Greetings
Sailing - I found a sunfish on the side of the Rd on
Long Island in 2008 just before my first kid, yes bad timing . The first drive by my inner not even husband voice said if I spend a cent on that she will
Kill me . . . But then on the sencond go around I saw that the sign said “free” -
Coming out of
South Africa , I almost couldn’t believe it. I loaded that thing like it was stolen .
Given my reality of the sound being , unsound ,’I never once tipped that sunfish , I even introduced sailing to my dog maci at the time , i am sure she said a few times along the way that she needed a bigger vessel if this was going to be a thing.
I got three
boats for free on
Long Island shortly thereafter, not all at once , but over a couple of years , had a 19
Catalina , a 25’oday , a 15 Chrysler mutineer , each with a cool little tale , but I am sure you don’t have the time. They were all good enough to sail , and bad enough to feel good getting the bottom painted staked down and rolled over at low tide !
The Chrysler was epic , I only experienced about 15 mins before the
mast came down , but she was
lightning. The
deck had rotted out and the base gave out . Someone watching from their northport home promptly csme out and towed me in ! The others had better luck on the ODay, , my first born was about 11months old st the time and would not stop until she was standing on the bow holdng the railing - under sail .
We Then moved back to
cape tOwn South Africa , late 2010, it was only about a month before my sailing stories had my grandfather set to get a sailboat . It was a Theta 26, built on the Vaal damn. Needless to say she was a lake
boat / but someone before us refitted her for the ocean and with the intention to sail long distance , but ran out of
money . She was a beaut , super wide beam for a 26’foot, with a
head, nav station , and and and ,
headroom ! In SA, one must get a sailing skippers ticket , I had just finished getting piloted so the nav and such was ok, still always hard ! It took me a while to fit it all in with
work and small child ,’ needles say woman not happy about it all ! This paired with weekends In the communities teaching ones to grow
food and keep
Animals : !
We sailed for almost five years out of Simons town Harbour into false bay and out to the Indian . I never went around cape point and out to the Atlantic although I had thought about it a million times . My skippers ticket was restricted to 21 miles from home port . I never had time to further my
license so I always stayed “roughly “ 21 miles from Simons town ! Wow
wind blOws hard in
Cape Town , maybe one or two champagne evenings ! To date ! Just kidding , had many hot days with a light breez drifting along the shores watching the cliffs . The ticket thing is a big reason for South Africans and others , to come to the
USA , find a
boat at a usually unimaginable
price , or free, and sail her back home without the maritime restrictions of needing to be heavily certified to go
offshore . In America like with aviation , mostly on a private level , providing one is not putting others at risk , and can get Approval from a couple of salty boys from this site , have at it rings a lot louder than the
fees and
regulations at home . I read an article in about 2011 of a South African man who was red green color blind and therefore by law , was pickled in South
Africa and dreams dashed of sailing internationally , until he csme over to the
USA , found a boat in upstate ny and sailed her safely , red and geeen on the correct sides of he boat , back to SA. He even had to climb his
mast to the very top mid Atlantic , and described it as being a top a telephone pole while it was shaken violently from below , his color blindness keeping him from seeing red during ! In South
Africa , it is outlawed to come to America and get a pilots lisence to then return and “convert” it to a South African one ! As they see it as “too easy “ ! In America I can walk out of the test room the day I get my HPPL, and rent a machine up
To 12500 lbs , that’s a big bird ! Providing I can follow one regulation pertaining to that flight ! In South Africa , that journey of ultimately flying bigger helicopters is governed far better than a Robinson ! And is far more costly .
Bounce we now back in
New York , leaving for
Florida in a few months , have been living on Cayuga lake and sailing a
Catalina 22 , wife’s
water broke on her with our third child last summer , we were about just in time ! Then we went back out for a week just after The little one came . It was very special . That. Catalina was a gift also ! Csme with more
gear than I have ever had on a
sail boat ! We spent days on her , got a bit small by this year !
I have been going up
And down , as it has been time for a bigger boat for a while now , and to broaden the horizons . I have read this site for years as reassurance that indeed ... I was not ready or able to sail any one of my small
boats out into the ocean for weeks on end ! For any interested I can share in more detail but as of today , I hold paper to and have had my hands all over , a 1958 John Alden 37 ft coastwise cruiser ,
hull 779, all
wood needless to say , and right now has holes in places any man or woman keen on a boat,’wouldn’t want to see them but hey , Beggars can’t be choosers and I am ready to put her back together, there are only a couple of boards needing replacement. And the previous owner did a great job on three others already ; plus getting her all opened up .
She is on
Lake Ontario , about an hour and fifteen from where I live .
ANywyas , thank you all for years of good reading and thorough go throughs of so many topics . I would like to discuss my patching ( and future full refurbish ) of “Fari” and sailing trip from
Ontario to
Florida this August . I will look around and see where to talk about this on your site . Any suggestions welcome
I am in need of some
gear ,
self steering , I have auto
helm but looking for a
windvane.
Power , I have a few deep cycle
batteries . Looking for
solar panel And turbine. Need
depth,
gps,
radar , some alerting technology would be nice ! And more Pls help ! Not finding anything reasonable on second hand
equipment .
Reuben
.
I have attached a few pics of Fari - still named Zara in the pics but that’s ok ! I have been reading for days about the 
Doh! Alden, you did mention that before. Beautiful.
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