Just starting to talk about it.

Pack Mule · Jun 3, 2013

Hey guys,
I 'm only been on this forum a few months and haven't had a lot of input.My wife and I just boat our first trawler back in September and have been working on it almost every day since.We owned a 1965 32 ft sailboat before the trawler that we restored, but sailing on the river just wasn't much fun. We seem to find more reasons to go to the boat than to be at home.We have already spent more time on this boat in less than a year than we spent on the sailboat in 8 years.Maybe the new hasn't worn off yet. We are only 15 minutes from the boat so it is easy to say lets go. You all know how it is it's just different at the boat.I'm sure that that changes when living aboard. I work every day and my wife takes care of everything at home and works on the boat all the time ,cleaning , varnishing and painting. We both work on it in the afternoon and some on the weekends.We are about done for this year with new projects planned for next year.
We get a little liquored up on the rum and we start talking about selling out and buying a bigger boat and living aboard. I would like to do some of the loop south someday. I will need to work another 7 to 8 years before being able to take off for a while. The boat would only be about 25 minutes to work. The wife would be at the boat most all of the time.One of the things that concern me the most about living aboard is being bored while at the slip for the both of us,mostly for her during the day.I have a woodworking shop and I use it for making stuff for the boat.I know that I will have to give that up but I also know that I will probably need it for whatever boat that we wind up with. I'm sure that some of you have had all these same thoughts and have had to work through them. If anyone wants to share some thoughts we would be appreciative.

CPseudonym · Jun 3, 2013

We are starting the back and forth waffling that is discussing moving aboard a larger boat. We, like you spend more time at the boat than we envisioned and it makes for as nice a chat subject as anything else. We currently live an hour from the boat and with a little marina hopping we could be within 30 minutes of work.

Realistically we know we will wait 6 years minimum as our youngest is 12 and well nested into his local school/church friends network. Our oldest has moved to Italy with the Air Force and our 17 year old graduated and leaves this year for the military. That however has not stopped us from starting the purging process we've read so much about liveaboard couples going through prior to moving aboard. It's a needed evil as our nest continues to empty and should work into our future vagabond plans well.

Being somewhat minimalist by nature should be a plus as we go forward with whatever our future plans hold. I've also found as I age the tools in the shop mean less to me than they once did. Our boat is currently sufficient for our mission of river cruising and we have serious doubts that we will sell our current boat even if we do move aboard a larger one.

The thought of sitting in the marina 24/7/365 has no appeal to us so an active lifestyle with plenty of boat trips is a must for us. Selecting a marina based on price point and location alone would seem a recipe for disaster for us. Plenty to think about and am sure it will fuel many an evening conversation for us for years to come.

Good luck with your plans Pack Mule.

Pack Mule · Jun 4, 2013

Thanks for your input.We also feel that we finally have the right boat for the area we live in and the right boat to takes us as far as we are comfortable in traveling.
We are both in our late 50's .Our daughters are grown married and we have 4 grandchildren. Our kids and grand kids are only a couple of hours away so we can see them often and they come here for visits often.
We live in a 100 year old house that we have totally rebuilt. This must be our thing working on old houses and boats.What we are starting to see as we get older is that it's hard to try and keep both the boat and the house up the way that we like to.We can handle it now but it keeps us both pretty busy.
For now this is working pretty good, with 50 to 60 mile river trips squeezed in on weekends.It would be nice to just have the boat to keep up with and focus all our efforts on one space.For us to own a boat that we could live on ,afford , and don't mind looking at and working on we would have to sell the house and make the leap.

Phil Fill · Jun 4, 2013

Most people will not take the leap and get rid of most of the dirt stuff. Not worth storing more than a year because you can buy new, but they have to have the dirt stuff. Hundred of people have said to us, I would like to live on a boat, but very few actually do. I figure less than 1% of all the boats are a year around 24/7 365 days live aboard. There is a larger % of want a be in the summer.

Many marines do not allow live a boards. If the marine does allow they try to keep the number quite low. I would guess less that 5%. A large % of those that do try do not make it 1 year and at most 3 to 5 years as the average person is to comfortable/spoiled living on the dirt.

Our goal in is to have no physical procession/ties or get to a bare minimum. When we move off the Eagle we will probable rent and be mobile. I do not want to own and/or have to maintain anything.

Pau Hana · Jun 4, 2013

Like those who live in traditional housing (single family residences, condos, apartments, etc) boredom is largely a choice for liveaboards. We've been fulltime onboard coming on 4 years, and there have been times when I did wish to have a fully equipped shop, as I like tinkering around on cars, and having a place to work on projects.

That being said, I have learned to make do, and have had very few boring days onboard. I've simply shifted my energies to onboard projects, and enjoying the waterborne lifestyle. We don't have cable, so we read a lot, watch (minimally) broadcast TV, and stream online services when a movie/entertainment is needed.

Phil has hit things right on the head- we run into plenty of folks that desire to live onboard; I always ask them why they don't make the move and just do it. 9.9 times of 10, the answer is either an excuse, or something based in fear.

Craig is correct about the purge- less can really equal more. Try this- section off a corner of your garage, and put things there that you use on a fairly infrequent basis. As you put things there, take some masking tape and label the stuff with the date it went into that pile. After 6 months, if you haven't touched something in that pile, consider how much you really need it.

Liveaboard- just do it, and you'll figure it out along the way. Cheers!

Pack Mule · Jun 4, 2013

My wife and I don't have the problem of hanging on to stuff.We love to "chunk it"
When we rebuilt the house we are in now I took out the pull down stairs to the attic and only have a hole in the closet to climb through. We have a big attic and nothing in it.I have built a couple of houses but nothing I couldn't walk away from in the past.
I work at a hardwood lumber company .I could probably set up shop at work for a while and slowly get rid of the tools or scale back for sure.Woodworking is not as much fun as it used to be.I'm around so much lumber everyday.
Like I said in the first post , the rum kicks in builds confidence and it sounds like a lot of fun.

CaptTom · Jun 4, 2013

In my trawler search, I came across a lot of boats on the market with the same backstory: Owners dreamed of travelling or living aboard. Some actually did, some never made it. Eventually one or both became unable to live aboard for whatever reason (usually medical.)

Another common theme is people who hold on to boats they never use (or maintain) for sentimental reasons. Then when it's time to sell, nobody wants to buy because it's too far gone to repair. It was heartbreaking to walk away from some once-great boats.

It's sobering. But the moral of the story is, if you want to do something, do it while you can!

Carolena · Jun 4, 2013

Welcome aboard! My wife and I also recently bought our first trawler (took delivery in November). Prior to that we were also river sailors, which while enjoyable - being on any boat is enjoyable for me - it was also a lesson in frustration due to the limited sailing grounds. We did become experts at tacking and jibbing.

I was looking at our survey records the other day and realized that we have already put about 45 hours on the main engine of our Tug. That is just since November, includes a winter insurance layup for the months of January and February, and it isn't even the first official day of summer yet. We spent just as much time on the sailboat, but we are leaving the dock a lot more and certainly venturing into new areas, both further away and in shallower water. So far we are loving it. Now if I can only stop daydreaming aobut he next, bigger boat. :banghead:

Lauderboy · Jun 13, 2013

I've been living aboard a 32ft sailboat the last 3 years and will be switching out to a larger trawler next year. Mostly for the same reasons you switched, sailing in rivers(or the ICW in my case) isn't much fun.

Boredom really doesn't have to be a thing these days. Even my small boat easily fits a 24 inch LCD HDTV, most marinas have cable and those that don't should still have internet access. With DVDs or even things like Netflix it's really easy to have a lot of entertainment on board. Also what works out well is owning a tablet or Kindle and reading ebooks.

In the early 90's and 80's I used to drive down to the local book store(or library) and spend hours searching through a few hundred books to find one I wanted to read. Today with a Kindle I have access to several hundred thousand books I can download pretty much instantly.

And that kind of portable entertainment access is only going to improve over the next few years.

Blender Boy · Jun 13, 2013

We're preparing to be cruiseaboards (new word), as we won't be tethered to the dock. We're selling almost all or our dirt stuff, constrained by a 10 X 10 storage space for what little is left. It's a little daunting to go from a 2500 square foot house to a 43' Nordhavn, but the boat will dictate what we can take with us. It's amazing how much stuff you compile over 20 years or so. I'm the pack rat, my wife has no problem tossing stuff.

awpptdt · Jun 29, 2013

Wok shop

Pack Mule said:
Hey guys,
I 'm only been on this forum a few months and haven't had a lot of input.My wife and I just boat our first trawler back in September and have been working on it almost every day since.We owned a 1965 32 ft sailboat before the trawler that we restored, but sailing on the river just wasn't much fun. We seem to find more reasons to go to the boat than to be at home.We have already spent more time on this boat in less than a year than we spent on the sailboat in 8 years.Maybe the new hasn't worn off yet. We are only 15 minutes from the boat so it is easy to say lets go. You all know how it is it's just different at the boat.I'm sure that that changes when living aboard. I work every day and my wife takes care of everything at home and works on the boat all the time ,cleaning , varnishing and painting. We both work on it in the afternoon and some on the weekends.We are about done for this year with new projects planned for next year.
We get a little liquored up on the rum and we start talking about selling out and buying a bigger boat and living aboard. I would like to do some of the loop south someday. I will need to work another 7 to 8 years before being able to take off for a while. The boat would only be about 25 minutes to work. The wife would be at the boat most all of the time.One of the things that concern me the most about living aboard is being bored while at the slip for the both of us,mostly for her during the day.I have a woodworking shop and I use it for making stuff for the boat.I know that I will have to give that up but I also know that I will probably need it for whatever boat that we wind up with. I'm sure that some of you have had all these same thoughts and have had to work through them. If anyone wants to share some thoughts we would be appreciative.

You do not need to give up your work shop, I purchased a used,

very, 24' uhaul and set up my shop in the back, lathe, table saw, miter saw, bandsaw, tool box and work bench with a vise or is that vice, I can't keep those straight, or winch, :nonono:

I guess that is why I have both. Powered it with a long extension cord or you could mount a small generator outside somewhere. Another option is an enclosed trailer, store it in a storage yard if your marina doesn't have a parking place for it. Careful though, the little woman will fill it up with stuff just like your shop :banghead:

. J.T.Duncan

kolive · Jul 1, 2013

J.T., your U-Haul shop is a great idea! I like it a lot. I have a small wood shop about that size and your idea could really work for us. Thanks for the idea.

FF · Jul 4, 2013

I purchased a used,

very, 24' uhaul and set up my shop in the back,

The fancier the marina the less chance they will go for this.

A boatyard with slips might be a better chance.

A boatyard probably will not have a pool , tennis court , restaurant .

A lift gate on the back will allow EZ work on the heavy stuff , and makes a great back porch.

IF plates are required to be parked ,insurance is not required for most trailers .

CPseudonym · Jul 4, 2013

A variation on the u-haul truck shop is the enclosed trailer. Available from 8-35 feet in length they can be sized to suit and avoid the issues associated with commercial vehicle parking.

993guy · Jul 4, 2013

Blender Boy said:
We're preparing to be cruiseaboards (new word), as we won't be tethered to the dock. We're selling almost all or our dirt stuff, constrained by a 10 X 10 storage space for what little is left. It's a little daunting to go from a 2500 square foot house to a 43' Nordhavn, but the boat will dictate what we can take with us. It's amazing how much stuff you compile over 20 years or so. I'm the pack rat, my wife has no problem tossing stuff.

Just looked on YachtWorld's listings of Nordhavn 43's, that's a very nice boat. I hope you enjoy her!

Just starting to talk about it.

Pack Mule

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