Two Sealanes Diverge

So those of you who've been scoring at home know that Kris and I are looking for a liveaboard to make step one (or two) toward our new life of cruising.

Love and Coconuts is the dinghy that we picked up this past fall to work on important skills, like sailing a sailboat with sails, so we will be ready when buy the big boat. And this blog here, the original, is meant to track our progress toward making that big move.

We have seen a few boats and even made one offer, just because it seemed like a good chance to pick up something that might meet our needs for a great price.

Today we looked at a couple of big cruisers up in Seattle. The first, a 1995 Island Packet 45 is fantastic shape and fully kitted out for offshore cruising.

The second, a 1991 Tayana 55, would cost about $50k less, but would require about that invested to get it ready to go offshore.

The Tayana is very attractive and incredible. With a 16' beam, the saloon could probably double as a ballroom dance studio. And the master stateroom has a true walkaround queen bed. I've seeen a lot of boats with advertised 'walk around' beds, that end up being the sort you can edge about midway up the bed and then you run out of room. This bed is truly walkable on three sides.

I won't go on about all of the appealing things in this boat, but, my god there are a lot. And, at once appealing and terrifying is the amount of sail this thing can put up. The yacht broker commented that it is probably viewable from a satellite in space with all of the sails up. I wouldn't doubt it.

We'd need the five+ years we have coming before we would have the confidence to sail this thing. I imagine we'd have to find some crew to really run it right. Although, ahem, electric winches ... giddyup!

The IP was a solid confidence-instilling cutter rigged bluewater boat. And, with two massive heads and fiddles and handholds everywhere it's truly a cruiser.

So, maybe we get one, maybe not, either way we are educated and have discovered that this process is going to require a lot more question asking before we start to get close to the point where we begin to answer some questions.

More broadening before the narrowing.

Much more broadening.

Our work is cut out for us.

Meanwhile, we drove out to Pier 90-91. The USS Wabash, oiler that I served in, moored there when we came town. There's a new marina right next door; well, maybe it's 20+ years old. We walked the shoreline, watched some folks sail, and had a Spanish coffee as the sun set on a beautiful springy day in Seattle.