First sail on the new (to me) H 18

Well, I finally had a nice day and warm enough water to get out for a sail with my crew Brian. Setup too a bit longer then I'm used to, but I think we can get a system set up that will make it faster. The wind was light and we had a fantastic time tooling around under full sail and under furled jib. I've got the cheata motor mount and an old Merc 2 and was amazed at the spray it kicked up at times. Naturally, when we were headed back to the dock/ ramp it was dead to windward and we couldn't get the motor started, so we short tacked up the channel and made it under sail. Un rigging was speedy and the trailer was fine--I'd had some doubts which will need to be addressed before dragging it to Texas for the www.texas200.com cruise. I'll have to fugure out ways to pack it. The little 5" ports look to be a major PITA for packing anything in there. rigging something up on deck ahead of the mast looks doable as does stacking a couple drybags on the forward end of the tramp. It's a bit stern heavy with Brian at 190 and myself at 215 on the tramp. We scooted up quite a ways to get the bows down a bit. All the weight from food, water and camping stuff will have to go around the ports or in front of them to balance the boat. That said, it is so fast compared to the Wave my father in law has! I went as fast as the wave ever goes in 30 knots in about 6-10 knots on the 18!

All in all a fun day and I'm happy with my purchase!

Any hints on packing?

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Dan St. Gean
'82 H 18
'96 H Wave

try putting drybags in ports m/t and pack in the hull, you can fit alot in that way.You are right about the weight,the 18 likes weight forward and transoms out of the water.
shawn
82 h18 #8211
div 3

Yeah the 2 horse on the Cheata motor mount puts weight in the worst possible location...but I'm only using it for cruising.

Dan

_________________
Dan St. Gean
'82 H 18
'96 H Wave