owlrigh

I grow tired of being on a small yacht in the same place for years. Small yachts are for sailing, for travelling on, and when I bought this yacht I was single, plans filling my head about places I was going to go, places I was going to station the yacht while I went off to the mines and worked for top dollar and then returned home to cruise.

( "It's when they find out that there is no toilet that they screw up their faces and reconsider boat living." )

There's been a low pressure system hanging around the Northern Rivers area the past few days, which will stay over the weekend. High wind warnings were issued and now flood warnings for all the major rivers in force. We couldn't sleep the other night, because of the wind howling and being in general nervous over whether the anchors would hold. Nothing untoward happened, unless one counts a lack of sleep.

Ben's father, Dan, left for Mackay yesterday morning, going to check a boat for someone who's interested in a boaties' opinion of its current seaworthiness. We dropped him off at the bus stop and then hung around town. Before leaving we had a look at the ocean; the beach was a mass of white froth and the wind, even though it had eased off considerably, was still so strong I could only just wedge the car door open with my body to get out.

It was just edging towards evening and Ben had gone ashore when I looked over at Dan's trimaran and noticed it was now further out in the river and pointing towards my boat, a sign it'd dragged anchor. Chances are if a boat points sideways to the wind, it's moving, adios, bye-bye.

"Ben," said I into the phone immediately, "you'd better come back. Your dad's boat's moved."

It must have snagged something, for it stopped moving shortly after. It was dark when Ben finished moving her closer back into the shore and resetting her anchors with the strongest one shoring up against the prevailing winds. He turned her navigation lights on so he could keep an eye on her against the dark background of the mangroves, the bright red and green lights reassuring us over the next few hours that she was all right.

We'd decided to pack it in for the night, for although it was windy it's wasn't as bad as the night before, and we were tired from sleep deprivation. It was still raining, though, and around 11pm Ben went outside to bail the dinghy so it wouldn't sink, as happened recently when we slept through the rain.

He'd hardly gotten back in the boat and was drying himself off when the wind picked up suddenly, and the next I knew the boat was flattened sideways, wind screamed, water came through the boat, and Ben was swearing.

"Fuck! Fuck! Dad's boat just flipped over!"

I jumped up and threw my clothes on hurriedly and scrambled around in the dark for my glasses, which had gone flying when the boat was knocked sideways. There's a reason to get laser surgery, thought I out of nowhere, and eventually I found my glasses -- and opted for the contacts, instead, in case the wind and rain picked up again.

By the time I was dressed it was eerily calm, and has remained that way ever since. Gone from 55kt (100km/h) winds to nothing in the space of minutes. [ screencap of Ballina weather info from bom.gov.au over this period of time ]

Our dinghy had filled up with water; the gust had come down the creek in a white wall of wind and water right up our stern, which was why the cabin had gotten wet even though the boards were all in. Priority was saving the dinghy and getting the engine working again. The fuel container was gone and we had just enough fuel to get ashore.

"I'm scared the shed's fallen in," said Ben, "I'm shaking."

We both were. We made it ashore just as the outboard began to splutter and ran up the yard, which was flooded with water, up to the shed. It was miraculously still standing. All around us small boats had fallen over and trees were broken and this shed, banged together with recycled roofing tin and whose sides are nothing more than tarpaulins had held together. Inside was a shambles, but it hadn't fallen in on the catamaran; I think it would have broken Ben if he'd found that these last two years of work had just been destroyed.

We found some fuel, "borrowed" some, and then went to look at the the capsized trimaran. The current in the creek was strong and the boat in the middle of the channel. The only thing keeping it in place is the mast stuck fast into the mud underneath it.

"Let's go ask Jacko for help," said I, expecting him to brush my suggestion away. "I know you hate asking people for help, but we have to this time. We have no rope, nothing."

He didn't even put up a fight about it and off we went, knocking on a yachties' boat downstream and sourcing rope and assistance. First we had to bail his dinghy out, and then took ages motoring against the current to get back to the boat. Tying a rope to the riverbank was hard, because such was the force of the water on the rope that the dinghy wouldn't move. We eventually managed, just, and then for the rest of the night watched the debris make an island of the trimaran.

As the night wore on we pulled out the boathook and pushed the collection of sticks and logs piling up on my yacht, for if the pressure grew too much it probably wouldn't hold, and Gecko would go on down the river too -- we ran out of diesel a couple of days ago and the prop is fouled; even if the engine was full we wouldn't go anywhere, not with how much growth is on the hull.

I kept quashing tears at the thought of Dan's home gone; he left yesterday with only a backpack, and now that's all he has in the world. The only comparison to a house I can think of is someone's house burning down, only they'd still have the land value, and the house would be insured. Now Dan has nothing, no savings, no insurance ... nothing, not even money to fix his boat if it could be salvaged -- and he has no money even for that.

At least he wasn't inside. His chances would have been slim, what with the boat flipping around in the wind and then smashing back down in the water. With it upside down it would have been impossible for him to get out, if conscious to do so. If last night had been the night before, when he'd been on board ...

"I can't believe Dad's boat's capsized," Ben kept saying last night. "I just watched the lights go around, it just flipped with the gust. I can't believe this, it's like it didn't happen."

"Let's have a cup of tea," said I, and continued to do so as we maintained watch throughout night, eyes burning but still awake.

It rained almost non-stop for a season last year; with winter it broke, and it was with sighs of relief that we welcomed the dry cool days. An entire summer of rain. We dreaded the appearance of summer towards the end of last year, and although it wasn't as bad, it still rained more often than not. I splurged and bought expensive raingear, two sets; one for boating, and one for on the bicycle, so that either way I wouldn't get caught in a downpour and join the legion of drowned rats.

The weather has turned grey again, and the rains started up. There's a low squatting above us. I've been lazy the past few days, not doing long rides because of rain. Walking through the quagmire of a boatyard is bad enough; riding through town and having an accident on every hidden pothole just takes the fun out of things.

This morning I entered the cockpit to greet the day and as I looked around I noticed the dinghy was apparently missing. This is not an entirely uncommon event; a couple of years ago, when we were anchored in Mobb's Bay, the dinghy disappeared.

( oh no! )

"Inara" is what the new catamaran is going to be named. There are many bad boat names around, and Ben and I often groan at seeing yet another "Catscan" or "Upside Down" or "Catapult". The number of riffs on the word "cat" in catamaran naming is ludicrous; although admittedly the "Snowball IV" we saw once was a coy and rather splendid nod at the cat from The Simpsons. "Inara", our mutual choice, came from when we were sailing down the Queensland coast watching Firefly.

We've not mentioned this choice to many people, instead referring to the proto-catamaran as "the cat", as people tend to be funny about names. Mine's "Gecko" and the catamaran Ben owned when I met him was "La Luna", his previous being "Paloma" -- both Spanish names, oddly enough, and both chosen by the previous owners, as was mine. It's bad luck to change a boat name, or so goes the old salt saying.

Ben's not keen on telling people of the "Inara" choice, either, because then would come the "why that name?" question, and although a search on the web comes up with the answer that Inara was a Hittite goddess, daughter of the Storm God, the reality is the catamaran's to be named for a character we both liked on a science fiction show we both like, and no real other reason besides. That it's easy to say and to spell over the radio may have given the whole thing a nudge, mostly coincidental. It could have been "Mal" if short and easy were the only criteria.

"I don't think people would understand if we told them that we were naming the boat after a prostitute on a TV series," he said as I tried vainly to find more references to the Hittite Inara to fob people off if pressed as to the name's origin. But really, it is; Inara of the show is an elegant, beautiful, and melodious woman, all good things to name a curvy and speedy boat -- and a nerdy name to boot. All good things.

"I'm glad you made me watch tv series," Ben said to me recently after I returned from a jaunt to Brisbane city with seasons of Sarah Conner Chronicles, Life on Mars, The Dresden Files, and Battlestar Galactica. I lay my hands on Rome most recently, and he's been hooked in ... while I'm off at work, falling behind on the episode-watching.

It's most excellent; I said to him recently that I wouldn't have been able to stay with him if he wasn't the sort of chap who thought Firefly or Battlestar Galactica (or Heroes!) was good. I was working at night when Heroes was airing on free-to-air. Sometimes I'd have to work Wednesday night, so I got Ben's mum to tape it for me, so she got suckered into it well -- as did Ben, who I pumped for an episode synopsis as soon as I hopped in the car at midnight.

"It was ... good? Things ... happened?" would be what he would say, to my groaning dismay, and then excitedly pointed out the DVD set of each season as it appeared.

Most recently he exclaimed that the fan songvid danamaree gave me of Doctor Who (to the tune of "Handlebars") was great, and say that the show looked interesting. Of course I then went and ordered the latest four seasons over the internet. My boat's become a library of sfnal TV series, just about all of which Ben's seen before me and I'm slowly catching up on, much like Heroes all over again, only now I know I'll be able to see it, without finding out his mum garbled the taping again!

We're multimedia fans, well and truly, although Ben would not know the term if I put it to him ... nor would he want to go to a con, not after that bloody awful one he insisted upon going with me to in Brisbane a couple of years back. If that'd been the only con I'd ever been to I too would have been put off! Now, however, he understands my nerdiness and so does not quibble about my going to Swancon this year.

Yesterday found me zooming into the manager's office at lunchtime.

"Ken," I said, no preamble. "There's this science fiction convention in Perth," at which point he started laughing, "and it's over the Easter weekend. May I go?"

"Like Doctor Who and stuff?"

"Yeah, like that, and books, too. I need a week."

Getting annual leave over Easter or Christmas is rare as hen's teeth and I hoped I'd beaten everyone else to the game.

"Sure," he said, the best manager in the world, "just don't tell anyone else or they'll want time off too. Just because I said yes doesn't mean I like science," he said, but I bet he's a closet Doctor Who fan for sure.

My happy fannish life, where I've an excellent man who names a boat for a science fiction show and an excellent manager who gives me time off to go cavort on the other side of Australia in a happy fannish wallow. It's all good, all good.

"We've got 60 knots of wind," said my father's SMS. "You'd better get back here."

Ben and I were in northern NSW on a car trip, and had just arrived in Ballina when this message came through. Sixty knots of wind and Cyclone Larry wasn't due to hit the coast until the next day! If the wind was that bad already it meant that the cyclone trajectory had changed and it was heading towards Mackay.

A follow-up message changed things; my father, Phil, had merely been exaggerating. There would be sixty knots the following morning, when the cyclone itself would hit the coast up near Townsville. Where our vessels were kept was at the end of the storm warning.

That night there were messages and calls from yachties all over Australia; people in Tasmania seeing if our vessels were all right, folks in the Whitsundays ringing to say that they were in the thick of things, winds rising and seas rolling on in high.

One guy in Shute Harbour, where our vessels had been for months while working on charter boats, couldn't move despite being open to the south-easterly, the worst quarter for the winds to be coming from with a cyclone. The seas were rolling in there, and as his engine wasn't working he had to sit it out, anchoring his trimaran as best he could and going ashore to see how it turned out. When the storm subsided there were yachts to be found on the rocks, in the mangroves, and boat bits floating all over the harbour.

( Mackay's weather and boat work. )

There is great musical talent to be had hereabouts; a couple of months ago a musical regatta of sailing vessels was had in Double Bay, a seldom-visited anchorage just north of Airlie. I have gone to music parties a couple of times, where most had guitars and sang -- or at least plonked away on a bush bass.

On board Trekker -- the captain used to play professionally and gets out his guitar every so often. The deckhand who joined us this week was once lead in a grunge rock band for fifteen years before he found a love of tallships.

These are all people having fun; there is one man I know of, however, who plays for a living, busking on the main street of Airlie.

My first acquaintance of Ron wasn't on the streetside; I met him at a public BBQ one afternoon, when my brother contributed food to his evening meal.

"I went to Lifeline," said Rob, "and they gave me all this meat." 'All' was right -- certainly the charity knows what kind of food to give to the homeless to store unrefrigerated in this clime.

Homeless he was -- or, if homelessnesss is a state of mind as well as being, he was not homeless at all. And in his state of mind, the whole world is his home.

( His various homes. )

"They can probably hear you laughing all the way in Cid Harbour," said Ben shortly after he began working on Coral Trekker. We were in Tongue Bay, the other side of Whitsunday Island.

Last week we were once more in Tongue Bay, at the top of Whitehaven Beach, when I climbed the rigging after the skipper told me to put a cork in it. Being up there is excellent; the view at the best of times is beyond par, and that night there was a full moon and clear sky.

I lay on the end of the yard, hanging on with a leg, and listened to music on my iPod, callously abandoning Ben to wash the dishes. When he came up to find me he was understandably cranky. It didn't last long. One comment, and then I was laughing.

Nearby was a charter vessel crewed by some friends of mine. She heard me laughing and began laughing as well -- and I could not stop laughing, louder and louder. Soon the whole anchorage was full of boats laughing. One man began singing. A-wim-oh-weh.

I laughed until I was weak and nearly fell off the t'gallant; only Ben hanging onto me kept me on the rigging. They probably did hear me in Cid Harbour that night.

( Sometimes quiet is nice ... )

"You have three days off this week," said a fellow co-worker. "The activities officer off Reef Odyssey's going to fill in for you."

Three days off? I didn't ask for time off. Maybe they were getting ready to shuffle me off seeing that the big boss thinks I do drugs and am a pisshead. Maybe all sorts of things.

By sheer coincidence I'd seen the latest Wheel of Time book in the local store as I walked by, and seeing that it's been over ten years of following the series, I succumbed and bought it, stashing it for reading upon the trip. I began it the Friday, and the next morning the captain saw me esconced in the galley with it.

"You'd better not read that the whole trip," he said. "I'll throw it over the side if you do."

Duly warned, I proceeded to read it the whole trip, all other things shunted aside. Even the Friday, when I was supposed to go move my yacht away from where she was a bit too close to some other vessels.

( Why my captain does have a point. Or two. )

It was nearly midnight when I returned to my boat. Three people trailed behind me, and yet I was the first to see her ... lying on her side in the mud. I guess the idea of sitting in the water hole in amidst the mangroves was not such a hot idea.

A local chap had been in there before me, with a big ferro yacht. He let me know that when he moved, I could have it; at low tide all he'd had to do was step ashore, and because there was a hole in the mud which his keel slipped comfortably into. He was away from the worst of the weather -- what better place for me to put my yacht into while I was away working and worrying about whether she dragged anchor or started pounding?

The night after the fellow moved I was ready to get on in -- and had five helpers to do it, with myself being the most disorganised of the lot. I hadn't even had lines out to tie to the mangroves! Seeing that my skipper had been on board for this it was more embarrassing than it would have been otherwise.

( So we went to sleep standing up. )

The first sight of home was from the bus as we wound our way towards Airlie. Or -- I saw my family's catamaran, for theirs is an unmistakable red. It was only then I saw my own yacht, which is a nondescript white. I could see the bullets of wind as a mass of white water moving across the bay. The gale warning my father had told me of was in full swing.

As soon as I stepped off the aeroplane I could feel the wind. Had I note been holding on I would have been blown away to the side, over the barrier. It was raining. My umbrella, when I ventured to take it out, nearly went for a world voyage without me!

The swell across from Hamilton Island was so that the ferry was thrashed. One of those catamaran ferries, which don't normally feel the swell, and with that odd half-roll which confuses those feet used to a mono. Spray covered the windows and waves beat against the sides. Quite thrilling, really, if one does not own a yacht one fears for and worse -- has to get to in a half-metre wind-driven swell.

( Smelly welcomes and dinghy adventures. )

My brother is a representative example of those on water. He is somewhat of an extremist in one of his views, and most vociferous in it, in a contemptuous sort of way. It goes along these lines: "People on land are so lazy! They just don't want to break with the status quo! How can they bear to live in one place so long? Don't they want to go sailing? They think it's dangerous, but it's more dangerous on land, where you can get hit by a car! More people die in car accidents than on water!" All said with a sneer. Ignoring the fact, also, that a hell of a lot more people go on land than there are on sea, and if there were equally representative numbers then you could say something like that, but not beforehand. Plus ... people who go on water tend to be a bit more careful than they are in cars, because they're just so used to the latter.

True, it has always been an annoyance of mine when people say that they wish they could do something, when they could -- only it would mean a change in lifestyle, an easy acceptance of not seeing the same people all of the time, all that sort of thing, the type of event which most people are unwilling to do because that which is familiar is more engaging than that which is not. Commenting upon landlubbers is a common theme in yachties, and the more I hear it the less I am liking it; both because I can see why people would like to stay on land and because you hear something enough times and it grows boring.

( What they all say! )

I managed to borrow someone's camera yesterday, and lo: photographs of my yacht. She's only a small one, and despite having photographed my family's catamaran at the same time you don't really get too much of an idea how my yacht looked like a dinghy when she was alongside. Their vessel is 56ft (17m), and my yacht's 27ft (8m). The big blue yacht I am up against in these photographs, Kulu, is 100ft (30m) on deck. My yacht looks very wee!

Starting with the interior, the following three photographs are of the front cabin. It's mostly used for storage, especially since at this time of year it's a bit too cold up front. Behind the cushions are sails and a crate or so of books.

I have been hard at work, as can be seen, with the addition of a few nets on the sides (port, starboard) of the cabin to put my clothes in. The little cupboards already put into the side of the yacht -- one presumes for clothes -- has been taken over by equipment, both electronic and mechanical. Underneath the mattresses lies more storage and water -- both in a tank and in jerricans. Storage has ... more books. Naturellement. Even though I gave the bulk of what I had away I have managed to purchase a hell of a lot more in the meantime.

The main cabin is where I spend most of my time; the benchtops on the left are above my stove (with the dark front) and the fridge, further up along. The sink is so tiny I don't bother using it for washing up -- that's what the cockpit is for, and in the cockpit photographs the bucket and dirty dishes are most visible. Beneath the table is my generator and the charts, and under the one seat to be seen in this photograph -- opposite the fridge -- is the toilet. The blue fabric dangling down by the pink teddy bear is, in fact, the only thing to give privacy when using the ol' loo.

And now for the quarterberths: one, on the port, is my bed, upon which a sleeping bag is lying, although by no means is there only that in there -- at the foot of the bed is my sewing gear and first aid box. As well as more charts. Underneath is a 100L water bladder and tool storage. The starboard quarterberth doubles as my "junk pile", inherited over from Pampero II over a decade ago, and where my bicycle goes when it is not ashore, although it needs to be dismantled quite thoroughly for this.

A couple of photographs of the cockpit to round things off, with the promised dirty dishes -- and working autopilot! The belt and the little black thing is the aforementioned pilot. The view of the back shows the davits, where I put my dinghy when not in the water. The cockpit is really that dirty -- the smudges are indeed ingrained dirt. I am too lazy to scrub what has about five people tramping through per day.

One miscellaneous deck photo, also very dirty. And my fantastic hatch, which lets me have some air! Yay breeze!

And for the time of truth: what she looks like from the side. With a grinning Damien on the foredeck. And my little dinghy alongside, which is what I look like up against Kulu, the big blue yacht. My family's catamaran, Big Bandicoot, and all three vessels (Kulu, Lilliputian Gecko, and Big Bandicoot), although I don't look nearly so tiny this way.

It's been two years that I have been vegan and now I, reluctantly, have to say that this is not the truth of me anymore. It is probably quite impossible to stay from any kind of animalistic eating upon a yacht. All of this has nothing to do with me purchasing these foodstuffs, for I haven't; every bit of food upon the yacht is of plant origin -- originally.

It's with some sympathy that I recognise that people not so very long ago were of the opinion that critters just spontaneously generated in foodstuffs. They'd put away a perfectly good bale of flour, beans, spices, and then come back to open the thing up and find that it'd been infested by some bug of choice. This seems to be true of life upon a yacht. I open up something I only put away a month ago and find ... critters.

( They're EVERYWHERE! )

I began telling people that the reason I was still in Bundaberg was that I was awaiting for my autopilot to be fixed. It was the truth, in a way; the guy who owned the slipway we were staying at had offered to sell me a cheap tiller autopilot, and I was going to purchase it if it worked. It didn't. So began a back-and-forth sally of him attempting to fix it, trying it out, and him attempting to fix it again.

The last time he fixed and then gave it to back my father and I sat in the cockpit and watched as it apparently worked. Bzzt, bzzt, it went, as it corrected the "course" every time the yacht moved from the wash of boats going past.

"Looks like it works," said my dad. "We'll have to take it out for a spin."

I was sure it would work, and thought this taking it out for a spin bizzo was a waste of fuel, but all things should be checked nonetheless.

Next morning we turned the engine on, dropped lines, and set off on a slow chug down the river. Then Phil turned on the autopilot, let go of the wheel, and sat back to see what would happen.

( Just as well we did go out. )

Night time was always been fraught with a certain air when we lived on Pampero II all those years ago. I'd lie in my bunk next to the galley and listen to the halyards banging against the mast and rigging when the wind was up. The bang, bang, bang of those lines weren't reassuring.

It was worse when I'd wake up to the high-pitched sound of the diesel engine starting. This was rarely good news; it meant that we were dragging or that my dad wasn't certain of the waters and thought the engine should go on -- just in case. So that high eeeeeeeeeee gave me a little nervousness, and somehow it was always to the dark that it would start, and my bed was next to the engine. My engine, now, has that same sound when starting or going off. It puts my teeth on edge.

My father always had this second sense when it came to the yacht. He still does. A droplet of rain and he'd be up to close all of the hatches. A small movement out of the ordinary and he'd be up to check the anchor. A change in wind and he'd be up. Somehow he always seems to sense other vessels coming in close proximity and is up to see that all is okay, shout at them, or otherwise fend them off, although this last part meant that he nearly died when we were in Ecuador.

( Dark, rain, sound, and wind. )

I awaken in the middle of the night needing to relieve myself, and as I get up I crack my head on the anchor locker. I have once again forgotten that it lies only centimetres from my face, once more bloodied my scalp because I can't make myself sleep with my head towards the stern.

Once that trauma of awakening is over, I have to untangle myself from my sleeping bag -- for I have rediscovered my allergic inability to breathe when near a blanket -- and stumble through the narrow walkway to the cockpit. Throughout this walkway are scattered things which have as yet not found a "home", and if I turn on the light then people will be able to see me -- and I can't use the portapotty because I didn't clear it away from all of the tools and gear piled upon it from the day before. So I carefully climb over stacks of magazines, the battery charger, food processor, and stray tool.

At last I'm in the cockpit, and now I've to find the loo bucket. Is that the one I see, or did one of the boys put it away in the lazarette while I wasn't looking? So I've to pull out both dark buckets, compare the colours by moonlight, and then sleepily lean over the side to fill it with water. Sometimes the wash of a tinny goes by and I nearly fall overboard.

( All things are harder on board. )

When my father described the dinghy which came with my yacht, he was full of praises. It's a tri design, he said, and that means it'll be stable. He said this before he saw it and he said this after he did, all before it hit the water.

Damien and I had just finished a long day of sailing -- last week -- when we put the dinghy in the water to take the dog ashore to Fraser Island, which we found out the next day is illegal and will get you a $3,000 fine. The dinghy seemed all right to start with, even if a little too prone to easy movement when you yourself moved about in it. Then we put the outboard motor upon it.

This was where we found that the dinghy was anything but excellent. It went on all right, but when Damien sat down where one normally does to steer -- on the rear -- he nearly went for a swim as it tipped backwards and the front end went skyward. When I ot in and back out again it was even worse, and we cursed the thing all over. Even the dog, with his happy running around in the dinghy, made it tip and threaten to send us all in for a dunking.

Upon returning to Bundaberg we complained about this to my dad.

( And so we got a new one. )

"There's a yacht dragging on the other side of the river," said my father last night. "He's nearly on the rocks."

Damien and I raced abovedecks and saw the faint outline of a tiny yacht on the other side. She was so far that way she was nearly up on the mangroves.

"The mast appears to be broken," continued Phil, looking at her through the binoculars. "Damien, go over and see if you can put the anchor down if she's got one."

Damien disappeared off into the gloom before I managed to return with my torch. The outboard spluttered and died several times and my brother floated a fair way down the river before he took to oar instead. There was no way he was going to return for me.

Luckily, however, the boy off the yacht in front of us was gearing up to go investigate as well. I hailed him over under the guise of giving him the torch and hopped into the dinghy, and off we sped.

We were up next to the yacht when we saw that there was a guy upon it. It was the tiniest little yacht you ever did see, a trailer sailer, and its mast was not broken but only not assembled. He had his anchor down.

"I went to sleep," said the guy, "and I found myself here. I don't have a fuel tank," he said in response to something my brother said. "I was going to get one tomorrow."

( You see a lot more by daylight. )

Gecko is her name.

"Hey, want to come to Tin Can Bay? It's only an hour away," my father cajoled early in the week. He lied. It was not, and I knew this was so. I stayed behind. Hours later they came back all excited.

"We found you a yacht! We're going to have a look at it on Friday, but it looks like the real thing."

Friday morning rolled around and I found myself bundled into the ute to go have a look. She was everything on the list: 28 foot, full of sails, solar panels, anchor locker, fibreglass, depth sounder, dinghy, Yanmar diesel engine.

( Yay! )

Deciding to purchase a yacht is the easy part. Then that's where it becomes complicated. There are ever so many to choose from. Once every two weeks a magazine is published. "Trade-A-Boat" it is called, and it's so chunky it would put many a telephone book to shame. One has to remember, too, that brokers do not put all of those they've for sale in there -- just a modest selection, and some brokers have so many for sale they'd take pages of ads up there.

It's through this chunky book that you have to wade, trying to figure out what people mean in the ads and near unto using a magnifying glass to figure out if the yacht looks all right in the photograph. Then it's the price, then it's a call. Mostly they are misses. There are very few hits.

My father has specifics in his mind as to what to get me. It fits along these specs: 26-30 foot, GRP (fibreglass) hull, needing little to no work, safety gear, dinghy and outboard, and preferably gadgets like eutectic fridges (or icebox which can be converted), depth sounders, solar panels, radios, gymballed gas stove, this sort of thing. Must be beamy, have a relatively small cockpit, high freeboard, and lots of living space, .

In short, a bit much of an ask when he is looking to spend no more than $30,000.

( What you do get for less than that. )