It took us only 3 months (August to October) to decide on Cinderella, but that's after 10 years of thinking about it, going to the boatshows to see all the different boats, 10 years of reading Cruising World, Sail, Multihulls, and most every other sail magazine I could get my hands on.

What did we look for, why, and how did we go about it ?

The easiest decision was to look at catamarans.    Why a Catamaran makes the case.

We also kind of knew what we wanted before we started looking at real boats. Choosing the Right Boat shows what we were thinking then.

Finally, having chartered Lagoon 37's, Fountaine Pajot 37's, and a Kennex 38 (which you can see in Boat Carousel ) we had some real-life input.

We wanted to sail throughout the Caribbean over the next 5 years, starting with the Bahamas during Xmas 2000, and then moving down the Caribbean over the years, and doing this with the kids (so room aboard was important). Eventually, I wanted to go beyond the Caribbean (note that not all the crew is quite ready for this yet)but maybe by then I could just buy a different boat.
So we needed a coastal cruising boat bordering on blue-ocean for some of the tougher crossings, and needed to equip it accordingly. We knew we wanted at least a 37' boat (the size we were most familiar with) and we would look at boats up to 42'. 42' is probably the biggest boat me and Isabelle can handle together in all conditions. At this point, we couldn't see ourselves handling a bigger boat and after we saw some 42', we even began to doubt that 42' would be a smart move for our first boat. If all worked out right, we could always move up to a 42', so we really began to zero in on 37' catamarans.

New or used and which make ?

We tried to stay open minded and agreed that we basically only had 2 choices :

• a used catamaran coming out of the charter fleets. In other words, a 5 year old boat with only basic equipment and with a fair amount of wear and tear.
  In other words :
  • important to find a boat with the hulls and engines in relatively good shape
  • base equipement would probably need replacing in the near term if not right away (so think $$)
  • would need to add " must have " equipment for the coastal crusing we wanted to do
  • the refit of the boat would take the usual TIME and $$$$$$. Time I had (having been fortunate to retire early), $$$$$ we had some (I was trying to keep to our budget of around $200K US), and experience of doing a refit, I had none ! (this in the end proved to be an important factor)
• a used catamaran from a private owner, somewhat more recent (2-3 years) and already equipped with most or all of the " must have " equipment we were looking for.
  This meant:
  • important to find an owner that was conscientious and had clearly kept up the maintenance on his boat
  • ensure that the wear and tear was reasonable on the boat and the equipement
  • we could essentially just sail the boat away with minimum refit effort and time
  • spending a little bit more on the purchase price but less on the refit

New boats were out of the question : too expensive and we didn't want to wait for the manufacturers,or deal with a shakedown (since our experience was somewhat limited).

On our first trip to Florida in August, we saw a whole slew of cats over 2 weeks thanks to brokers like Navigator Yachts, 2 Hulls , and Charters, and finally Catamaran Co. where we met Christine, who helped us tremendously in making this a reality. (click on their names to reach their web sites) Have to say, all were great to work with and helpfull in going over the boats and answering all the questions of neophyte boat buyers. We saw Lagoon 37's, Lagoon 42's, Fountaine Pajot 38's, Norseman 400's, 430's, Nautitech 395's, Manta 40's, PDQ's, and Prouts, so that I think we covered the slate of well known cats.

Nautitech 395   More Pictures   Nautitech Site	Manta 40
Lagoon 37   More Pictures   Lagoon Site	Lagoon 42   More Pictures   Lagoon Site

With so many boats, it would have been easy to get them confused, so for the boats that were in the ballpark, we took pictures, video and notes. (Didn't need to take notes of the PDQ's, Prouts or the rundown Lagoon37 we saw since they were clearly not for us and I won't bore you with the details). I also had prepared a detailed comparison spreadsheet to let me note down the equipment that was on the boat and it's condition, or to add it as part of the refit costs in both " must have " and " nice to have " categories. In hindsight, that was my best tool since I was able to quickly estimate the total cost of a specific boat (base+refit+addon's)and compare with the other choices.

So why Cinderella ?

• She's fully equipped for blue-water cruising (see Equipment List) with GPS, Autopilot, Radar, SSB, EPIRB, LifeRaft, solar panels, etc. and we could sail her away almost immediately
• launched in July 99, she's almost like new (hulls, sails, rigging, engines, instruments, etc.) and so no refit, and we can expect 1-2 years of problem free enjoyment (yea right!)
• the survey highlighted nothing except for a few real minor issues (the surveyor felt guilty about handing us a report with so little on it !)
• a new Athena 38 model, Fountaine Pajot have tweaked the design and delivered a very comfortable and liveable boat (inside and out) which you can see in the Picture Gallery. A quick example : the hood over the cabin blocks out the sun and keeps the boat very cool. How many cats and sailboats have you seen with sunshades permanently on the windows ? The older Lagoon's, Norseman's, Kennex, etc. all have this problem, and under the Caribbean sun, it can get real hot in the main cabin.
• her previous owner, Hans, was meticulous on maintenance and upkeep, so that she really looked like new (and probably better than if she had been delivered to North America by the manufacturer/dealer)
• the sailing rig is clean and simple (fully battened mainsail and rollerfurled genoa) and most of the manoeouvers can be done from the cockpit (except for raising the mainsail and taking a reef). The kids can help and everyone stays safe in the cockpit during most sail handling.
• she had one Atlantic Ocean crossing and 5 months of Caribbean cruising to her credit which I saw as a pretty good shakedown cruise
• the price was right (compared to option (1) or compared to buying new with all the same equipment and delivered to North America
• and finally, she just looked real good !! (and I guess that really counts too)

After a couple of weeks of discussion, we came to the conclusion that Cinderella would be the best pick of the lot (assuming we really wanted to do this), and scheduled a 2-day sea-trial (we wanted to sleep one night on the boat and have the opportunity to sail and live aboard it), the surveyor and a haul-out. In mid-October we returned to Florida, and, not surprisingly, everything checked A-1.

Two weeks later, for October 30th, I had secured insurance, began the registration of the boat in Canada, wired all that hard earned money, and the deal was set to close !

By November 8th, I had Cinderella hauled-out at FT.Lauderdale Marine center for her yearly anti-fouling, and some regular maintenance work.

November 11th, Cinderella was relaunched in Ft.Lauderdale, with new anti-fouling, all waxed, looking like new, and with her new canadian flag.

As they say, the rest is history (and some of it is in the Sailing Log).


Let's just say, that this was a big turning point in all our lives. Cinderella could be changing the way we looked at life going forward and whether or not I would ever get back in the rat race. Only time could tell, but me and Isabelle both knew that it would be hard to go back now.

CeBe WebDesign November 12, 2007