The Systems  This is an overview of all our systems.

Maintenance  Click on this section to read about what products we use and what mistakes we have made in maintaining our boat as well as other projects we attempted.

The Haul-outs  This section is completely dedicated to the haul-out's and the work completed during them.

We really had no clue what we were doing, so calling us lucky would be an understatement. We looked online and in the newspaper and walked the docks of Kodiak aimlessly dreaming about how much fun it would be to own our own sailboat and live aboard. We both agreed on a price range somewhere between $20-$30,000. Paul thought it would be a great idea to buy a really fast boat because the only sailing he had really done was in Lasers and small racing yachts like J-24's. Saesha, on the other hand, had never sailed a boat before in her life (except for the 6 ft gaff-rig dingy that we built earlier that year in our spare upstairs bedroom). So Saesha's only real requirement was that it be big enough to live aboard (i.e. slightly larger than the 6 ft gaff-rig dingy that we built in our spare upstairs bedroom), and have the amenities to make living aboard comfortable (i.e. not a racing yacht). So we happily went about our business, each showing the other the cool boat we found on the internet. Saesha would show Paul a picture of a Westsail 32 and say "Look how comfortable it looks!",and Paul would show Saesha a picture of a Cal 34 and say "Look how fast it is!".

One day one of Saesha's soon to be brothers-in-law mentioned that he had seen a boat for sale over in Dog Bay. So after work we jumped in our little car and zipped over the bridge to check it out. It turned out to be a cutter-rig Downeaster 38. So, ok, maybe it won't outpace a Cal 34, but it didn't take any convincing for Paul to realize that maybe Saesha was right, if you're going to LIVE on a boat it should be designed for that purpose. And so what if it was TWICE what we orinally planned on paying!

We contacted the local Marine Surveyor (the ONLY Marine Surveyor) in Kodiak to come down and take a look at the boat. Talk about a waste of money! For $500 we would have expected him to at least visually VERIFY that what the owners told him was correct! But of course the bank wouldn't give us a loan without a "Marine Survey" so we got a "Marine Survey". The surveyor talked to the owners (whom he already knew because only 10,000 people live in Kodiak), asked them questions like: How long is the anchor chain? And What is the water capacity? And is there any sign of blistering? He then regurgitated that onto a piece of paper and signed it! So, obviously, the marine survey didn't uncover any major issues with the boat.

Putting all fear and logic aside, Paul got on the phone with his bank, and quickly arranged a loan. We met with the owners and took care of all the paperwork without an agent. The day after we signed for the purchase Paul departed on a two month Coast Guard patrol leaving Saesha to take care of the little details (like selling all our furniture, moving out of the apartment, and figuring out how to start the Diesel heater on the boat in typical 75 knot Kodiak wind storms). Somehow, it all worked out. Nobody is really sure how. Possibly this was due to the previous owners honesty and general good-naturedness and we obviously took very good care of the boat. Or maybe it was just dumb luck. Either way, every time we read some disaster story about a boat with this problem or that we realized that nothing we did would have uncovered such a problem. So, let this be a warning, this seems to be the exception to rather than the rule of boat buying.

The Mantra: The general plan has always been to keep the current and future costs to a minimum because we fully expect to be unemployed sometime in the near future.