Hi Tim, Thanks for the welcome. Now I'm curious - where are you located? Funny you mention a book, writing is one of my other things I love to do - I have a mystery novel written and have shopped it around some, with a sequel partway done, but am rehabbing the first one a bit right now. It's based on my search and rescue dog activities though. As I've been revisiting a lot of my memories of our life moving onto the boat, I have been thinking of writing a book based on those. My dad's propensity for doing things in odd ways, and loving sailing in weather no one else went out in, and just being sort of a crazy guy, made for a lot of adventures, dangerous situations, and tense family dynamics. (Remember how all the whole family moved off of the boat when we got to Alaska, except my dad?) My dad singlehandedly sailed that 50' boat all over Alaska, down to Mexico, over to Hawaii - he had lots of wild adventures after we moved off too. My little brother lived down in Mexico on the boat with my dad for a few years when my brother was eleven - thirteen or so. They rode their motorcycles around the desert, worked for a missionary project, and just adventured around. My brother built his own steel sailboat when he was nineteen, here in Ketchikan. He planned to circumnavigate the arctic with it, so built it with some unique design features. He got distracted with a girlfriend, etc, so sold it, but he's rehabbed and lived on many sailboats since. He just sold his most recent two sailboats down in Port Townsend, WA, and went to Ecuador for a couple of months...lots of stories in our family! So now I can blame my long posts on my novelist tendencies! Danelle ----- Original Message ---- From: Tim Diebert <tim@timtone.com> To: For and about Montgomery Sailboats <montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2008 10:04:32 PM Subject: Re: M_Boats: Intro from SE Alaska Wow. What an interesting backround! Sounds like there could be a book in you..... Welcome to this place. You picked a nice design for your first small boat. Regardless of the work needed, they are fun and quite capable. I am sure there is the odd person around here that can help you with any advice or guidance in the repair department. Including the chap that made your boat. Have fun. Tim Diebert M17 Just a couple of miles south of you on the 49th. -----Original Message----- From: montgomery_boats-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:montgomery_boats-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Danelle Landis Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2008 6:10 PM To: montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com Subject: M_Boats: Intro from SE Alaska Hi, Danelle Landis here, I've been enjoying learning from the archives - and I have a *lot* to learn! I just bought an M17 here in Ketchikan, Alaska that of course, needs a lot of attention. It is pretty sound mostly, but needs what looks to be the typical repairs and rehabs that the older (I think it must be between 1981 and 1987). It's got the notorious rusted/stuck CB, and the boat has been sitting in saltwater, uncovered, in a marina for the last year and a half, probably longer. We need to haul it asap, but it came with no trailer. We'll probably have to buy one and have it barged up from Seattle. The sails are in great condition - even a spinnaker! Poor thing hasn't been really valued highly - she has no name, and I just realized today that the beat up old tiller is actually an old axe handle, among other pending projects. I started sailing with my family when I was about 7, on a Blanchard 26 on Coeur d'Alene lake in ID. My dad totally caught the bug and decided he wanted to retire at age 30, and move onto a sailboat. We did it, on the Islander 30 we had by that time, all five of us - us kids were 4, 10 and 14. We launched the boat at Lewiston, ID and sailed through the locks and dams in the Snake, Columbia rivers, the up the WA coast to Seattle where my parents promptly bought a Cal Cruising 36. It seemed HUGE. Eventually, we bought a 50' custom wierdly-designed aluminum hard-chined gaff-rigged sailboat we lived on for the next five years, and sailed up here to Alaska - our first dream destination. From there, the family all moved off and my dad kept on sailing, living aboard in Mexico, Hawaii, Sitka...for another fifteen years. He and I sailed the aluminum boat (since rehabbed into a regular sloop) from Hawaii to Seattle in 1988. Anyway, I've missed sailing all these years, and when this little M17 became available for only $2,500, I had to snap it up! I've never sailed on such a small boat before, but from what I've read so far, they sound capable of taking hard weather (we have plenty here), but are fun to sail too. The sailing part is second nature to me, the repairs - well, I'll need a lot of advice and help from my husband, who is great at those things, fortunately. I want to do most of it myself though. Having my own sailboat has been a dream of mine since I was a teenager pouring over "Sailpower" on my cozy bunk. My other hobbies - I'm a stay at home mom of three, and I have been a K9 Search and Rescue handler for twelve years. ____________________________________________________________________________ ________ Looking for last minute shopping deals? Find them fast with Yahoo! Search. http://tools.search.yahoo.com/newsearch/category.php?category=shopping _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG. 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