One boat, two boat, we got a new boat!!!

Sea Trial Day with our new boat!

Here we are on the sea trial day, with our new {to us} 1983 Endeavour 40'!!!

As you can tell, hubs is over the moon excited about the new boat, as am I!! I told him, "I'd like to think this photo shows his love for me, but I really think this photo shows the love between a man and his boat!" To my surprise, he responded with, "it's the love of a man that has a wife that lets me live on a boat!" ....yeah, he's a keeper!!! ;)

Enough of all that sweetness, let's get to the real reason you're reading this! 

We got our new boat the Wednesday afternoon before Christmas! (Whew, just in the St. Nick of time there Santa!!) We unloaded all the things out of both of our cars onto the boat on Thursday and then left Friday morning to drive to Fort Worth to spend Christmas with both of our families! Hubs really didn't want to leave his new boat, right after getting it, but neither of us wanted to call our mom's and tell them we wouldn't be home for Christmas, after telling them both, "we would be there for Christmas!" So, off we went for a few days...  

So, what did we buy? We went with a 1983, center cockpit, 40' Endeavour sailboat. For you non-boaty people, a center cockpit simply means, the helm {a.k.a. the wheel}, from where you drive the boat, is located in the center of the boat. Unlike our two Catalina's, that were both aft cockpits. 

The benefits of a center cockpit are mostly interior, giving better access to the engine and allowing for a bigger, roomier, aft cabin! Exterior wise, the center cockpit means you sit a little higher out of the water, which is good for both visibility and more likely to get sprayed by crashing waves! You'll have to remind me of that last one being a good thing when I post about how soaked we get!! 

Here's the layout in case you're not familiar with the Endeavours.... 

What are the differences between this one and the other two? 

• 1st boat: 30 foot long and had a beam of 10' with 5'8" headroom. Vberth, quarter berth, 1 head. 

• 2nd boat: 36 foot long and had a beam of 11'6" with 6' headroom. 2 cabins, 1 head

• 3rd boat: 40 foot long and has a beam of 13' with 6'6" headroom. 2 cabins, 2 heads

Is this boat, our forever boat? Only time will tell, but I do know that, the more time we spend on it, the more we like it! And, I do see us going cruising in this boat!! 

She needs a little love and attention on the outside, but the inside teak has been well taken care of and was just recently varnished! 

We even have a hallway!!! And the best part is, I don't even have to duck or crouch down to walk through it. Hubs has to tilt his head, slightly, but that's really the only spot. The rest of the boat has 6'6" headroom, so that is something we both appreciate, since we are both tall. 

The other major upgrade is that this boat has two heads (a.k.a. bathrooms). She's a two cabin, 2 head, layout, with plenty of storage and can sleep 8 comfortably, before we have to send anyone outside, to sleep in hammocks!!

Now for some more photos....

Starboard side of the boat

Port side of the boat

Navigation area | looking down the hall to our cabin

Hallway with control panel, engine room access, & more storage

Aft cabin | closet/storage

Aft cabin | bed

Aft head

Vberth | there's much to be said about this part of the boat, but for now, let's just call it the garage ;)

Forward head

Port side settee

Starboard side settee

Each settee folds out & makes a full-size bed

The galley

Closeup of the galley

The cockpit | albeit, somewhat messy

The aft deck | or what i like to call it, the back porch ;)

We still have a little settling in to do, but we are mostly moved in! Besides, I just couldn't handle keeping our blog readers in suspense any longer. So, now that you've seen our beautiful boat & disorganized cockpit, what do you think of our new digs?? Let us know in the comments! ;) 

Happy New Year & thanks for following along on our journey afloat!!!

Big changes coming our way

So far, the changes are merely thoughts, but I'm sure it's close to being a big change to the way we liveaboard. Anyone who has been following us for even a day, knows that our current boat is not our forever boat! After selling our first boat we had hoped to buy the boat we would stay on forever and go cruising on, but we just didn't find what we were looking for.  And after being homeless for two months and coming along this boat at a great price, we dove head first into our second Catalina. Don't get me wrong, we love our boat, but we knew when we bought her she was merely going to tide us over until we found the one we really wanted. 

What is it that we really want, you ask? Well, the answer is a bit tricky, but I will tell you what qualities we are looking for in our forever boat!

We want a true ocean-going boat. A boat that you could sail around the world in {if we ever decided to do that...way, way down the road or ocean lane} and we want that boat to be paid for by the time we leave, so basically, we need to find a needle in a haystack or a fixer upper. 

The only way to get a well-built boat at a cheap price is to find one that needs a lot of work. Think of it like this:

(*We read somewhere about the above diagram where the three options were: build quality, cheap price & speed of boat. But for my illustration, I'm using move-in ready in place of boat speed.)

Pick any two items that are/would be most important to you. Whatever item you didn't choose is the one you will (most likely) sacrifice, in order to gain the two you don't want to budge on. Lets say you want a move-in ready boat that is well built, chances are, it's not going to be cheap! So in our case, we want a well-built boat at a super cheap price, which means we most certainly are not going to find a boat that doesn't require work to be done. The only good thing about that equation is the fact that we will be doing most, if not all the work ourselves. Yeah, I know what you're  thinking, how is that good? I've thought the same thing! The repairs won't cost us as much, because we won't be paying for someone else's labor. Plus, hubs can do anything and he's good at it, no shortcuts! The downside however, comes when I tell you we will be living on it while we are doing the work. My hopes are that we can find something by fall so that the renovations can begin right around the time winter rolls in, when we are already stuck inside hibernating from the cold air. We are so not cold-weather sailors! 

We've taken on this challenge before, but somehow, I think it is going to be way more different than when we lived in our house while we gutted and reno'd the dining room, living room & kitchen. The good thing is, we both like to have projects to work on...and oh, what a project this will be!! 

At least I won't fall into a lull of blog posts! ;)