Need All The Advice I Can Get

[Curmudgeon]

Here's my $.02. There are quite a few on Yachtworld for under 200K, and several older ones under 100K.

[Alan Wheeler]

Plant your spuds early this year and never trust any guy that comes to pick up your daughter.

[rtbates]

Good luck with your cruise. I won't begin to try to tell you how to go about acheiving this dream. I will however offer one word of advice. Learn to navigate WITHOUT GPS.

fair winds

[SailingPassage]

Ha, we've got a rather dilligent skipper teaching us and he refuses to let us use the GPS/chartplotter. Its old-school all the way, which I guess is the best way to learn. It's all about wind, tides, and charts down here in the Solent. But we may actually need a course on how to use the GPS after its all said and done...

[SailingPassage]

Originally Posted by Alan Wheeler

Plant your spuds early this year and never trust any guy that comes to pick up your daughter.

and i don't have a daughter, or a wife for that matter. in fact, i may be the guy coming to pick up the daughter! but im not so bad...

[Amgine]

While I generally agree with everything PBlais said, I'm not entirely in agreement with the idea you should buy close to home.

I purchased my boat a long ways from home, but not far from where I planned to keep it. I did a lot of research, and I'm an opinionated cuss, and I bought a used boat with years under its keel but in near-creampuff condition. I believed it needed some systems upgrades, but I picked up the boat after a thorough survey and a not-so-thorough sea trial knowing the primary systems were in working order.

I jumped aboard with a couple weeks worth of food, most of which required no cooking, beverages in cans and jugs of water, appropriate clothing, and enough money to haul the boat in an emergency. Plus odds and ends of gear I hoped to upgrade or that I felt were useful, a coil of new nylon and a coil of dacron line, charts, tables. The minimum, plus my two extra anchors.

The water system failed within an hour. The mainsheet was so stiff it wouldn't release. One of the stove burners failed the first night. The first night I ended up on two anchors with 40+ kt winds after midnight (predicted, and I was anchored exactly where I'd planned to be before sundown.)

One thing after the other came up, and I had the necessary gear with to either fix it, or it wasn't necessary for the delivery. I got to the marina a day ahead of schedule with a number of the tasks on my list already accomplished, and I spent nothing on repairs or gear en route.

The two reasons I think things went well were I focused on being very simple if necessary, and I did my homework. I had all the equipment with to keep the boat sailing, and was sailing on a boat which was well-found, and I'd spent 6 months searching for just the right boat. I knew about many yards and marinas along my route, and as many of the chandleries as I could find, just in case. I had charts and cruising guides. I'd prepaid my slip fees at the destination. I looked at the daiy weather charts for 3 months, was aware of the current weather forecasts...

Being prepared, and willing/able to deal with systems failures, means you can arrive at the boat and get it to where you need it to be without undue expense and delay. That can mean the difference between the right boat at the right price, or delaying retirement for another year or two.