new sailor

[Bob Poff]

By all means dream

Christian,

Still have the 20 footer? Sail it! Then sail it some more.
Spend a few weekends aboard. Then sail it some more.
Sail it in many conditions.
When you think you're ready, find the larger boat.
Then sail it.

Perhaps charter a boat in the islands, or the Med.

And learn.

A friend once told me the adage "You can learn to handle the boat in a weekend. You spend the rest of your life learning to sail"

The larger boat? You'll find it's a completely different world.
Having sailed a 22' boat starting in 1995, two years in after moving to a 34' I'm still amazed
at the differences. Systems, handling, maintenance.

You're in a great place to connect with people. People you can learn from.
As others have said this site is a perfect place to learn.
Build your experience.

And you'll build memories.

What you're proposing isn't impossible. But HIGHLY challenging.
And yes, many aspects are highly dangerous.
It's not "the road less traveled" for a reason. It's not for everyone.

But after you've sailed, then sailed some more.... if you find it's for you.....
You won't regret it.

Don't give up your dream.
Just don't throw your life (and your wife's) away trying to do it before you have the experience you need "out there".

 

[MoonSailer]

Roger Long I have a Pearson 323 which by the "numbers" is very simular to your Endeavor 32. Did you consider a Pearson???

 

[George H260]

Dreamers...where would we be without them?

I see a couple of alternatives for you here:

1. Find a boat and set out for Turkey and learn as you go. Good Luck with that.

2. Take some baby steps first. Plan to take a bareboat charter in Turkey -- that would give you an idea of what your destination is like. In order to be able to do the charter you'll have to take some sailing instruction from a nationally recognized sailing school. In addition to the keelboat and bareboat instruction, and acquiring advanced navigation and weather forcasting skills, your training should include offshore passagemaking experience. Hopefully you'll get to the point where being in a 40mph gale in 25 ft waves in the middle of the Atlantic does not make you mess your pants.

Once you get all of this done, you'll have a pretty good chance of accomplishing your dream. You'll have a better idea of what you'll be facing, the kind of boat you want, and what it all will cost. If, in the end you decide that this was just another pipedream and prefer to just do some local daysailing, you'll only have expended a few thousand dollars and had a great experience along the way.

Good luck - there are dreamers and dooers, We all hope you are the latter.

In the meantime, here's a homework assignment: Spend some time reading about passagemaking. Browse some of the great sailing blogs that are readily available on the internet.

 

[Roger Long]

Did you consider a Pearson???

At the time, I wasn't very serious about a boat. I was happy flying airplanes and it was my ex. wife's idea. We were looking for a cheap boat to just fool around in on weekends and take some short cruises. The reason for the large size was so we could take enough of the boy's friends to make it interesting for them as well as friends of our own. Basically, we were thinking, big funky daysailer.

My primary consideration at the age and price we were considering was to not have any core in the deck or hull. The E 32 was the first boat I found that met this criteria and I liked just about everything about it from a boat designer's perspective. I don't remember any 323's for sale at the time in our price range.

Full story here:

http://home.roadrunner.com/~rlma/Strider.htm

Considering where I am now, I really lucked out on the boat. If anything happened to her, I would start looking for another E 32 the next day.