Sailing vs Cruising

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

I am what I am.

I have no place to be and no schedule to get there.

Cruising is doing boat maintenance in new "exotic" places.

Screw it, it will still be the same level of broke tomorrow.

Weather happens to it's own schedule.

That sucked! But was better than going to work.

When I raced I didn't understand how the monohull guys could hang out at the dock all day.

They'd be there when I left to go race and when I returned. I was in my late 30's to late 40's then.

Now when all the monohull guys hustle out on Wednesday Nights to race (many of them my age now), I happily watch them leave and continue my important duties at the marina like enjoying another beer while admiring the beautiful lines of my good old boat.

Or emptying the water from my ice box from the past weekend's cruising/sailing trip. Or washing and repositioning my anchor from the foredeck to the bow platform and getting the rode and chain back below after a quick sail off anchorage a few days earlier, etc, etc

[sailorboy1]

I think you need to check your list. I believe there a few more boater types/groups you haven't insulted yet and I would hate to see you start repeating and missing those.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

I think you need to check your list. I believe there a few more boater types/groups you haven't insulted yet and I would hate to see you start repeating and missing those.

That last wasn't meant as an insult....it was meant to show how age affects us all.

Plus I even mentioned the possibility of purchasing a fin keeled/spade rudder sailboat earlier and that is almost blasphemy coming from a full keel sailboat owner!

It's PHRF of close to 129 does help though

[ranger58sb]

Originally Posted by Rangemarker25

The thing is my boat is small (less than 30' with an 8' beam) so the thought of spending any length of time on it not being on the move is a worry.

It sounds to me like this is the key issue you're trying to wrap your head around.

??

Accept it, or not. "Not" can mean abandon the whole cruising (sailing, whatever) idea, modifying the idea to incorporate more "off the boat" time, getting a bigger boat, etc.

But if this is central to your questions... it's likely only something you can answer for yourself. Just as everyone else has made/is making similar personal decisions...

FWIW, we are mostly "hub and spoke" cruisers, although sometimes the spokes can be a tad long-ish and asymmetric. Something just over 10K NM on this latest boat... but then we do lots of off-boat and off-season stuff, too...

-Chris

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by ranger42c

It sounds to me like this is the key issue you're trying to wrap your head around.

??

Accept it, or not. "Not" can mean abandon the whole cruising (sailing, whatever) idea, modifying the idea to incorporate more "off the boat" time, getting a bigger boat, etc.

But if this is central to your questions... it's likely only something you can answer for yourself. Just as everyone else has made/is making similar personal decisions...

FWIW, we are mostly "hub and spoke" cruisers, although sometimes the spokes can be a tad long-ish and asymmetric. Something just over 10K NM on this latest boat... but then we do lots of off-boat and off-season stuff, too...

-Chris

I think you have cut to the core/key issue.

Thanks!

And thanks for all errr… most all the other replies.

[Group9]

I enjoy sailing, just for the fun of sailing, and I have had plenty of day sailors in the past (two Hobie 16's for instance) that were totally inappropriate for cruising.

On the other hand, I've had a couple of sailboats that I bought just with cruising in mind. We can still sail them for fun, but we also use sailing as a means of getting where we want to go.

And, yes, when we were cruising, we would cut that motor on in a second if it meant fulfilling our cruising plan for the day.

A funny thing was bringing our boat back from the Bahamas a few years ago with several friends, one of whom is a very serious lifelong off shore racer. I thought we were going to have to duct tape him to the mast to get him to quit constantly trimming the sails the whole trip.

The other funny thing was asking him to work the bow one night when anchoring and him telling me he had never anchored a boat before. Now he is 62 and has sailed all over the place, tons of offshore passages to other countries while racing. I asked how that was possible. He answered, "Hey, we're either sailing at night, or we're tied up in a marina. We never anchor out."

Different strokes for different folks.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Group9

I enjoy sailing, just for the fun of sailing, and I have had plenty of day sailors in the past (two Hobie 16's for instance) that were totally inappropriate for cruising.

On the other hand, I've had a couple of sailboats that I bought just with cruising in mind. We can still sail them for fun, but we also use sailing as a means of getting where we want to go.

And, yes, when we were cruising, we would cut that motor on in a second if it meant fulfilling our cruising plan for the day.

A funny thing was bringing our boat back from the Bahamas a few years ago with several friends, one of whom is a very serious lifelong off shore racer. I thought we were going to have to duct tape him to the mast to get him to quit constantly trimming the sails the whole trip.

The other funny thing was asking him to work the bow one night when anchoring and him telling me he had never anchored a boat before. Now he is 62 and has sailed all over the place, tons of offshore passages to other countries while racing. I asked how that was possible. He answered, "Hey, we're either sailing at night, or we're tied up in a marina. We never anchor out."

Different strokes for different folks.

It's definitely a hard adjustment going from racing sailboats to cruising.

I never anchored any of my racing sailboats either. I actually didn't have anchors onboard, but I had owned a bunch of fishing boats with outboards and learned anchoring on those

It's a wonder you didn't learn cruising on your beach cats though since you have two perfect islands down there to "cruise" to which are only like 12-14 miles offshore in the Gulf. Horn Island and Ship Island.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Rangemarker25

I'm thinking you were still quite young when you started the cruising thing.

I'll be late 60's most probably when I start full time cruising/sailing!

But I have been on the water and on boats since I was maybe 6-7 years old having grown up 4 miles from the Atlantic Ocean.

Swimming on ocean beaches as a child taught me the power of the waves especially when I got slammed to the bottom thinking I'd never get back up due to a bad dive into a large breaker

This goes back to the diet and exercise. Since I'll be so old when I start full time, I'm trying to stay in decent shape with the exercise, running, diet, and beer!

True, I was only 50 when I started living on boats and traveling one way.. no back to a home base.

[belizesailor]

Have you figured out what you are trying to ask yet?

Could it be you are just fretting over becoming an old sled dog?

[Group9]

Originally Posted by Rangemarker25

It's definitely a hard adjustment going from racing sailboats to cruising.

I never anchored any of my racing sailboats either. I actually didn't have anchors onboard, but I had owned a bunch of fishing boats with outboards and learned anchoring on those

It's a wonder you didn't learn cruising on your beach cats though since you have two perfect islands down there to "cruise" to which are only like 12-14 miles offshore in the Gulf. Horn Island and Ship Island.

I learned to sail at 14 on Grenada Lake, in Mississippi. I bought my first sailboat, the day after I got my first job. I have been to Horn, Ship, Petis Bois, and Cat, so many times, I couldn't even count! I sailed my wife to Ship Island on our first date. But, I've only camped out on them a couple of times. Too many no see ums!

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Group9

I learned to sail at 14 on Grenada Lake, in Mississippi. I bought my first sailboat, the day after I got my first job. I have been to Horn, Ship, Petis Bois, and Cat, so many times, I couldn't even count! I sailed my wife to Ship Island on our first date. But, I've only camped out on them a couple of times. Too many no see ums!

Awesome!

I learned to sail on Arkabutla Lake with my sailing dinghy and later on Hobie 16's

I also raced the Hobie 16's on Arkabutla Lake and Sardis. I/we were living in Memphis at the time.

Here's a picture from 1997 at Sardis Lake. It's my crew and son. We won that regatta against 15 other Hobie 16's! He's an inner city kid out in the country so it probably seems weird for him

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by belizesailor

Have you figured out what you are trying to ask yet?

Could it be you are just fretting over becoming an old sled dog?

Yeah probably!

Also that C&C 36 sort of put the hooks in me (being an exracer and all) as did that boat of Wingsail's since they look like they can move on out there.

Btw if you haven't read this lately and are a dog lover here's Call of the Wild. Attached is my son's dog Mitchell that likes to attacked me as I rowed in on my kayak

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/215/215-h/215-h.htm

[Simi 60]

Originally Posted by Rangemarker25

Maybe I should have asked what's it like to actually cruise constantly rather than be on a constant retirement vacation (which for some that have worked hard all their lives would be great!)

I don't even know what that means

We constantly cruise
We are retired
Every day is a holiday

I'm just one of those that thinks it's a bad thing to actually retire.

Beats working til you're 70 just in time to pop your clogs.

. Table 1 and the chart indicate that for people retired at the age of 50, their average life span is 86; whereas for people retired at the age of 65, their average life span is only 66.8. An important conclusion from this study is that for every year one works beyond age 55, one loses 2 years of life span on average.

https://faculty.kfupm.edu.sa/coe/gut...sc/retire1.htm

[Group9]

Originally Posted by Rangemarker25

Awesome!

I learned to sail on Arkabutla Lake with my sailing dinghy and later on Hobie 16's

I also raced the Hobie 16's on Arkabutla Lake and Sardis. I/we were living in Memphis at the time.

Here's a picture from 1997 at Sardis Lake. It's my crew and son. We won that regatta against 15 other Hobie 16's! He's an inner city kid out in the country so it probably seems weird for him

Nothing better than a Hobie 16! Wet boats, but tons of fun! A friend of mine had one back in the 70's when they were running the Worrell 1000 Race down in Fort Lauderdale, up to Virginia Beach, back when they were using Hobie 16's. We talked about running it, but we never did it, and I have always regretted it.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Simi 60

I don't even know what that means

We constantly cruise
We are retired
Every day is a holiday



Beats working til you're 70 just in time to pop your clogs.

Does it though?

I thought I knew everything early on but soon realized that maybe I didn't.

I learn cool things everyday from my young techs at work when I'm not having to push them to get stuff done.

My youngest tech was born in the early 90's! He's never heard of an 8 track or cassette player! And doesn't remember when folks actually lived without cell phones

I try to run my 3 miles once a week which includes a bit of yoga (which rednecks like me would never have done back in the day and now it kicks my ass) plus pullups and pushups and weights when I have the energy