The Beginning

Life in a land locked state is never easy, especially when you have quite a bit of time on your hands!  My work currently has me on a part time schedule so I took advantage of the lull in work and boredom.  This blog documents  my search and restoration of the "perfect" classic sailboat. 

The Search:  Atfter hundreds of hours of searching I began to develop what kind of boat I wanted.  For a first boat I wanted somthing around 25', having had some postive expierences on a Catalina 250.  Criteria that determined the search:

-A daysailor boat (no overnights)
-A boat with a long bow or stern total length is 20% or greater than LWL
-Classic Northeast sailing vessal, clipper, bermuda racer, schooner etc



Etchells 22

The Ultimate boat in my opinion Bolero a modified Shields
http://www.lackeysailing.com/bolero/bolero.htm

Great candidate examples would be the Shields 30' or the etchells 22' which both have about 40% greater length then LWL.  Also appealing are international one design classes like the IOD 210 or IOD Dragon.

After months of searching I finally lined up a boat fit for the project.  Though intially wanting an etchells, they were a little out of my price range as the base models started around $5000 plus shipping.  So, I found a 21' boat that needed a lot of work, and the price showed.  The boat is a 1971 Luders 21'.  This boat has the lines I like and the right price point.  Because of the low price I hope to really put a lot of nice things on her.  Some ideas I have been floating around with are wood decks, canvas boat cover, blue hull etc...