging enthusiasm, and some broker out there is going to admire you boneheaded desire to throw every dime you have at your dream.

As I said earlier, other people here are nice.

I'm not.

First, stow your excuses. You have lots of excuses why you haven't sailed since St. Croix, 6 years ago.

They are all bovine fecallacies.
If you want to sail, you sail. Some way, some how. So if you REALLY want to sail...

Start there.

And start now.
Don't start with "i am going to circumnavigate 2 years from now.... starting in January. for sure. i promise."

i have no idea what you actually have in the bank, what you have in liquid, lay -your- hands- on- it -today money, nickle and dime wise, but if you have $15k, take $10K of it and buy a 30 foot boat. Lots of decent ones out there in that price range.

And start sailing.
if you have $150K, still only take $10K and start sailing. if you are boat rich your are cruising kitty poor, and no one has ever cut a cruise short because they spent too LITTLE on their boat. You cna always invest more cash in your boat as time goes by, or buy another boat, but it is damn hard to pull cash OUT of your overbudgeted boat,when you realize everything cost more than you think it would when you bought your boat.

Look, lots of folks will tell you you are undercapitalized, your boat is too small, your budget is too small, you don't know enough, you're gonna die out there, you need at least $300- $500k to circumnavigate and every ASA and RYA and CYA course ASAP and a meticulous logbook and you know what?
They are all right...for them.
That is what THEY need, and that is either what they had when a) they did it, or b) what they comfort themselves with, to excuse why they haven't done it.

Frankly, you don't have enough experience to know what you need or don't need yet.

You are smart enough to know what you don't know.

That's good.

And you have enthusiasm. That is necessary.

Now you need a cheapass, ready-to-sail boat to help you figure out what you need to know. And, you need to know it NOW, before you spend $160K on more boat then you need, can handle, and can afford to maintain.

Romanticism will either get you killed or bankrupt you. The less money you have invested in an untested dream, the more money you have to either ease the pain or prolong the ecstacy, whichever is required.

i'm betting on sailing into ecstacy...but i'm not willing to bet everything on that outcome- you shouldn't be either. Placing all your money on a single bet is a heartbreaking dreamkiller, my friend.

Me? I'm no circumnavigator. I have no ambitions to travel in the wakes of Cook and Magellan.
Now.
But when i was in my 30s, not THAT damn long ago, I lived on that possibility. Man, one day i was gonna do it, on a bigass boat and I was gonna...
and I wasted a schitload of years NOT doing it, but getting ready to do it, any day now.

And then I realized, phuque it, I am enjoying life on my boat no matter where i am. I bought a $5k boat and just started sailing.

There are 3000 islands and keys in the Bahamas alone. Gunkhole the Bahamas and then roam south down the thorny path can take 3 months or 10 years, depending upon your pace...and there is adventure and gorgeous women along the way.

Buy a boat, now. Start sailing, now. Start weekending, now, then start living aboard, then start short cruising, then start overnight passages, then leave the country, then ... if you REALLY want to gird the globe, you will, eventually, as a natural progression.

But if you just want to leave sight of land, that is perfectly okay too.

But do it. Starting now.

 

[aeventyr60]

BLjones can be a nice guy too.

 

[Faster]

BLjones can be a nice guy too.

Who knew ????

 

[sandy stone]

I think a Morgan 38x has a separate shower compartment. We know a couple that sailed one from Florida to Australia, so maybe worth a look.

 

[tdw]

BLjones can be a nice guy too.

Who knew ????

The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you've got it made.
Groucho Marx

 

[tdw]

I think a Morgan 38x has a separate shower compartment. We know a couple that sailed one from Florida to Australia, so maybe worth a look.

Of all the reasons to not buy a specific boat, a separate shower has got to be way down the list.

OK so at home we can if we so desire have multiple showers each day but reality is that on a sailing boat you spend some five minutes a day in there. We do have a separate shower room in our girl but if we are moving around we use the thing for stowage and will shower in the main head. Disadvantage ? You have to wipe the head down after you have both showered. Oh dear, what a trial.