curious about the MacGregor 26M

[rbk]

Had ours for eight years. Took it offshore into the gulf of Alaska fishing every year, powered up and through some of the biggest and strongest tidal rips on the west coast. They will take more punishment than most people will take. Have been caught in a number of gales and taken green water over the deck without issue. They sail to windward like any mono (45-50 degrees to windward)but the higher the wind tends to blow it off due to the high freeboard and light weight, but with deep reefs in each you can make windward progress up to 25knts. It motors like a large underpowered motor boat but it is nice to be able to get on step those last few miles to get to anchorage/dock. With a good four stroke you can motorsail very efficiently. The interior has more room than most 32 footers. That said they have severe weather helm in high winds when over canvased and wallow/wander when powering at mid-speed just on or off step.

[tomlisasail]

We had a Tattoo 26 which is the successor to the MacGregor. We live in Naples Fl. and used the boat in the Ten Thousand Islands which is a swallow water area. We could pull up the centerboard and rudders and get into some shallow water to anchor for the night. With the right tide and winds we could sail with the jib only inside the islands with the keel partially retracted. We surprised a few fisherman. The boat had a 60 hp envirude 2 stroke new technology motor which was a fantastic motor. Quiet and fuel efficient. I will probably replace my 1996 70 hp envinrude on my flats boat with the new 60 hp.
That's the upside. The boat is very weight restricted. It is a great boat for light winds and calm seas. It has a water ballast in addition to the retractable keel. You can increase your motoring speed a few knots if you run with the water ballast empty. However it must be calm. If you sail you must make sure the water ballast is completely full otherwise it can be deadly. Making sure the water ballast is full can be tricky, if the ballast is not full the water will slosh around in the ballast and you'll be in for a real scare. We had this happen.
As for raising the mast, we planned on keeping the boat at our house and masting it everytime we went out. That idea went out the window with out first raising. We ended up keeping the boat on the trailer with the mast up at a local marina without power lines.
It was the first sailboat we owned. Before that we were partners in an old morgan 36. The ownership of the Tattoo taught us that we needed to be sole owners of a sailboat. We sold the Tattoo after a year for a 25% loss. We were happy to get rid of it before hurricane season.