This weekend I finally crossed a threshold I have long awaited. I got myself a sailboat. It is not a liveaboard type. In fact, it doesn’t even have an electrical system in it at the moment. It is an old one, too. The boat is a 21-foot Macgregor Venture from 1970. It needs a lot of work, but it should be manageable work on a relatively small budget.
The first big job is restoring the swing keel on it. The keel is a 400 pounds steel plate that drops down from the bottom extending the draft from about 18 inches to five and a half feet. It is coated in house paint from its previous owner, who kept it on a budget. I’d like to see her gel-coated with some lovely rich colors like blue gunwales and a red bottom with a white strip at the waterline. Something classic like that. White topsides and a sand color for the tread would probably come together real nice. I can see a couple of instruments and a radio, and I can also see a slight modification to the trailer in her future, too. What it also needs desperately is a mast raising system. That is one job that is a challenge! There is plenty to do, as one would expect from a cheap, old boat. But with any luck, I will never be heard to say, “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
So, as of this weekend, I have embarked on a new adventure. It is one I have dreamed of for ages, at least in part. Okay, true I have always wanted to live aboard. But for where we are at and what we are doing, this will do for now. I get to spend a bit of time working on the boat, getting to know it, and learning all the things I will need to do to maintain her going forward. I could sail it soon, but why take the chance before I get to understand the rigging and components of the boat really well. I can do a lot of that on the trailer, messing about and familiarizing myself with positions and the overall shape of things.
Is it a proud moment? A proud moment would be a Cabo Rico or an Island Packet that is live-able and blue water ready. I go into this with some trepidation, but a readiness to learn for real something I have only got some of the terms down for. It’s like knowing Chess rules of Castling, or En Passant Capture, or knowing the Ruy Lopez opening, but having never played a game. It’s different to be sat at the board. It is different to hold a tiller in my hand and look up at the rigging and know I have got to get this right. Safety and enjoyability are at stake here.
So where will I begin? I need to order a part for the boom to get it fully operational, and I will need to replace a cable on the standing rigging, if not most of them just to get rid of rust. There is the keel. Maybe some new sailcloth is in order, if not at least some repairs. I can get by with handheld electronics to substitute for instrumentation for a sail or two, but if I am going to sail properly, I would like to sort out a VHF, GPS, wind direction and speed, and maybe even a chart plotter after a bit, as there is no room for a nav table in this tiny little boat. I can always set my app on my cellphone as a back-up. Anything drastic enough to knock out both will also require rescue and an insurance claim. If I can see all that done by then end of next summer, I think I will be ahead of schedule.