Liveaboard Boat Info Needed

[Ivelin Kolarov]

Good day to all. I am new to the Cruise forum and already loving it. WILL APPRECIATE IDEAS FOR BEST LIVEABOARD MONOHULL BOAT 'MAKE AND STILE' Currently I am in a planing process of setting up my future cruise & liveaboard life. I do not have great sailing experience, 6 short 5-6 days cruises in the Med, Greek isles and Black sea. Being at sea is amassing lifestyle. My job is being at se as well. I have spent 12 years working on cruise ships and can not take being on land for longer than 3 months. After reading multiple books on sailing, liveaboard guides, and liveaboard stories by real sailors including a boat buyer guide, I still can not make my mind what kind of boat to buy. Well, I will leave it here. Talk soon. Looking forward for your valuable info.

[beiland]

How about something like this 46 footer?

I’ve written in the past;
“One particular design has haunted me for years. It was I think a Phil Rhodes design somewhere around 60'~70', a ketch, with a sizable twin engine room, over which was located a grand main saloon with portlights above deck level. This main saloon had great comfort and expansive vista's, and opened onto a sizable aft deck with a fishing chair at its center. There was even a mini-flybridge helm station and a crow's nest. What a great all-around design to liveaboard and travel the world. She could do anything and everything!!"

[RainDog]

Welcome to CF.

It is really not possible to answer this question without more info. What is your budget? How many people living on the boat? What climate will you be living in?

[mangomuffins]

2nd time today that I've posted this

Atom Voyages - Good Old Boats List

[Ocean Girl]

You will be in cold climate?

[Ivelin Kolarov]

Some more info: I think that boat between 35ft - 40ft is a good idea, easy to single handle & comfortable enough for 2 person year around sailing, mainly warm waters including transpacific/transatlantic sailings. Budget $120,000. The boat must be really sea worthy. Thanks. Oh - ketch design really scares me

[RainDog]

Here is some food for thought: Mahina Expedition - Selecting A Boat for Offshore Cruising

If you scroll down to the bottom there is a list of sailboats the author feels are appropriate for offshore use. I am sure he is missing lots of good boats, but this is a great list to start goggling different boats and seeing what appeals to you.

[Tony B]

Originally Posted by Ivelin Kolarov

.............Oh - ketch design really scares me

Before you buy, you might want to look further into ketch rigs. For shorthanded or older crew, a ketch makes more sense. There may be more sails to handle but they are smaller.
Its easier to raise and lower a 40' sail than a 55' sail especially in rough weather. If you have all 3 sails up and the wind starts to pick up, its a lot easier to completely drop a 40' main sail on a ketch than it is to try to reef a 55' main sail on a sloop. While you are doing this on a ketch, the mizen holds the boat steady into the wind while the sloop uses the ............ ???????????
The small mizen on the back does not generally move off center as much as you would think or as great an angle as the main. When you start out and raise your sails, you start with the mizen first. Being in the back of the boat it acts like a tail feather on a weather vane and holds the boat into the wind. You can actually steer with the mizen. That also takes the load off the steering wheel and you. Generally, once you set your mizzen on a course, you can just about forget it's even there. Even on a tack - it is self tacking.
I'm not even going to get into the various types of sails and combinations for just about every condition possible - I'll let someone else do that.
All I'm saying is, don't discount it yet. Maybe even start a new thread on cruising with a sloop or ketch or something similar.

Tony B

[beiland]

Originally Posted by Ivelin Kolarov

. Thanks. Oh - ketch design really scares me

BTW, I did mention KETCH in that quote, ...but it was a Rhodes sloop I pictured in that posting....sorry for any confusion.
One particular design has haunted me for years. It was I think a Phil Rhodes design somewhere around 60'~70', a ketch.....

[ArtM]

Here are my recent thoughts on Monohull liveaboard

Under a certain length, there is an unavoidable reality of the feeling that you are living in a basement. To me, this is ok for a single person with a powerful ability to fight depression, but for many people will be too dark, too isolating, and just generally unpleasant for anyone but the most stalwart sailors.

You can't pilot from inside the boat, or at least you certainly can't pilot visually. Besides, if you're underway on even moderately rough water, you will need the constitution of a - well, of a sailor - to stay below. Your option is to go back up top, leaving you (or me, in any case) basically living in the cockpit.

Such a boat has room to stand, to sit, and even to lie down - but walking is out of the question. You can sort of walk, in a stilted kind of way, down the narrow side deck, carefully avoiding the pulleys and lines and travelers and whatnots with your bare feet with one hand on the stays, but walking in a balanced, comfortable way in anything resembling a straight line does not exist.

If you're motoring at all, you are living with your motor. You might have a nice solid motorhouse cover with good seals, in which case it will not be that "bad", and you might not even notice after a while - but your guest might notice what you do not.

Over a certain length, and your options expand a little. It becomes possible to find boats with a taller saloon, with wide flat decks, possibly even a solid roofed pilothouse that does not drip through the zippers and force you to strain to pear through rippled, drizzly plastic sheeting.

However, at that length new obstacles appear. Draft depth becomes prohibitive for many ports, even with innovative keel designs. Length becomes a cost and maintenance issue. Height of the mast may limit your access to many areas. You might reach a size that single handing becomes risky or impossible.

I am only stating these because you have not actually "lived aboard" such a boat, but have read accounts of them. For the right kind of salt, it can be a gratifying and freeing way to live, but it can also be a very solitary way to live. The books you read won't show this side of the world.

There are solutions to these dilemmas, if indeed they are dilemmas for you, but the solutions will depend much on who you are, what you want/need, what you are capable of accomplishing, and with whom (if anyone) you plan to share this lifestyle.

[beiland]

Originally Posted by ArtM

Here are my recent thoughts on Monohull liveaboard

Under a certain length, there is an unavoidable reality of the feeling that you are living in a basement. To me, this is ok for a single person with a powerful ability to fight depression, but for many people will be too dark, too isolating, and just generally unpleasant for anyone but the most stalwart sailors.

You can't pilot from inside the boat, or at least you certainly can't pilot visually. Besides, if you're underway on even moderately rough water, you will need the constitution of a - well, of a sailor - to stay below. Your option is to go back up top, leaving you (or me, in any case) basically living in the cockpit.

Have a look at a few of these photos of the interior of that 44....sorry they are of such poor quality asa I did not want to 'break in' to someone elses vessel even though she had been sitting there for many years.
Motor Sailers by Philip Rhodes & John Alden - Page 5 - YachtForums.Com
...but you can get the idea of the saloon raised up over the engines with nice big windows to view out of.

Here is another such design:
Motor Sailers by Philip Rhodes & John Alden - Page 4 - YachtForums.Com

Such a boat has room to stand, to sit, and even to lie down - but walking is out of the question. You can sort of walk, in a stilted kind of way, down the narrow side deck, carefully avoiding the pulleys and lines and travelers and whatnots with your bare feet with one hand on the stays, but walking in a balanced, comfortable way in anything resembling a straight line does not exist.

Over a certain length, and your options expand a little. It becomes possible to find boats with a taller saloon, with wide flat decks, possibly even a solid roofed pilothouse that does not drip through the zippers and force you to strain to pear through rippled, drizzly plastic sheeting.

I think you will find a pretty nice wide deck edge to walk down here in these two examples. And if you have spent time on both monos and multis as I have you will find the motion of the mono a little easier to handle as it is not as 'abrupt' Granted it is not 'level', but it can be an easier motion many times.

However, at that length new obstacles appear. Draft depth becomes prohibitive for many ports, even with innovative keel designs. Length becomes a cost and maintenance issue. Height of the mast may limit your access to many areas. You might reach a size that single handing becomes risky or impossible.

Both of these monohulls I've made reference to have no more than 5 foot of draft. Thats not too bad when you consider their props and rudders are fully protected by their keels. Yes it is not a 'beachable' vessel, but they will take care of you offshore.

I bring up these two monos as I consider them representative of the best 'all-around' designs in their category to go explore the world, or live-aboard at dockside.

I am only stating these because you have not actually "lived aboard" such a boat, but have read accounts of them. For the right kind of salt, it can be a gratifying and freeing way to live, but it can also be a very solitary way to live. The books you read won't show this side of the world.

There are solutions to these dilemmas, if indeed they are dilemmas for you, but the solutions will depend much on who you are, what you want/need, what you are capable of accomplishing, and with whom (if anyone) you plan to share this lifestyle.

It is not a lifestyle for everyone, but most folks who have that hankering make the best of the experience, and really enjoy having done it....at least for some portion of their life. I've done it on two occasions, and I'm looking forward to a third time.....in triplet

What would you build with a $600 million Lotto ticket? - Page 4 - YachtForums.Com

[ArtM]

Originally Posted by beiland

It is not a lifestyle for everyone, but most folks who have that hankering make the best of the experience, and really enjoy having done it....at least for some portion of their life. I've done it on two occasions, and I'm looking forward to a third time.....in triplet

What would you build with a $600 million Lotto ticket? - Page 4 - YachtForums.Com

Well don't get me wrong, I'm definitely NOT knocking the lifestyle, only the design limitations of the monohulls. For me, the monohulls I've seen which are acceptable to me in terms of livability pale beside a catamaran, which is far more liveable, has comparable or superior sailing ability, is of shallower draft, and is of comparable price.

Now, the mono's in these pictures do appear to be a possible exception. Are there modern versions of these vessels? I'll look them up when I get a chance. I wasn't even sure if that first one was a sailboat.

How do these bad boys sail? Once a monohull reaches a certain weight, beam, and windage with a reduced sail plan due to cabin height, then it seems to me that it will lose the purported values that make monohulls more desirable than cats - pointing and speed - while failing to meet the liveability standards.

I'm open minded though, and thank you for the reference to this boat - definitely looking forward to researching it more.

And I really liked the furnishing in that second boat. One of the things I dislike about the modern catamarans is the "fixed" decorating. The interior materials, fabrics, and furnishing is fixed into the design of the boat and would be prohibitive to change.

[beiland]

Originally Posted by ArtM

....Now, the mono's in these pictures do appear to be a possible exception. Are there modern versions of these vessels? I'll look them up when I get a chance. I wasn't even sure if that first one was a sailboat.

I'm gearing up to do a modernized version of these two monohulls, the Alden and the Rhodes. I will likely start a new subject thread on just that project.

And I really liked the furnishing in that second boat. One of the things I dislike about the modern catamarans is the "fixed" decorating. The interior materials, fabrics, and furnishing is fixed into the design of the boat and would be prohibitive to change.

I have a few interesting new ideas related to this 'fixed decorations' stuation as well... some modules....

[ArtM]

Originally Posted by beiland

I have a few interesting new ideas related to this 'fixed decorations' stuation as well... some modules....

Sounds cool. Maybe I'll check back with you later, when I have some time to collect my head.