My advice is to buy yourself a boat you can afford, lavish her with the best in essential equipment, and cast off your lines
Issue 1 : June 1998
I love sailing for its simplicity. Wrap the breeze with canvas and you are away. No consumption. No pollution. No noise. Not even the faintest track to mark your passage. Add good food, affable mates, an interesting destination … can there be a better way to spend a day? Or a year?
If the pleasures of cruising under sail were somehow diminished by the age of the boat, the joy would have gone out of it for me decades ago. In fact, it seems to me that older boats tend to enhance the experience.
First, there is cost. Today even modest new “cruising” boats can cost more than $200,000, and prices in excess of $500,000 are not uncommon. That’s half a million. Dollars. For a sailboat. If extended cruising is your goal, such a financial obligation almost certainly takes you farther from it, not closer. And if you sail only a few days a year, that’s a lot of money tied up in a depreciating asset. Old boats sail just as well, and the smaller investment means they sit idle much more comfortably.
Then there is style. Too many new boats are apartments with the corners rounded off. A sailboat should be defined by grace and charm, not volume. It should be half fish, half bird, and no part modern art. A new boat is only new for a short while; a beautiful boat is beautiful forever.
And let’s not overlook value. Many older boats were built to a standard that builders today call “cost prohibitive,” yet they can be purchased for a fraction of a new boat’s cost. And the price almost always includes thousands of dollars’ worth of extra gear and equipment.
If you are new to sailing, maybe you think owning an old boat is like owning an old car. Here is an essential truth: the only similarity between a 1968 Chevy and a 1968 Hinckley is the year of manufacture. The safe assumption is that a 30-year-old car isn’t trustworthy. In contrast, a well-maintained 30-year-old sailboat can be the equal of a brand-new boat in every way.
Anyone who wants to own a sailboat can. You may locate it in a boatyard rather than at a boat show. And you may have to visit the library archives to find it featured in a full-color magazine ad. But if it was ever a good sailer, it still is. If it ever had sweet lines, it still does. And if it could ever fulfill dreams, it still can.
Sailing is a tactile connection to the cosmos. You are propelled by a force as invisible as faith, lifted over shallows by the pull of the moon, guided by the star-pricked sky, reassured by the rising sun. These are not things you will experience ashore. My advice is buy yourself a boat you can afford, lavish her with the best in essential equipment, and cast off your lines.
Thank you to Sailrite Enterprises, Inc., for providing free access to back issues of Good Old Boat through intellectual property rights. Sailrite.com
