April 3 – Today’s Photos of The Day come
from Mike Miller of the Ventura-based Vanguard 33 Uhuru,
who has spent most of the last two years in Mexico. “Sorry
I missed all of you at the Banderas Regatta,” writes Mike,
“but surfing down south was too much fun to leave. I am
presently getting ready to pick up the hook from Tenacatita Bay
to head further north. Here are a couple of pictures from the
recent Semana Santa catamaran ’round-up’ we had in Tenacatita.
Everybody did little tours of each of their cats, and we all
had a great time. I felt honored to be the only monohull owner
at the raft up. As a monohull sailor heading north to Ventura
and continuing my search for my next boat – I really liked the
Catana 42 – it was quite a boatshow.”
Mike identified the boats, but frankly
we’re not sure he got them right. Unless we’re mistaken, they
are, bow to, from left to right, Chuck and Ellie’s Catana 42 Cat Ballou, the Catana 43 Bright Wing, Guy and
Deborah Bunting’s Morelli & Melvin 46 Elan, and the
Corsair 36 Crazy Kid. Mike mentioned something about Maluhia,
but we think that’s a F/P 43. Could somebody correct us in the
likely event that we are wrong?
Photos Mike Miller
Orange
Finds the Pacific to Their Liking
April 3 – Pacific Ocean
Bruno Peyron and the crew of the maxi cat Orange have
finally left the deep Indian Ocean, which was nothing but trouble
and misery, and are finding great weather in the deep Pacific.
With the wind at 30 knots, they are averaging about 22 knots
under reefed main and gennaker, not straining the boat at all.
And they are loving it. They are already more than 2,000 miles
ahead of the record pace, and looking to expand on it in the
next week or so.
The Un-French, Un-charter Cat
April 3 – The World of Cats
Lots of potential cat buyers bemoan the fact that virtually all
production catamarans are built for the charter market – which
means they tend to have wider hulls and more weight than is good
for optimum performance. But now there is the Morrelli &
Melvin 62, which was recently launched in South Africa, and sailed
across the Atlantic to the Caribbean. There are many interesting
things about this cat, not the least of which is that the limited
partnership that has already sold three of them is the doing
of Peter Johnstone, son of one of the co-founders of J/Boats,
the monohull monolith. In fact, Johnstone is the owner of hull
number #1 Tribe.
As far as we’re concerned, this is the
best-looking M&M cruising cat to date – and in several important
ways resembles Profligate. We like the uniform height
of the hulls, the large saloon with big windows, the broad decks
for easy walking forward, the self-tacking jib, and the overall
simplicity. We’re envious of the lightweight carbon rig, carbon
forward beam, carbon compression post, and Aramid rigging. We
also like the underwater shape of the bows. One thing we don’t
envy is the forward steering station, a concept pioneered by
Chris White. With all due respect to everyone from Chris White
on down, we think the concept is bizarre, as it reduces visibility
of the most important areas, and often leaves the helmsman out
in the worst weather, and stations him where the weather is the
roughest. Of course, where Catana and Lagoon place the helms
on their larger cats – dual helms way aft and in the open – seems
almost as silly. We have two wheels on Profligate, one
on each side behind the saloon bulkhead. After five years, we
think this is the only way to go, as it offers great protection
from the weather, and excellent visibility all around. But to
each their own.
The M&M 62 is built by Jaz Marine in South Africa, and Pete
Melvin compares the quality of their work to the best custom
yards in New England. Big and high tech cats don’t come cheap,
even in South Africa, where labor rates are low. Melvin reports
that fully outfitted 62s are selling for about $1.2 million U.S.
But we like the looks of this boat, and suspect that this high
tech, lightweight speedster, will leave all other similar cruising
cats – including Profligate – in her wake. Actually, we
like the general looks and concept so much, we hope Morrelli
& Melvin will design a similar 55-ft version. For details
and more photos of this cat, visit www.morrellimelvin.com/
All the accompanying photos were taken by Clint Clemens,
owner of hull #2.
YOTREPS
April 3 – The Pacific Ocean and Cyberspace
Who is out making passages in the Pacific
and what kind of weather are they having? Check out YOTREPS –
‘yacht reports’ – at http://www.bitwrangler.com/yotreps/
Looking for current as well as recent wind
and sea readings from 17 buoys and stations between Pt. Arena
and the Mexican border? Here’s the place – which has further
links to weather buoys and stations all over the U.S.: www.ndbc.noaa.gov/stuff/southwest/swstmap.shtml.
Pacific Winds and Pressure
The University of Hawaii Dept. of Meteorology
page posts a daily
map of the NE Pacific Ocean barometric pressure and winds.
