Hello from Oregon, USA

[Coolruns]

Welcome aboard Les and Linda.

I spent 4 years in Newport and really enjoyed it there.

Look forward to cruising out there some day.

Best wishes

[rubyjean]

Howdy Les & Linda,
good to hear from you, we'll get together soon. Can help a lot as far as sailing the west coast. I have sailed from Canada to Mexico and learned many lessons the hard way. That's not the way you should take, belive me..........Michael & Brenda.....

[Swift Drift]

Hey Les and Linda!

Good Luck with the journey! I grew up in Florence and have property on Siltcoos Lake that I sail from nearly every weekend of the summer (actually heading down this weekend). I live in Salem now and am also in search of my "Bluewater boat."....flying to LA next week to check one out. When's are you hoping to make a departure and become "cruisers."

Good to know there's some Florence Folk around!

[Adelie]

Originally Posted by K7KIT

Hello to all. My wife and I are planning for our great escape. We our currently in the research and learning stage of bluewater cruising.

How do you define 'bluewater boat'?

[webejammin]

Originally Posted by Adelie

How do you define 'bluewater boat'?

That's a trick question. It depends on how comfortable you want to be. Some folks cruse blue water in a 20+ footer with no electronicts and others perfer multi million dollar super fast multi-hulls. Guts and sailing experence will get you across oceans in either, the 20+ footer may have big hair raising stories and the fast multi-hull may just yawn and say nothing like it's easy.

[K7KIT]

Originally Posted by Swift Drift

Hey Les and Linda!

Good Luck with the journey! I grew up in Florence and have property on Siltcoos Lake that I sail from nearly every weekend of the summer (actually heading down this weekend). I live in Salem now and am also in search of my "Bluewater boat."....flying to LA next week to check one out. When's are you hoping to make a departure and become "cruisers."

Good to know there's some Florence Folk around!

Well good to meet you! I (Les) am a new Florence import while Linda has been there for over a dozen years. At this moment it looks like the absolute soonest we could head West would be two years. There are also some parental care issues in the mix. As the siblings are not stepping up to it the plate.

My personal definition of a "bluewater sailboat" is molding into something like this: Strong and safe, large enough to have good tank capacities, large enough to carry the weight of the gear associated with long term cruising, not allot of wood/teak on the exterior and a manageable sail plan.

Thanks folks for the responses!