Day 88 Back to Fare

Boat tour
Dave and Melanie wanted to see the chart that Guy had given us so I visited Talerra and while there got a fascinating tour of the boat. When Dave was 10, he and his two brothers cruised on a boat with his parents and spent the next 8 years sailing the world. When he and Melanie met, he began building his own boat. He was in the house building business so he had all the tools and the skills needed. He built a two-story structure next to their house, bought the fiber glass hull and spent the next 14 years constructing the rest of the 34 foot boat. The structural members are all teak, cedar and Honduran mahogany and the decking is hand-laid-up fiberglass. All of the stainless steel railings and fittings were made by one of Dave's friends. The workmanship is excellent and many of the details that I have seen overlooked on other boats are covered in proper order. They launched Talerra 8 years ago, sold their house and have been living aboard ever since. Their son is married and has a child so it is just the two of them re-tracing the journey of his youth.
We raised anchor in mid-morning and headed North with the current to spend the night near the town of Fare before making the crossing to Ra'iatea in the morning.
I am intrigued by the different sailboats. About one-third of the boats we see are catamarans although the hard core yachties disparage them as not really sailboats. Inside, they are like a small apartment. They have a lot of space with cabins in each hull and a large "salon" over the space between the hulls. In the past they had problems with strength or with capsizing in heavy seas but those seem to have been solved with newer designs. The owners are all men sailing with their wives and the female element seems to be the deciding factor in the purchase. Somehow, having enough space and not banging around in heavy seas appears to be the attraction. Mark said that if he were charting with other couples, he would always choose a cat.
Among the single hull cruisers, the choices seem to be related a lot to price with luxury and speed at the top end. The Oyster built in England seems to be the top of the top with the Swan right behind it. Other small production boats built in Norway and New Zealand are in the middle with the French Beneteau at the bottom. Mark calls this latter boat a "Clorox bottle".
It seems that the right way to test the water (so to speak) is to charter with a reputable company like Moorings and see if sailing and cruising feels like a pastime of interest. Of course, for the extreme introduction, one could just decide to sail from Mexico to New Zealand and skip the preliminaries.