WHY IS THE MAC DISRESPECTED AMONG SAILORS

[irayone]

I have sold my Pearson 385....Looking for a Mac....All my old sailing buddies(mostly blue water crusiers) Don't give the Mac any respect. They are cautioning me not to buy it, that it's junk ??? A used Mac is hard to find and they seem to hold there value. I sailed one and loved it. The perfect pocket coastal cruiser. Any thoughts ???

[K9Kampers]

irayone -

Check the archives. Do a search on the word "bash". Use the Search box in the upper right corner.

[TAW02]

irayone;

Don't give a fart about what alll the other people think about what is important to you. Do you want to work your tail-off for an image? I didn't really think so. Take it from me (I am known around here as being crass and sarcastic), but take it from the rest of these slobs around here , I think they are of the same mindset as me but won't really admit it

I am no longer young. I don't bend easily anymore. I don't believe I am cool either. Cool went away when I left high-school. I believe that that is the only place where cool really works. After that ... just change the C in cool to an F.

Watch your friends stand on there heads while they drop a 2 ton keel to repair a leak

Watch your friends open up their boat after a weekend out on the islands only to find mushrooms sprouting from the grain of thier teakwood

Watch your friends try to make an inlet cut on a following tide that threatens to swamp their prize possesion for Davy Jones Locker because they don't have enough power to the prop to make it through

Watch your friends spend weekends scraping and sanding wood and refinishing while you wave and head off to enjoy life sailing.

Watch your friends haul-out with a crane and a team of support to lower/raise the mast and splash the boat.

Watch your friends cruise the same old water year after year while you trailor off to new 'weekend' jaunts

Watch your friends 'bilge pump' water from the bilge that would gag a pig and leave the owner wondering where the water is seeping in from ...

I don't know about you, but I have been there and done that. I was younger then. But I am older now and smarter.

I have a sailboat that is nearly maintenance free. It gives an old crank like me more time to enjoy life and have adventures in places no other sailboat could take me.

Thank goodness for the

[waternwaves]

Sometimes..... it seems disproportionate the amount of time I work on my boats versus the time I get to spend enjoying them....


The rest of the time.....
I am sure it is a disproportionate amount.

But
It is still fun.

[NiceAft]

irayone said:

They are cautioning me not to buy it, that it's junk

I'm just wondering, how many of those people had actually been on an X or M prior to making their minds known


Ray

[dennisneal]

Say what they will, but here's just one of the reasons why I love my boat:

Last October, my Admiral and I were sailing out of Marina Del Rey. Winds were light and from the North. We sailed due South, "wing on wing" for several hours when the wind totally died. Nada! We were at least ten miles from port.

I suppose that if we were in a "pure" sailboat we could have continued to drift to the South, or, maybe, we could have fought our way North against non-existent winds. As it was getting on toward evening, maybe we could have been back by midnight, or much later. I know we both would have been very hungry, tired and cranky.

Instead:

We lowered the dacron sails, and lowered the aluminum "sail", (our 60HP Etec), and were back in time for dinner!

[bubba]

My wife and I really enjoy our Mac M . I really love trailering 4 hours 200 miles and have the boat in the water in Puget Sound or 2 hours to Lake Coeur da Lene Idaho or here on the Columbia River 3 miles from home to the marina where there is a 6 mph current to deal with. Let those big heavy boats do that, don't get me wrong We are looking at a 38 ft Sea Wind 22ft beam catamaran but for a full time live aboard though we will probably keep out Mac for lakes and traveling over land.

If you custom rig your boat and add 3 reef's, spinnakers and possibly a super cruiser package with fully enclosed Bimini with dodger you will not be disappointed. My wife and I have almost 150 days and nights sailing in a year and half. Single handing is easier than lots of larger boats. We have been out 15 days http://i293.photobucket.com/albums/mm42 ... ure042.jpg and enjoying winter and thin ice.

[Night Sailor]

I think in many cases it's simply a fact of denial. They spent a lot of money and/or went into to debt for years to look traditional, have a boat approved of by the local yacht club or race committees, or dreams of ocean voyages they will never take, so don't want to admit that you got a lot more boat and function for the money than they did.
I traded down to a 26x in 1997 for very practical reasons relative to the type of sailing and exploring we like to do. Cost was not an object, and I bought the Mac for cash, but multiple function and ease of maintenance was primary. Of course I miss the headroom and gentle ride of the big old deep keel boat at times, but only for a second or two. Now, having a shallow water sailor, and a boat that can probe creeks and flats only 18' deep under motor power is my kind of machine... and I love it when it turns heads, causes outbreaks of envy and rashes of consternation among the channel bound showoffs with big mortgages on their boats, guys and gals who just can't stand the thought that you are having more fun for less money than they can. Just watch other brands of traditional boats being launched and see if strangers stop their cars or workers drop what they are doing to ask go about it the way they do my M26X on the ramp.

[Québec 1]

I really like this subject
Cause it's not a real sail boat!
A real 26 foot sailboat takes 7 days to go 800 kilometers along the St lawrence River to Cambelton New Brunswick to cruise La Baie de Chaleurs!
My mac takes 7 hrs and 32 minutes hours to go to Cambelton( its only 500 kilometers by car)!
A real sailboat takes 3 to 4 weeks to get to Marathon Florida from Québec!
With 2 buddy drivers it takes my Mac 1 day and 6 hours to get to Marathon Florida from Québec!

It's not disrespect,its something else!!

[Boblee]

After two weeks poking around our Gippsland lakes and actually using the boat the whole time while all the real sail and power boats were in their berths, no one but will ever convince me that there is a better boat for actually getting out there and doing it.
Actually was blown away with how well the did sail when given half a ,we clocked 5 knots on the jib only and 5.4 with a double reefed main and the wife working the sheets , so the boat never really had a show of showing what it could really do.
On the one occasion when we struck a real sailboat out there he got so embarrased by having a gaining on him he dropped his sails
Try doing this with real sailboats.

[pokerrick1]

I low tide beached my M once when I was in San Felipe, BC, Mexico - - - and was about 1/2 mile from shore with two anchors in the sand (for when the tide returned) and I had AT LEAST 50 people walk out the 1/2 mile to "see". We stayed on board all night and in the AM we were afloat again. Try that with a keel sailboat!!!

Rick

[kadet]

Just watch other brands of traditional boats being launched and see if strangers stop their cars or workers drop what they are doing to ask go about it the way they do my M26X on the ramp.

Forget about the ramp, hull I have people stop their cars and knock on my front door to ask about the .

No! come to think of it don't forget about the ramp, there they add about 1/2 an hour to the rig time with all their questions

[vkmaynard]

We've had only complements on our boat for four seasons.

As for "sailing" performance, the 26x will actually out perform "real" sailboats without a spinnaker, wing-on-wing down wind. It sails reasonable well on a beam reach (we’ve actually gained on some “real” sailboats owner that did not know how to trim their sails). The 26x is very weak when pointing high into the wind. However, we found last week that the jib severely improves the 26x pointing ability (we were able to get within a guesstimated 25-30 angle). One of our fastest runs (8.5 mph) was in a Nor’easter with only the Genoa on a quartering beam reach. It still feels like sailing to us.

When my family gets board of sailing we simply power up and head to our destination.

We also wakeboard in the local lake with no mast.

Bottom line, the Mac gets us in the water with nearly zero required maintenance.

Highly recommend by our family.

Victor

[LOUIS B HOLUB]

I keep my Mac-X within a Marina slip, and I've had nothing but favorable comments from larger upscale boat owners here. Anyway, it wouldnt matter...I like my Mac-X.
Im glad I discovered the Mac, mainly because of its versatility. (the versatility of this boat is worth checking out)

NO -- its not comparable to a floating clorox bottle...that's an inside Mac owners JOKE.

And..by the way, Pokerrick said it well.

[irayone]

Hey Thanks to all for there comments....Just as I thought....Going shopping after the rains and hope to live abord for the summer around the Channel Islands.