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I finaly got Jennifer to go aboard a sailboat at the Jacksonville Boat show, and she said.......maybe. And, like everything we do we just let nature take it's course. After talking to an instructor at the show we found out we couldn't start off with a fifty foot yacht, (like we could afford on anyway) so we figured if we ever ran into the right deal on something around twenty foot we'd give it a try.

Low and behold there is a sailboat sitting on a trailer beside the RV park we are in right now for sale. It is not new, and needs some TLC (it rubbed a whole in the corner of the transom and side on a dock) but it is cheap, and what better way to start out with something unknown than cheap.

The repairs it needs are within my abilities, and my Dad said I could store it at his house while getting it ready to go in the water. And as Carma would have it I even have a little four horse outboard, SAIL BOAT MOTOR, hanging on a stand with nothing to do. (I say sail boat motor because of the extended shaft length)

So, if we decide to give this a try we will be asking all kinds of questions, GET READY.

Deb, Lou, Teresa, Maryelis,HELP!

We haven't decided for sure yet, but God help us if we do. Wish us luck and get ready to bail us out when we sink.

Oh, and I hope everyone survived the winter OK, and look forward to some sailing stories from all of you "Real" sailors .

Very cool! I look forward to a sunset sail in Tampa!

My ONLY concern about these sailboats is the leaning( I am sure there is a technical word for that, so bare with me I am still a power boater ).  We talked to a few people at the Jacksonville Boat show who said that the boats do not have to lean, and that they actually go slower when they lean.  If that is the case WHY is every picture you EVER see of a sail boat leaning???? 

This sounds so familiar. My husband wants to switch to a sailboat. He actually wants us to live on it. I've been very wary about the "leaning" myself. I also worried about moving the sails quick enough. We went on a Discover Sailing trip at the St. Petersburg boat show to check it out. They will let you help if you want to. So I asked to pull in the sails. I was told it would be very easy. At first it was. Then the line just wouldn't budge. I pulled as hard as I could and the line popped out of the pulley and I went flying backwards. If not for the quick thinking of a friend aboard the boat, I would have been overboard! The captain insisted that very rarely happens.

Stan & Jen, aren't you going to Floridaze? We'll be there on our boat. We'll have to get together and talk about sailing. We are supposed to be in slip #4. Gary will be boating down on Friday afternoon and I'll be driving down after work. We'll be there all weekend. Looking forward to meeting you.

Shelly

Yes we are going to Floridaze. I can't wait! We are suposed to be in a one bedroom condo, but I don't have a room number yet. I can find slip 4, and I think we have Laurie and Jim as mutual friends to help us all catch one another.

What is the Floridadaze and where is it being held.

FloriDaze Music Festival, in Ruskin. That's all I know for now, it's our first time going.

Under Destinations there is a post by me about the Miami Boat show, and it was first discussed there.