Free: WANTED: SHORT NOTICE COASTAL CRUISER ADVENTURERS

[ijiraq]

Originally Posted by gts1544

Badsanta, I apologize for not stating that the boat had 2 coats of bottom paint applied this spring and was splashed shortly after. She has been in the water and sporadically used all season. My profession was as an airline pilot. I don't operate any vehicle without checking it out thoroughly first. My wife calls it airline anal! George

Well Hi there George, sorry for coming on hard, but I am a CARS OBS/COM (like an FSS) up here in CYGZ! I guess you are used to it for the likes of us Always throwing a monkey wrench in you intentions. Hey are ATC or FSS still giving an ACK "altimeter read back correct" down there??? They just cut it out here a while back. I noticed the newbies outta school don't use that statement anymore... I told my APO liability or not I am not gonna stop doing it. I think dropping it will come back to bite the regulators in the ass hard... Who do you fly for?

[gts1544]

ijiraq, I have a very thick skin or I wouldn't post on these forums, so no offense taken at all. I purchased this boat (Catalina 25 fixed keel) from a gentleman selling her on E-Bay, who just wanted to get out from under the responsibility, or at least so he said (health & work). He has been the perfect gentleman over the phone, but I didn't fall off of the turnip truck last night either. The sale price was under $1000 and the vessel is equipped with a Garmin 440s chart plotter with sounder, a Raymarine ST-1000 tiller pilot and an Evinrude 8 HP outboard, plus other instrumentation. I have been sailing in the Caribbean for 35 years and just wanted something to play around with in the Beaufort, NC area, so you can probable see why I am not going to pony up for a professional delivery crew. We are now implementing Plan B, which is to trailer her down. I looked into winter storage and it would have been considerably more than I paid for the boat. As for flying, I have been retired for 10 years now (Got caught by the age 60 rule), but for the final 17 years of my 35 year airline career, I was flying high altitude 18 wheelers for Airborne Express (overnight express cargo). People used to ask me how long I had to fly cargo before they would let me fly passengers. My response was that I had to fly passengers for 20 years before they would let me fly cargo!! FYI - Love your country - I have made 4 round trips to Alaska on the highway, spending most of our time in Canada - great country / great people!! George

[mrohr]

Years back when I bought my first investment property I discovered a pipe that had broken years before and filled the basement with raw sewage. What to do? Call a plumber! When I did he said to me : "well son, you are a property owner now, so you might just as well get some empathy with your project".

I never forgot his words, and who here has not had some similar experience with their own boats ? So to the OP : I think now is the time to get some empathy with your project.

[ijiraq]

Sorry, had trouble formatting it and wrote too fast. The red lines are me

[ijiraq]

You didn't do too bad on the boat! You will enjoy her! Did you like cargo runs? I guess they didn't make you hand-bomb like the Kenn Borek pilots up here do in the DHC6... You couldn't pay me enough to do what they do...

[gts1544]

ijiraq, I just located your location on Google Earth. No offence, but you are out at the end of the world. What is boating like up in that neck of the woods? In the Caribbean, we keep a weather eye out for barracuda and sharks, though very few. Up there I am assuming polar bears! On another note, the boat market down here is terrible for small vessels. People are just trying to bail out and, in fact, many are simply abandoning the boats in the marinas, rather than continue the fees. I just purchased a Buccaneer 240 on an excellent heavy duty tandem boat trailer for $1000 for my son. The trailer has to be worth nearly 3 times that. George

[El Rubio]

Originally Posted by gts1544

Badsanta, I apologize for not stating that the boat had 2 coats of bottom paint applied this spring and was splashed shortly after. She has been in the water and sporadically used all season. My profession was as an airline pilot. I don't operate any vehicle without checking it out thoroughly first. My wife calls it airline anal! George

Airline Anal??? I thought you said you were a pilot... not TSA. Couldn't resist. Good luck with the delivery.

[ijiraq]

I don't boat anymore than I have to up here; we have very small open boats with outboards, and its not safe... One trip I took a few years back while we were Narwhal hunting involved 6 of us dragging the boat by its gunnels through 2 miles of very thick pack ice... One minute you are help pull the boat along the next minute you are hanging on for dear life because there is no solid ice under you, up to your armpits in very cold water... Thank gawd for those floater suits... Anyway not at all my idea of fun. Yup. Different world... I am a CASARA spotter also, and have seen quite a lot of fatality out there -considering our populations... See lots polar bears, you can touch them when swimming, they can't get you when they are like that.... The boat market in the US is utterly insane right now. That is why I finally bought again... The material value is so much more than selling prices. Sad about the economy there, but good for us folk outta town I got a very good price on my (hopefully) ideal vessel. With our inflated real estate price in southern Canada (up here you can't OWN property really, don't need to anyway), it makes more sense for someone to buy a big ugly boat down there, bring it to Canada, and drag it onto a nice waterfront lot... save you $100K in building materials...

[gts1544]

Participants, Thanks to all who replied! You certainly are not dull and do keep life interesting. Plan B is firmly in place. My sailboat trailer bearings are scheduled to be repacked with marine grease on Monday morning and then I am off to the Chesapeake to retrieve my Catalina and haul her down to NC. The wife and I will enjoy stretching our legs and seeing old friends. Too bad that someone could not take advantage of the opportunity! Cheers, George