Fitting out Rosa for living aboard

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Choosing a boat

We started the process of figuring out what sort of boat we needed to live aboard several years ago. Figuring out our requirements required a lot of reading and some experience in different boats. We Chartered a Dufour 30 in the Ionian, A Juneau 38 in Croatia and a Bavaria Holiday 36 in the Aegean. These all had their advantages and foibles and gave us more idea of what we valued and what we did not.
Among the most important lessons was that you get what you pay for. In particular the Bavaria was a lot of boat for the money but at only 3 years old was deteriorating badly. The significantly older Juneau however was still in very good condition.
There were several major questions to answer before we got down to details: "Cat or Monohull", "new or second hand" and "how big" ?
While chartering we met several people on cats who let have a look inside. The quantity and particularly the quality of the accommodation was impressive. Unfortunately, it seems, so are the fees demanded for mooring. Cats also sail faster as they remain upright, presenting the best sail angle to the wind. The catch is that they don't tell you they are getting into trouble so if you make a wrong decision and leave too much sail up - a disastrous capsize or even a pitch-pole is on the cards. A monohull by contrast heels more and more - making the crew as uncomfortable as the boat and the sails less efficient so a capsize from wind alone is almost impossible.
So we decided monohull.
Having tried 3 different sized boats and imagined ourself living aboard permanently, we knew that 30' is way too small. Both the 36 and 38 seemed to have the space we would need and were manageable with just the two of us so we decided that we would buy somewhere in the range 35 to 39 foot. We didn't want to go over 40 foot because of substantially more expensive mooring fees, restrictions on many moorings and just being too much to handle for two old fogeys.
New or used was a harder question. You obviously get more boat for your money second hand, it will generally be loaded with more goodies and the teething troubles will be long gone. On the other hand, with a new boat you get to modify the specification and fit up to the minute toys of your own choosing. The warranty should cover teething troubles (don't laugh). We kept an open mind but were leaning on the new side if we could afford it (see finance in this blog).

So now we were faced with a choice of over 50 boats - mostly doing a similar job. How do you choose? The Southampton boat show is a really useful tool. We spent 2 days just going round all the boats that seemed sensible and writing down what each salesman thought was great about his particular model. Boat reviews in PBO were also very helpful. Out of all of this came the idea that the unusual thing that we would really like is a shallow draft boat but we didn't want to compromise on sailing performance or sea-kindness. This would allow us to go easily through the inland waterways to the Med and give us an edge in very crowded moorings where we could get closer to the beach than most other boats. Performance dictated no bilge keels or shallow draft wings so we decided that a lifting keel or centreboard was the answer.
We saw three solutions to this problem - Feeling, Ovni and Southerly. The Feeling solution involved a winged stub keel with a projecting centreboard. We eliminated this quickly as, despite the salesman's protestations, it just didn't look stable to me and I wouldn't trust it on land. The decision between Southerly and Ovni was really difficult. They are both thoroughly capable seagoing boats.
There are really only three classes of things that can go seriously wrong at sea: Something biological( disease, pirates, etc.), You can hit something and sink or you can capsize and sink. Neither boat has anything particular to offer on the first problem.
The aluminium hull of the Ovni was initially very attractive. It is very strong indeed and there is a good chance that hitting something ( a container, a whale, or even a rock) will bend the hull but not break it - where a GRP hull would have a good chance of shattering. that put Ovni on top. So I turned my attention to capsizing. I asked both companies for the GZ curve. Now the GZ curve is by no means everything but it is a reasonable indicator of how likely she is to capsize and not self right. It also gives some indication of how badly she will roll in a seaway or anchorage. Southerly came straight out with very impressive curves. With the keel up she's good and with it down she has a curve like a lifeboat. Ovni wouldn't give us their curve! I was surprised and very suspicious. When I got a curve from an old review in PBO I could see why. It was difficult for me to see how it got a Class A Ocean going rating. It is true that you don't hear of Ovni's capsizing all over the place - and the French certainly do take them everywhere - but nevertheless it was a serious black mark.

So now we were faced with a choice of two roughly equal boats and needed to look at the details. Both had an option for the main sheet track to be mounted out of the cockpit, both were thoroughly competent lifting-keel solutions. We loved the Ovni arch, the internal space and layout. We liked the Southerly stability, high standard of finish and the fact that it would be built, delivered and warranted in Chichester rather than in western France. When Northshore volunteered to make us an Arch and to deliver the boat 6 months after ordering rather than 18 months, that clinched it and we started serious discussions with them.

Initially we liked the 110 for its stern cockpit, size (35') and layout. There are many more models now but back then it was pretty much a choice between a 110 and a 115. We went for a test sail and were very impressed. She behaved like a thoroughbred beating, reaching and running with great ease. When I was deliberately misdirected so that I ran her aground, the salesmen just pressed a button, up came the keel, and we were off again! I was convinced.
We took another year to get our finances into shape so that we could order her and then went back to Northshore for another look before ordering - and they had a new design - the Southerly 35. Same size as the 110 but with a completely different layout inside and on deck. She had a self-tacking jib which I was very keen on having used them frequently on the Broads. Inside, she has a raised saloon so you can sit inside in those glorious places we all go to - and actually see out! Our initial impression was that the accommodation was rather bitty with a couple of steps in the saloon. However, we were offered a sail from Chichester to Southampton for the boat show - and we were converted! The self tacking jib was a dream!

We placed the order expecting to wait for a few months before anything happened - but Northshore had a gap in their schedule and wanted to lay down the hull moulding early - to which we agreed even though the full set of options and designs had not been fully bottomed out.

A couple of months later we were sitting in the office, about to sign on the dotted line, when I noticed there was no option for the main sheet track to be on the coach roof. "Oh no", said Gary, "that's not an option on this boat". I hit the roof (see First Charter in this blog for the reason). I'd asked the salesman and he'd said yes it was an option, and the deck moulding (which is the same as the 110) clearly had a groove where the track would go. The reason it turned out was that with the small 90% jib, she has to have a huge mainsail to get enough power. That raises the spectre that with the wind from 45 degrees astern, she will not turn further down wind unless you dump the main sheet - and that's dangerous.
Luckily the salesman backed me up that he had sold us the option and to their great credit, they went into a huddle for an hour and came back with the solution - a "German Main Sheet" layout. The main runs from a winch on the port quarter (where you would normally expect a Genoa winch) then runs alongside the coach roof, up to the gooseneck, along the underside of the boom then down to the track which is in front of the spray hood. It then goes back up to the boom, along to the gooseneck along the starboard coach roof and back to a second winch on the port quarter. The helmsman can easily reach either winch to dump the main in an instant. Of course this is all more expensive than the standard arrangement - more pulleys, bigger boom to take the stress and two extra winches. To their credit, Northshore did it all for cost price.
We took delivery in May 2006 and have lived (almost) happily ever after. - see Fitting Out if you're interested.

How we financed the lifestyle

We aren't rich. Having spent a lifetime with a reasonable job and a big mortgage and three teenage kids, we got into our late fifties with a house, some pension entitlement and not much else. So how were we going to make it happen?

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