6. Kestrel (1997)

The first boat I bought in New Zealand was a 19 ft. trailer yacht, a Kestrel. I drove to Raglan to see the boat. The owner had the sails all rigged up waiting for me to inspect the boat. I walked around the boat twice and informed him that I would buy it for 2.8K if he would throw in the 2hp Yamaha! All I was interested in, at the time was whether the hull was sound and water tight. I did not even go inside the cabin to check it out!

I could see where everything went because it has a simple rig-up. The sails looked like they were in reasonable conditions. Perhaps I should have asked for a test drive! The launching and recovery can be done easily by one man. The water in New Zealand is too cold for me to go sailing in Laser dinghies and doing capsize drills. So I simply decided to buy a larger boat that does not capsize! Although it was bigger, it was much slower than the little dinghies which I was used to sailing. However, it was a more relaxed type of sailing: cruising. 

I went sailing first at Huntly lake, Ngaroto, Rotorua and Rotoiti. Mostly at Ngaroto, my club near Te Awamutu. After two years learning to launch, recover and sail this larger boat, I finally decided to sell it and upgrade to a 22 footer, a Noelex which is slightly larger but faster! This new boat cost me 5.5K and is my most expensive boat so far. At present I have no plans to get a bigger boat. A 50 footer should be able to take me to Fiji or the Gold Coast. It is good to have dreams!