Undecided and help needed

[Mparr]

Hi all, I am new here. I have joined this forum and would like to ask for some advice. I am starting my RYA training and hope to be able to sail in a couple of months. I want to buy a sailing boat to start getting some practice and also to cross the channel to France in preparation to be able to sail to Spain. Any advice on size or type of boat is good to gain practice and good to cross to France. Thank you in advance for your help

[SomeGuyInaShirt]

I highly recommend you don't buy a boat before you get sailing experience on a number of vessels. You probably have no idea what kind of boat will suit you and you can't really know until you get out there. If you end up choosing wrong you'll probably lose a lot of time and money selling it and buying another and doing modifications and repairs to that boat. And the wrong boat can REALLY sour the sailing experience.

[Mparr]

Originally Posted by SomeGuyInaShirt

I highly recommend you don't buy a boat before you get sailing experience on a number of vessels. You probably have no idea what kind of boat will suit you and you can't really know until you get out there. If you end up choosing wrong you'll probably lose a lot of time and money selling it and buying another and doing modifications and repairs to that boat. And the wrong boat can REALLY sour the sailing experience.

It probably will be the right thing, but to get experience, I do need a small vessel. In the long run, the boat I do want to buy will be a Catana 44. I just took early retirement after surviving cancer and want to go and see the world. Obviously, that will be a big investment, as Catamarans do not come cheap, but traveling for a few years seems like a very stable and easy boat to sail single-handed. So basically, I was trying to find out if it would be good to have a small boat for now so I could practice every week without depending on other's boats. But thank you for your honest opinion.

[kayakerChuck]

Excellent! My advice, worth exactly what you paid for it, is to buy a 20' ish, reasonably common, used boat in decent condition. Sail it locally, not across the channel.

After your classes, and after sailing on some other boats, you will have a MUCH better idea what you want. Sell the little 20'er for about what you paid for it and move up to a bigger boat.

[Joh.Ghurt]

Originally Posted by Mparr

I just took early retirement after surviving cancer and want to go and see the world. [...] So basically, I was trying to find out if it would be good to have a small boat for now so I could practice every week without depending on other's boats.

This makes it a little different from the usual situation. In your case, buy any old boat in the 25-31 foot range that doesn't need much work. It should be dry, the engine working a the sails usable, even if they can be totally tired. Don't bother about any other details like electronics etc. If they work, fine otherwise not big deal. With this you can fool around to your hearts desire.

If it comes with a mooring in a location convenient to you, even better. This should set you back about 15 to 25 thousand € and you'll probably be able to recover 10 to 15 in a few years.

As an alternative, get a dinghy to sail around i the evening. Even cheaper and you learn a lot more about sailing.

[boatman61]

Where are you based could affect the type/size of boat best for you.
If you live in the Midlands for example you want something big enough to sleep/eat/live on for a week or more at a time like a Westerly Centaur.
If on the coast something like a Hurley 22 or Corribee would be good enough with basic shelter and facilities for day sailing..

[leecea]

From a quick search it seems like there are a lot of reasonably prices boats in the high-20 ft to low-30 ft range for sale in Southampton. Assuming you are in the UK, perhaps a trip down there would let you see a variety of boats and get an idea of what you want and can afford at this first step. If you will be sailing by yourself, it will be an advantage to have most control lines in the cockpit area and, IMO, an autopilot will also be helpful.

[Hugh McCormack]

I agree with "boatman61." Get something you can live aboard for days and/or weeks at a time - something with ground tackle, a couple of headsails, a reefing system on the main, a working stove and fridge etc. Then go forth in calm seas at first, sail to a new harbor for an overnight, anchor, then repeat the next day. Prepare meals, putter about, sleep, relax and repeat. Bring the vessel alongside a floating dock for water, diesel and supplies, just move her about and conditions and situations will naturally arise. You will meet Mr. Murphy and his intractable law, embrace it. Every mistake you make (and there will be many) is your absolute best teacher. Go out in weather, avoid fog as your small vessel will lack a radar, and if you do get caught in fog, you will learn from that too. Anchor and anchor again if you're too close to another vessel. I don't know how much prior sailing you've done, but if this is your first time as skipper/owner, expect to feel fear in some situations, it's entirely natural if you're encountering something for the first time. Don't expect it to be fun 100% of the time. You'll have days when you question the whole endeavor. We all have. Go dockside. Learn how to tie up without someone catching your lines. Back into a slip. Always ask if the petrol hose your handed is diesel (not gas), label you tanks clearly. Get a gurry bucket to slosh the foredeck after retrieving a muddy rode and anchor, when something breaks or fails, you'll learn what a jury-rig is because you'll have to. At RYA it looks like you will be learning on mono-hulls, catamarans are quite different, some like them other don't. Don't rigidly sick to one hull form or another. You may end up preferring monos. Best of luck to you.

[Sailing August]

Buy the smallest boat you can stand.....not the largest boat you can afford.

[KeelsonGraham]

Originally Posted by Mparr

Hi all, I am new here. I have joined this forum and would like to ask for some advice. I am starting my RYA training and hope to be able to sail in a couple of months. I want to buy a sailing boat to start getting some practice and also to cross the channel to France in preparation to be able to sail to Spain. Any advice on size or type of boat is good to gain practice and good to cross to France. Thank you in advance for your help

Anything in the 28ft range and above would be fine to cross the channel and gain some sense of what sailing is really like. An old Westerly Konsort, for example, would be an ideal starter boat. An IPhone or iPad with SIM slot will take care of navigation.

Go small, go now.

[grantmc]

Originally Posted by Mparr

Hi all, I am new here. I have joined this forum and would like to ask for some advice. I am starting my RYA training and hope to be able to sail in a couple of months. I want to buy a sailing boat to start getting some practice and also to cross the channel to France in preparation to be able to sail to Spain. Any advice on size or type of boat is good to gain practice and good to cross to France. Thank you in advance for your help

Reading this post so reminded me of Shane Acton's opening chapters in his first book Shrimpy Sails. A download link: http://members.multimania.co.uk/mary...Fs/Shrimpy.pdf

After a stint in the Army he found a nice little Caprice bilge keeler, I think of 18 feet knowing nothing of sailing or boats.

A few weeks later he set sail from Cambridge, that was 1972 and he was 22. And when I say set sail, that might be a tad exaggeration (rather he floated down the river), a day later as he says "The next morning we passed through Denver Lock into the tidal waters of the Wash and I was sure I could hear Shrimpy give a sigh of relief as she touched salt water again. At the port of King’s Lynn, which is in the mouth of this river, I could erect the mast – having passed my last bridge for many a year. It took me quite a while to figure out where all the wires and ropes went, for never before had I set foot on a yacht (let alone sailed one). Eventually, everything seemed to be in its right place and I was ready for my first sail."

His first sea passages were along the coast of England obviously, and then he thought I'll try sailing to France, so with £20 to his name, and equipped with a book on celestial navigation (a gift) and a plastic sextant he set off. And after arriving in France and wondered why not go on to Spain and so on and so on. It was eight years before Shane was to return to Cambridge as a local celebrity. In that time he'd sailed around the World and made fascinating observations of all the places he visited in the book he wrote along the way. He just kept going and going.

Like Joshua Slocum, many decades earlier, Shane Acton was an inspiration for many to sail over the horizon in little boats.

So I hope that this is the start of a lifelong interest in sailing and I wish you well and good voyages Mparr.