How are pre-out island Morgans?

[JohnSilver]

We are the proud owners of "Felicity" a 41 ft Morgan ( hull built in 1968, and finished in England in 1969, with all mahogany wood work, including a stained glass window in one of the lockers) . She's a keel-centreboard, with a 11'-3" beam, 4'-2" draft with the board up and 9'-8" with the board fully down. As a yawl rig, we have lots of sails, but at least they're small enough that I can still handle them, so she's a good boat for us older sailors. She went around the world back in 1972 with a couple of reporters from the Washington Post who filed stories as they went. In 2007, we repowered as the old Perkins had 19,000 hrs, and needed more parts and repairs than a new Yanmar. As the previous readers have said, her waterline length is only a little over 30 ft, so we don't get much over 6 kts when under power or running. However with good winds, she lays over, her waterline increases to almost 39 ft. and she runs like a teenager. Great fun as she has low freeboard so the sea is rushing by your elbow as you sit on the lee side. With the yawl rig, you can set the mizzen and pretty well balance her out under any point of sail. Yes, the cabin is smaller than most modern boats her length, but with just the two of us, there's plenty of room. Lots of lockers ( 54) so we can stow more stuff out of the way than many bigger boats.
Negatives - not many, but running into a strong headwind and 4 -5 ft seas her speed is down to 3.5 kts with full rpms out of the Yanmar. She's a little heavy,( 12T,) so we don't accelerate after a tack, but on the other hand, we don't pound into headseas either. After 46 yrs of sailing in eastern US and the Bahamas, she needs constant maintenance and with an overabundance of wood both below and on deck, I find that the only time I'm not varnishing, is when I just ignore it. As Canadians, we leave her south for the summers and try to get at least 4 months during the winter in someplace warm. Even if we treat her like a floating condo, we still enjoy her size and comfort.
As a bonus, what really makes us feel good is to over hear a conversation that says " I thing that's the prettiest boat in the harbour" .

[jimbunyard]

Can't really tell you anything about real world ability, I've only had her out about a couple of dozen times, but the pictures might say something. She's pretty swoopy. Classic 33, or 33 Classic, from 1969, maybe not in your size range, but at least some more information. The pictures are from May 2014, putting a new bottom on.

[roverhi]

When I was looking at Morgans in the '70s, the dealer told me the 33 design was based on the tank testing from Charlie's America's Cup boat experience. A very pretty underbody and a sweet sailing boat.