We Bought a Sailboat!
Friday, April 21st – Papers signed, money transferred, a 52 foot J/160 sailboat made by J-Boats is officially ours. As all new boat owners do, we set about adding personal touches and changes to make the boat truly ours.
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One change we have to make is the boat’s name. Our boat’s prior owner has reused the former name on his brand new boat, and our changing the name was a condition of the sale. This is a classy boat and deserves a name that is classy, that reflects her outstanding sailing performance and that will work in many languages. After considerable thought, we choose the name Avante. We look up the word “Avant” in the English dictionary, and it means culturally or stylistically advanced. “Avant” is a French word meaning forward or front. “Avanti” is an Italian word meaning ahead or to go forward. We look up the word “Avante” and find that it is a Portuguese word meaning forward or onward and a Spanish word with a nautical use meaning full ahead.
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The name Avante fits. It expresses our dream to sail onward, maybe around the world, and it is a name easily pronounced in several major languages. The name will be displayed on the aft sides of the boat. Giving the lettering a forward slant and with a gold arrow underneath, Avante looks ready to take to the seas.
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We also must put Avante‘s hailing port on the transom. While Avante will never get within 1,000 miles of Telluride, documenting the boat with the Coast Guard requires our home address to be used as the hailing port. The First Mate offers that since living in Telluride is all about altitude while life on a boat is at sea level, we should put Telluride’s altitude on the stern, too. “Alt. 8750” is added.
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One would assume that any couple buying a high-performance, racer-cruiser sailboat like a J/160 would be long-time, experienced sailors, but such is not the case. Avante is our first real boat, and “experienced sailors” is not a ready attribute for us. The learning curve on this boat is about to go into overtime. To The Captain’s credit, his former experience as a Navy pilot overlaps with the aerodynamics of sailing, and his navigational skills acquired in those jets cruising along at 500 knots easily translate into sailboat navigation moving along at 5 knots. He also does have some prior sailing experience, and frankly, the concepts of sailing come easy to him. His learning curve will involve maintaining the complex electrical and mechanical systems on the boat. That will take some study and experimentation.
To The First Mate’s credit …. well, there is not much that can be ascribed to her sailing credentials. Sure, the two of them had sailed on vacations where they bare-boat chartered for 10 days to 2 weeks. How she loved that sailing, and living on the boat was such a fun experience! While The Captain sailed to his heart’s content, she curled up with a good book. She acquired enough knowledge to sail the boat a little, but though The Captain talked of “wouldn’t it be fun to sail around the world?”, she never thought so. To be honestly frank, she is a white-knuckled sailor, unhappy when the boat tips away from the vertical position when under sail. Not able to see that wind, she does not trust it. Top that off with a tendency for seasickness, one would wonder why she even considered owning a boat. Yet, she is one who craves the adventure of doing new and exciting things, and, ironically, she really does enjoy living on a boat!
What changed? Well, The Captain began talking about buying a glider plane to fly around the 14,000-foot peaks of Colorado where we lived. This did not interest The First Mate at all. She knew she was never going to go flying in something with no engine and subject to the whim of air currents. Those mountain peaks and alpine valleys? No way! And she did not want him up there either! Without fully thinking it through, she countered his flight of fancy by asking him if he remembered his dream to sail around the world. Yes, he did. “Well, build me my house on our ranch land, and you can have your boat,” she said. Talk about motivation! Records were broken in Telluride getting that house built in a little over a year.
No sooner had internet been connected in the new home than The Captain-to-be was on yachtworld.com. In no time, we were making trips around the country to look at boats. Ten months later, he is at the helm of his beautiful sailboat, and now The First Mate had better get serious about this sailing thing!
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Though our boat was in San Diego when we agreed to buy her, we had no intention of keeping her in California. So we opted for an off-shore closing which kept the transaction out of the greedy hands of the California tax system. After closing, we returned to San Diego, but had something like 3 months to move the boat out of the state. We used those days to familiarize ourselves with the boat and her systems. We hired a sailing instructor, Sheila, to help us learn to fly Avante’s huge spinnaker and to help build The First Mate’s slowly growing sailing skills. Telluride friend, Bingo Eaton, joined us for a few days to be part of the excitement of our new ownership. We took Avante out in the bay, anxiously staying out of the way of the many Navy ships coming and going in the bay.
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Another long-time friend and sailing enthusiast, John Thorne, also made a trip out to see our new prize. The weather and wind were perfect. What a great sail that was!
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Finally, we are ready for a shake-down cruise, and as Catalina Island is the most interesting place to head to from San Diego that is within a day’s sail and still within the country, it is to Catalina Island we are going. Telluride sailing friend, Bill Perkins, arrives to to join us. Leaving the bay for our first “off shore” adventure is exciting.
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Tuesday, May 16th – We exit San Diego Harbor and head west for the 75nm passage to Catalina. Along the way, our first stowaways join us sitting on knees, hands and even flying below to investigate. We are amazed at how unintimidated by us these little ones were.
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The winds were great for a wonderful sail to Avalon on Catalina. Finding our assigned mooring ball in the “Walmart” parking lot configuration of rows and columns of mooring balls was not easy. Not yet the summer season, we cannot imagine what a mess it will be then. It does not take long for us to realize that this spot is not what we have in mind when we think of island cruising.
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From Avalon, we sail to Twin Harbors where we anchor and go ashore to explore. We are getting a taste of cruising life, sailing to and seeing new places, and we are enjoying the adventure immensely.
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All too soon, it is time to return to San Diego. The fine weather we had had is replaced by overcast and cold, both of which give The First Mate her first taste of manning the helm in inclement weather.
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Avante is a well maintained 6 year old boat that has already had one extensive upgrade. We don’t need to do to much to make her ready for cruising. She even came with a storage locker full of boat stuff that was very useful for us first-time boat owners. The one thing she did not come with was a dinghy, so our first big purchase was a new dinghy and outboard. We also decided to replace the dodger, bimini, and sail cover as they were fairly weathered. Having set up the boat the way that we wanted, and having completed our shake-down cruise to Catalina with no major surprises, we are set to leave San Diego to begin our voyaging on Avante.
We have decided that for the first 2 years or so, we will stay along the Pacific Coast. Why? While we are learning this boat and its systems, if anything fails, we are within easy reach of getting it fixed or of having parts sent to us to fix it ourselves. Once truly offshore and heading round the world, that is not going to be as easy. The Captain is more than confident, and The First Mate, though not a repository of confidence in herself, is more than confident in him. We are eager to set off, heading north up the Pacific Coast.