$0.29 a day...

What with the push for induction stoves for boats, the current news that gas stoves may be less than healthy, and the fact that I'd love to lessen the amount of fossil fuels aboard. So, hardly surprising I've found myself thinking about the various alternatives to propane lately.

The main issue with going electric is that , for someone who cooks a lot, the energy budget for induction is pretty hefty requiring a bigger battery bank and more solar panels than I have room for aboard "So It Goes". Sure I could add a genset but then I'd still be burning fossil fuels. By my calculations I'd really need to move up to a bigger boat if going with more solar. Something of a conundrum is it not?

Propane biggest selling point is that it's cheap. Our current cost per day for propane is $0.29 a day and we cook a lot. That's a whole lot less than alcohol, kerosene, or any sort of electric system that's available when all things are considered.

Granted propane gets a bad reputation regarding hassle factor and availability but sense we get between 75 to 90 days from a 20 pound tank (and we have two) so we can go close to six months with out having to refill. Off hand I can say that we've never been more that three months away from a place where we can top off our propane bottles.

I'm still open-minded but I'll have to see some serious improvements in electric before I jettison the propane in favor of some other source of cooking.

Charles Morgan is no longer with us...

Yesterday I heard that Charlie Morgan was no longer with us and it got me thinking about some of his designs. 

While there's something about the look of his Out Island series that sorta/kinda rubbed me the wrong way there's no denying that they are prime candidates for VolksCruising. Just take a look at the Out Island 33...

Way overbuilt with moderate shoal draft as befits a boat designed to go into charter it's a lot of boat in a smallish envelope. As they made a lot of them they can be found for a reasonable price and since they were built like a tank they're mostly in pretty good shape.

Two other Out Islands with great VolksCruiser potential are the Out Island 28 and Out Island 30 that are both well worth taking a look at.

Charles Morgan designed a lot of sailboats boats as well and his body of work is as impressive as you can get so well worth a study.
 

Some low-budget DIY wonderfullness...

A boat-worthy project worth checking out.

more on the budget front...

So, what’s your bottom line? A long, long time ago I think it was Lin Pardey who coined the $500-a-month-budget as a passing reference of the “Some people do it for as little as…" example.    Back in the late 60’s, $500 was a doable, if tight, budget for cruising but today, according to a handy inflation calculator, to have the purchasing power of $500 in 1969 dollars would be equivalent to $4,055 today.    

I’ll let that sink in for a moment…

I’m pretty sure if you’re reading VolksCruiser that it’s safe to assume that a $4,055 monthly budget is not what you signed up for. Which gives me a chance to show you one of my favorite movie clips.

Now, while I can think of any number of marinas I’d love to take a shotgun or M79 to, I’’ll admit that while it might be cathartic, it's a bit more anti-social and somewhat problematic to the cruising lifestyle. Hell, with my luck, I’d wind up with a roommate who’s a MAGA droid named Bubba.
 

What’s a poor boy or girl going to do?

Lucky for us there are any number of ways to get by with less money if you’re so inclined to cruise outside the consumerist bubble. For instance, simply quit getting stuff you don’t really need and and get off the recreational shopping bandwagon. Sure it requires a bit of mindset adjustment and the learning curve is a bit steep but it’s nothing you can’t do if you want to get going to some nice anchorage.

Speaking of anchorages have you heard the news about Bonaire?

Bonaire’s a great place. It has some of the best diving in the world, the powers that be are Eco-conscious and doing their bit to keep it nice, and it is a kiss off the beaten track so it’s more Caribbean like than you can find in the Caribbean proper. So, what’s not to like?

Since the locals care about their waters, it’s a moorings-only situation and as most all of Bonaire is a park you have to pay to be there. This year moorings have shot up in price to $35 a day (it used to be $10) and the park fee is $40 per person (good for a year). Which in real terms means if I want to stay there for ten days it’s going to cost a minimum of $430 for the two of us. Which is not bad when you consider it but it starts adding up really quickly and it’s not a place you’re going to hang out longer than needful. That said, it’s still a lot cheaper than staying in a marina anywhere that has a developed yachting scene which is frelling anywhere in the Caribbean these days.

So here’s the good news/bad news if you want to cruise on a budget these days. The good news being that it’s doable and the bad news is that, for the most part, you’ll want to minimize all the normal milk run destinations.

Lucky for us is that it’s a big frelling world and there are still a lot of great places to cruise where folks on boats are not looked at as floating ATMs.  You might want to add “Hors Piste” to your manta jar.

More needful stuff for getting control of your cruising budget on Friday…

                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

the truth about VolksCruising budgets...

Whether it's building a boat, refitting a fixer-upper, or actually cruising, the bottom line is always going to be what you can or can't afford. As much as we might prefer otherwise, the bottom line is always going to be with us.

Living in a consumerist society is problematic where budgets are concerned. After all, consumers are supposed to consume in some sort of consumerism prime directive so the answer to just about any question is to throw money at it and, boy howdy, anything to do with boats is an awesome opportunity to spend money.

Personally, I’ve never felt that money was a very good answer where most important things are concerned. Sure, it’s a pretty good social lubricant to get along in a society that values money and possessions over the individual. How is it that a good person is considered not as good as a bad person because of his bank balance?

So yeah, we’re talking about boats right?

There’s a Reuel Parker design I’d love to build and it’s one of my top designs in my "small boat to retire on" file. It looks like this…
 

 

Parker designed this scow sloop as a budget best-bang-for-the-buck design. The materials involved can all be bought at your local lumber yard and local purveyor of epoxy and glass with no exotic materials involved. All labor is doable by the builder with no need to resort to marine professionals. It’s a simple boat and the cost of building it reflects that.

As it happens, I came across a mention of said design on a forum where someone asked what the boat would cost to build. One response really opened my eyes…

“Conversationally, having a boat like that built is probably $300K-$400K, depending upon level of finish and type of fit out. So, again, from the hip, figure $150K or so to build it DIY. I grant that this is unscientific, but I believe that the above numbers represent a fair test of your wallet and resolve.”

Now, since it’s a boat I might actually build and I've have done a lot of homework amd know that the aforementioned budget of a $150K bears no relationship to the actual cost of building this boat. It is a great illustration of how not doing your homework and math, results in a situation where spending silly money becomes part of the matrix and ignores what should be reality.

It’s a boat so it has to be expensive!

Right?

The fact that just about everything related to sailboats and cruising is inflated to a point where it’s downright criminal is a given, but with a little thought and study you can avoid most of it.

Doing your homework is a major part of successfully getting a boat project in the water and sailing. Researching possible cruising routes and areas is the difference between being on a negative or sustainable budget. All you have to do is use your brain rather than your wallet or credit cards.

The funny thing is a lot of those folks cruising on expensive boats and throwing money around like drunken sailors are actually worse off than those cruising on slim budgets. Same goes for those building and refitting on sustainable budgets within their means as opposed to those with big expensive projects and need to get on Patreon so others can subsidize their projects.

Knowing what you can afford and managing your life in a way that makes sense where budgets are concerned is maybe the most important factor in successful boat projects and cruising. It’s not about what you spend but rather about spending smart.

More on the subject come Monday.




.

Just a quiick note...

I'll still be doing VolksCruiser for the foreseeable future and just taking a few days off to sort out a bit of reorganization.

More soon come.

the best of times, the worst of times...

So it's 2023 and a new year. For some of us, it comes with some musing over the state of things.

As far as sailing and cruising goes, my musings seemed to be along the lines of that Dickens quote and I spent a couple of hours thinking about the good/bad reality after the ball dropped at midnight.

On the positive side...

• The cost of a good condition, under 36-foot, blue water capable boats have come down and are now very affordable.
• The cost of needful gear has become more affordable.
• Systems that were once considered too complicated or unaffordable for many are now within most cruiser's means.
• Needful information is readily available and no one has to reinvent the wheel. That said, finding good information should include a buyer beware warning.
  
• The current state of computer-based communication systems means you can almost always be connected to the world.

On the negative side...

• One of the main reasons boat prices have fallen is that we have a "Too many boats and not enough places to put them" situation so moorage and marinas have become unaffordable. A related issue is that this is causing a lot of anti-cruiser attitude on municipal and state levels.
  
• While needful gear may be cheaper, the marine industry exerts incredible pressure to get the newest, most expensive thing/flavor of the month.
• Sadly, the "You get what you pay for" mindset is counter productive to affordable cruising and really does not make any sense but considered gospel by far too many.
  
• YouTube influencers, while helpful from time to time, are mostly pimping on one level or another. Any information from most of these sources should be considered suspect and taken with a grain of salt.
• The current state of computer-based communication systems means you can almost always be connected to the world.

Actually, those lists could be a lot longer but I suspect you get the general drift. So, how do we deal with the best/worst conundrum?

For starters, VolksCruising only works if you're actually cruising. Your mantra should be "Keep on Trucking" as any nomadic society knows that being welcomed always comes with a time stamp and it's best to leave Dodge before the welcome expires. Which is a roundabout way of saying if you're going to cruise you best be on your way.

Since there are so many inexpensive sailboats in good shape, the desire to buy a fixer-upper should be suppressed. Why spend a year or three fixing a boat when you can just buy one and get gone? Sure, I know you want to tweak the boat to your needs but a major refit is seldom a good financial investment and, if you think it's required, you should be looking for another boat.

Same goes for the need some have of wanting to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse. For a special few it might work but in 99% of the cases I've seen, you just wind up with a very, very expensive sow's ear.

As far as stuff goes for cruising, less is more as the old adage says. I could go into deep detail but do I really have to? 

Overall the best/worst scenario comes out as pretty positive for someone wanting to cruise on a VolksCruiserish budget. Of course, you'll need to do some critical thinking, jump through a bunch of hoops, and make some of those negatives work for you rather than against but the overall math says it's going to be a good year to get going.

Here's hoping we all have a happy new year.

great boat in a great location...

Here's a boat I've always liked.

It's the Chris Craft Pawnee and it is a very cool little cruising boat. Sadly they only built them for a year so did not make a lot of the excellent Sparkman & Stephens design.  

As it happens there's one for sale in Hawaii if anyone's interested.

A boat I was once looking for...

Every once in a while I'll see a Bristol 26  (aka Sailstar 26) for sale for a good price and it gets me thinking. Back when I was in Paris looking for a boat to buy. The sailboat in my head that I was looking for was a European facsimile of the Halsey Herreshoff Bristol 26.

It's a good design and packs a lot of living space into a small envelope.

 

As it happens there's a Bristol 26 which appears to be in reasonable shape in Annapolis going for $2.5K which is the current street price for a Bristol 26 in reasonable shape. that I find more than a little interesting. Certainly worth checking out.

and in the "Because not everyone wants to build a fifty-foot catamaran" department...

An important point, the sort of project we need more of, and P-22 is no longer with us...

Tad Roberts (one of my favorite designers) currently has a catamaran review in the new Wooden Boat Magazine which you might want to check out. It certainly got my attention.

The cat in question is Mike Waller's 880 catamaran and it certainly helps fill a niche that needs filling.

Listening to Xenio Rubinos

So it goes...