Minnesota San Juan

[willoutlaw]

Howdy, been lurking since the summer and since it's cold up here in the Northland naturally I'm thinking about boats.

Anyhow, I sailed a little bit as a kid then took a brief 30-something-year hiatus before getting back into it. I stumbled on an open slot in an ASA class nearby, had a blast and figured "what the heck, I'll buy a boat."

A San Juan was high on my list because they just look right and, more importantly, are light enough (barely) that I could pull one with my Honda Element.

As luck would have it, a guy a few miles away was selling his cheap and my wife was out of town so I drove down and bought it before I had a chance to change my mind.

Joisey Girl (named in honor of my extremely forgiving wife's home state) is a '74, I forget the serial number but she appears to be about as basic as they come. No pulpit, no lifelines, no electric, no real interior stuff other than a few cushions. Just the way I like it, honestly, less weight and less to fuss over. Somewhere along the line someone replaced the original winch with a crank-down version, which is a nice addition and other than that I don't think she's been touched.

It took some time to get it somewhat sorted out, including some repairs to stop the poor thing from falling completely apart, replacing the clothesline that was being used for the mainsheet, stuff like that.... but eventually I got her to the point that I had no choice but to stick her in the water and see what happened.

I grabbed one of my airline buddies to lend a hand, eventually figured out how to get the mast up and rigged and backed her into Lake Saint Croix where she promptly didn't sink.

I figured that was a good omen, so after a quick repair to make her rudder actually functional we eventually got the motor started and managed to get off of the dock without hitting anything.

After motoring out in the channel and getting my bearings I figured, "what the hell, no guts no glory" handed to the tiller to Jim and raised the mainsail.

Full of over confidence we shut down the motor and sailed on just the main for a few minutes.

Since that seemed to be working out and the winds were light I decided to hoist the jib.

Since Jim knows exactly nothing about sailboats and I know next to nothing I had my hands full trying to drive the boat, explain to Jim what I thought was happening, get the sails trimmed out reasonably well and keep from hitting anything important.

Luckily it's a big-ish lake so there's plenty of room for error, which came in handy.

I managed to talk Jim through a tack just in time to miss the far (now near) shore and from then on it was a piece of cake.

I could see within a few minutes why San Juan 21s have such a devoted following, they really are lovely to sail.

We just sailed up river for a couple of hours, tacking every 10 minutes or so and were making decent progress against the current.

Then, the winds died down and we'd tack from one side of the lake to the other, about a mile, and measure our upstream progress in yards.

We worked our way back to the Marina, slowly and finally gave up, dropped the jib, got the motor started, dropped the main and motored in.

I managed to not hit anything on the way in, got her to the dock then back on the trailer.

The Element pulled her up the ramp no problem and we took down the mast, got all the various lines and cables secured and headed home.

The Element pulled it fine, but I wouldn't want to do a whole bunch of towing with it. The boat and trailer are right at the rated towing capacity, maybe a hundred pounds over, and it never struggled, but you know it's back there. She'll be in a slip on Lake Pepin this season, which will be a heck of a lot more convenient. I'd like to take her up to the Apostle Islands for a bit this summer once I get some more time under my belt as well.

I've been checking out a bunch of the posts on this forum and they've been really useful, so thanks to all. I've picked up some great tips and ideas.

She's a fun little boat and I"m looking forward to sailing the heck out of here this summer.

Cheers!

Will

[Quixotic Juan]

Congratulations! That's a great looking boat.

I'm a neophyte sailor as well but my latest excursion didn't go nearly as well as yours.

Good job and welcome.

KM

[kuriti]

Congrats, sounds like a perfect day! I tow mine with a 4-cylinder Toyota Highlander rated at 2000 lbs. I leave mine at the marina on the trailer with the mast up and put her in when needed. We go to the coast a few times per year, about 3.5 hours. Wouldn't want to do that regularly, but people tend to buy cars for 10% of their actual use. I needed something fuel efficient that could barely tow the boat from time to time.

[cklamp]

Welcome.

You could also look into trailer brakes to help you out as well since braking with a lightweight vehicle, and a short wheelbase car can be scary. I'd also change your car's engine oil more often, and get something that would you monitor the transmission temperature if you're doing anything more than a couple of miles.

Later
C

[kuriti]

I should have mentioned I added an aftermarket generic transmission cooler. My car didn't come with the towing package. I investigated what that meant and the only difference from stock was a transmission cooler, a larger alternator and of course the hitch assembly. Not sure what additional electrical load a trailer adds other than LED lights, so I am unconcerned about the alternator. I guess I could turn down the stereo while braking if I was worried.

[willoutlaw]

Thanks! She looks better from afar than up close, but don't we all.

I'll have to check if the mighty E has a transmission cooler. The trans is what I'm most worried about, but luckily it's pretty flat around these parts and I just take my time when I'm hauling Joisey Girl around.

She'll be in a slip all summer (the marina just cashed my check. Hilarious how it costs more to dock the boat for a season than it cost for the boat) so there won't be a lot of pulling being done this year anyway.

The first thing I did when I got her (other than fix the goose neck that was pulling out of the boom, give her a good wash, replace the department store rope with proper lines and a few dozen other things) was add a jib downhaul. Makes stepping the mast solo a relatively simple job and it nice to know that the jib will come down NOW if need be without having to go forward.

She takes a little bit of water (less than a gallon after a couple of trips out on he lake) in what passes for the bilge. Her keel gasket is in atrocious shape and I'm guessing it was replaced many moons ago with the wrong screws so I'll be ordering up a new gasket set and screws this spring and get busy with some epoxy while I"m down there. I am not looking forward to that job. I don't even want to think about inspecting the keel pivot bolt, so I won't.

Beyond that, she needs a keel lockbolt, which was MIA, and the cover for the keel is just sitting there loose so I need to sort that and might as well put a window in it while I'm at it. Oh, and I need to install backing plates for the motor mount, which is currently held in place by six different-sized bolts and a about three washers. The standing rigging could probably use some love too and one of the spreaders is a little wonky. Oh, and I'd like to wire up a set of lights just in case I decide to stay out after dark. And a stereo would be nice. It came with a heavy 7 horse, which was way too much motor and a pain the back, literally, to haul around so I traded it for a little 4-horse that I've decided I'm not in love with either so the search is on for a used 3.5, although I'm fighting the urge to just buy a new one, which would roughly double my investment in the the entire boat and trailer.

Unfortunately, my personality won't let me to leave well enough alone and just sail the heck out of her as is so it looks like a long road of small fixes and as many improvements as I can stand. Typical boat owner than.

[kuriti]

Yup, sounds about right. You own a boat now.