my observations/experiences...only
I loved sailing my friends 23 tri..hobie 18 split and 23ft center
hull made in Michigan bolted in the middle, in west palm in the late '70's, man that thing was fun and fast...
my 40yr old mono is beautiful, fast for a mono, shoal 4'
draft ,stable,.. and most of all
cheap...a 10th the cost of a fancy multi...or even less
I would/will never have the change for a multi, I think tri's are awesome cool looking though I've never been on a big one..
In '81 while sailing in the Windwards one day, between a couple of the big islands in the
winter trades, big lumpy sea...we encountered a 40 foot production cat, I in my 35' 12000 lb
morgan cb
sloop with a working
jib and a double reefed main...hull speed+ everywhere we went...the cat never caught up or passed us...I was surprised, then realized she was loaded for cruising...
In the
winter of '81 I was mate/crew on a SA built 52' cat...we took 20 guests from
St Martin to St Barts and return day trip... , what a blast hanging off the backstay and watching the
knotmeter hit 18 in the gusts..!...a 40 minute ride...
anchored one nite in the
exumas next to a smallish tri..perhaps 29 ft...towering thunder squalls came in from the west at 2 am and exposed us to rock lee shore...50+
knot gusts...scary...I watched that tri go airborne on its
rode in one big gust, and
I don't like cats going to windward in a big sea...the
wind gets under the hulls at the top of a sea in big gusts..unsettling...
Having 2 engines to care for mechanically, with associated shafts struts etc. is not appealing..
a few days ago on the
ICW at Johns pass a new 42 ft ish cat, no stick, 6 ft topsides at least.. 2 stories...what 400 grand?...motored by us seemingly on a magic carpet...heard nothing, no movement, it was doing 15+ knots ? 19 ?...and seemed to be on top of the water, not in it...stunning...