Thursday, 24 May 2012

Hunting for the Ideal Boat


So, today I started a serious search for my boat. The best selling boating Journal in the UK 'Practical Boat Owner' seemed to be a good starting point, 70 private ads for boats, sailing boats in the main. So, how many could I afford? Well, if I take the advice of people who have commented on my scribblings to date, 'half of your money for the purchase, half for renovation and commissioning', then of the 70 for sale, I could have bought thirteen. What were they?



Well there were:

three Achilles 24's,
a Swift 18,
a Drascombe lugger,
a Heard Picarooner,
a Vivacity 24,
a Westerly Warwick,
a Robert Ives 21-4,
a Sterling Matador,
a Westerly 22,
a Newbridge Navigator,
and a Hurley 22.

Of those, some aree unknown to me.
.

A Heard Picarooner? Well, according to the ad she's a GRP gaff cutter, built in 1995 - Mmm interesting! Ah, a sixteen foot day sailer! Too small no cabin - no thank you.

A Sterling Matador? 23ft  GRP yacht with inboard diesel and bilge keels - OK a possibility but more research would be required - why haven't I heard of them?

A Robert Ives? 21ft GRP bilge keel sloop - maybe a bit on the small side, no mention of an engine.

The Swift 18 - too small with an outboard slung on the transom - not for me.

So that leaves me with the Hurley 22, I seem to remember that these boats were strong and well respected as sea boats. Some (if not all) were deep keeled however so, I'd need information about the draft.

The Newbridge Navigator, was originally advertised as a having full standing head room in the cabin. Unfortunately at 19ft she's a little small, and on such a waterline length, I wonder what compromises the designer had to make to get that headroom.

Now the Vivacity, I know has a good reputation. At 24ft she's an ideal length and this one had bilge keels and a new engine. Could be a serious contender.

As for the Achilles, two of the three were described as fin keels - as for the third, the ad didn't say.The Drascombe Lugger ad said very little except to contact a broker.

Which leaves me with the two Westerly's. This company had a reputation for producing strong sea boats but I know nothing of either of these models.

What is clear, is that there are an awful lot of boats out of my reach - pretty much all of those I have written about so far. Unless, of course, I can find a semi-derelict specimen, in need of serious TLC. Now the question is, am I likely to find a Practical Boat Owner reader selling such a vessel? Nope - I guess not. So a new strategy is required. Boating journals are fine for general reading, but I'm hardly likely to find my boat within their pages -- and I can't waste money chasing all over the UK. I need to look more locally.

Seaward

22 comments :

  1. Hi David local searching is a good strategy you just never know what you will find. I was in Topsham in Devon last weekend, and there in the car park was a Colvic Watson. Very good condition, and the owner was selling. It was the first time I had seen one close.up. Looked like a bulldog. i can't believe they move that fast but looked like it would survive a hammering. Looked like a fishing boat. It looked so stumpy I assumed that it was the Watson 20, but it was infact the 23. Don't think it's for me, though looks like if the wind dropped you could motor into wherever you are going.
    Looks to be a contessa 26 on eBay. Trouble is its a fin keel. I wonder how you could find out if sealegs could be fitted to one of these. Vivacity 24s have a good reputation.

    Regards

    Michael

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Aggh!

      Responding with a bottle of wine inside is difficult.

      BUT our individual requirements are probebly different - from my point of view I need less than 1 metre draft to get me through the French canals, if necessary, and yet a boat which will keep me safe on the 'milk run' St Malo to Jeresy or vica versa - across 35 miles of open sea. Plus Massive accomodation and easy to lower and errect mast and rig - Tall order! All that in a vessel that I can improve and maintain without need of a boatyard and specialists - an even Taller order! So, a Colvic Watson may be on the list - if the price is right and I have confidence in being able to maintain the engine, but a deep keel Contessa would not work - despite the fact that friends have a contessas that they love and swear by! Ahg, if I wanted only a deep sea cruiser, life would be much simpler. Thanks for your advice Michael, as usual it is really welcome and thought provoking - hopefully, one day, we'll cruise a few miles through northern France together and share a bottle of wine on board a boat we can both claim some kind of ownership to!

      Delete
  2. Hi David, it would be great to meet up, for a drink. But it is going to have to wait until I get a boat. I have just returned from a sailing trip to Lundy island in the Bristol channel, sailing from Swansea aboard a first Beneteau 401. It was ideal sailing conditions, a bit blowy, 6 gusting 7. We sailed all the way there on beam reach. It is around 40nm and took about 6.5 hours. On the way back the wind virtually died so we did a lot of motoring. This has reinforced that I definitely need something with a good engine, as once I see land I generally am a bit impatient to get in. I picked the brains of the owner. He said that he sailed a Centaur for 20 years. He loved it and saiid that the bilge keels gave him a choice of a lot more ports than his fin keel. I asked him what he thought of Vivacity 24s and he said that he did not think that they were heavy weather boats. He did nt seem to think his Centaur was that slow. Regards. Michael

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi Dave, I had an idea the other day that might be fun to pursue, even if it doesn't lead you to your ideal boat...

    Back in the wooden boat days, every little harbor, river, or lake had its local boatbuilder. These guys built to meet the local demand, which was primarily from watermen. The watermen were conservative, since radical ideas tended to not return to shore, but every once in awhile someone would come up with a new idea to solve a local problem.

    This caused boats to 'evolve' to fit their local conditions better and better. The process was similar to evolution in living things... the boats that were fit for their local conditions thrived; the rest died out.

    At the end of the wooden boat age (1930s - 1940s) people started documenting these local boats before they all died out. Howard Chapelle was the big name in the US. He's best known for "Boatbuilding", but most of his books are descriptions of boats rapidly disappearing from the scene not because they weren't suited, but because mass production was homogenizing the industry.

    The designer of my boat, Tom Gilmer, wrote a book about the boats in Europe, called "A history of working watercraft of the western world".

    Another classic is "Wooden Boat Designs" by Christian Nielsen, which focuses on the boats of Denmark.

    My point is, with a bit of digging, you could probably discover boats that really were 'perfect' for your local environment, or at least as perfect as you can get with several thousand years of experience.

    You might not be able to locate a serviceable vessel of a local design, but if you had its lines, rig, etc., you'd have a good idea of what to look for in a boat, GRP or otherwise.

    It certainly would be fun and interesting to read about!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just to clarify... by 'perfect', I mean a boat that evolved to meet the local conditions and demands of the local watermen, like the Bawley for the southeast British coast, or Galway hooker for the Irish west coast. Both great boats, but probably neither would be terrific for cruising the Norfolk Broads, if you see what I mean.

      What boats were used in your area, 80 or 100 years ago?

      Delete
    2. speaking of which:

      http://www.yachtworld.com/core/listing/boatFullDetails.jsp?boat_id=2462165&ybw=&units=Feet&currency=USD&access=Public

      Delete
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