http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smlP6iXnk2s
or this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ2tGhtDwvg
mac or slug -
Dylan
PS I would switch the engine off for the bits where I filmed the birds or the seals or the sunsets or the beautiful wooden boats
fireball
stick with the slug - you know you love her really ...
KTL is about you AND the slug.... not some other vessel ... or some other presenter.
Captain Haddock
*splutter*.... A Mac 26?!!!!
My god no! I had a look around one of these years ago and I consider them to be an affront to the sea. The sea was looking lumpy in that video, why? Because the gods themselves knew how vile a vessel the Mac26 is and wanted to smite if from the face of the planet :)
A sterile, soul less, tupperware petri dish vs the full blown character (and now celebrity) that is the Slug.
No contest... Slug wins in the beauty stakes and in every other area over the Mac 26.
dylanwinter
the slug might appear to have more character as a boat
but that might be just because it is a product of a certain time in yacht design history.
The first flowering of Fibre Glass - a heavy lay for a heavy little boat - like the early westerlies.
A mac is, I put it to you, a classic yacht of its time too.
The fact that so many thousands of them have been produced and are being enjoyed means that many will survive.
In addition, if you can find one that has spent most of its life sitting on a trailer beside some-one house - the old ones can be almost like new.
Its my guess that in 500 years time its the mac that will represent the great age of small plastic yachts.
that aside - my guess is the audience for the series would grow because there are so many mac owners out there.
Mind you - I would hate to give up the tiller - I don't think I would like wheel steering that much.
Dylan
The mac is a floating RV. Lightly constructed so it can be trailered..Your days of refinishing would be over. The mac is arguably the ugliest sailboat on the market.. Jim
on several levels I agree
but there are an awful lot of macs out there – and their forums are busy places
Its my guess that KTL would be more successful – when measured by subscribers or people who buy the DVDs if I was sailing a more ‘popular’ boat
would you quit watching KTL if I started doing the journey in a Mac sponsored 26 – and for every KTL diehard who walked out the digital door…. how many Mac owners would watch
heck I might even get some of the mobo people watching
Right now the KTL demographic is an uberniche
Dylan
I would not quit watching but I have a macgregor. It was our first boat and was bought because of the layout inside and we can put it on the trailer to go to places that we could not get to in a 2 week holiday. Its not what it looks like but whether it does what you it to do. For sailing the rudders go down over 3ft but you can moter in 18 inches
Nope. I would not stop watching if you continue in a Mac. Although I love sailing for me ktl is about the journey not the mode of travel. Jim
Don’t ditch the slug for one of the new Macs, they’re clorox bottles….
However I met some folks who sailed a Mac 26S on Lake Superior, they are what they are and can be quite good ditch crawlers as well. The Macgregor Venture of Newport 23 is one of the prettiest trailer-sailors ever built.
Personally, If I were going to sail a production boat where you are I’d stick with my Catlina 27 (called a Jaguar 27 over on your side). Tons of room, you can single-hand it and it’s built like the proverbial brick shit-house.
I think you are taking the piss!
I agree its the journey, but you stirring and you know it.
I think out of spite I might stop, hopefully you don’t go & do this stupid thing in the next few months cause I’ve just renewed my subscription and, upped my broadband to lots of giga’s so I can download all the films that you going to give us, VERY SOON.
Surely you should be spending time GETTING those birds in Wells, I’m getting impatient so you must be steaming.
Anyway, driving home last night saw crow’rooks? big black birds doing their thing, they are pretty uncordinated compared to starlings and other birds, so was a nice end to the day, I’ve got a bad cold so stop taking the p!
Taking the piss and stirring
– well I will never have £16,000 to throw at a Mac26 – second hand of course – so it is an entirely academic excercise.
if however, Roger macgregor came along to me and offered me one for the rest of the journey – or even for a year with expenses…. well I would be a fool not to take it.
And for every outraged woolly hat that stops subscribing because of the arrival of a brand new sparkling Mac 26, it is my guess that five Mac26 owners would start subscribing. If Roger gave a free set of DVDs to every new mac owner…. well that would be 400 sets…. retty good I reckon
As for the speed of the journey and the posting of the films – well the joruney is the way it is…sadly the weather, the gaps in the work, the income from other jobs are what determine the pace. It would be great if there were enough subscribers and DVD buyers to allow me to go faster and do more….
I am afrad all that bandwidth will have to be used for other stuff
loads of great sailing films on youtube.
The Mac is utilitarian and offers greater creature comforts, but if I recall your question was which was uglier, the ‘slug’ or the Mac, and, of course, the Mac wins, hands down! The Mac has no sheer line and anything without a sheer line is not a boat! And if it’s not a boat, I have no interest in it.
Al Holman
Living in SE Alaska a Mac 26 would spend most if its time on a trailer, there’s no way I would put it in 45 degree water and attempt to sail. That being said I think I would be more than willing to go out in the Slug here. If nothing else its a pretty little sailor. I will admit to being somewhat partial to pretty little boats, I sail a Bristol 35. I enjoy your videos immensely, and don’t really care what you are sailing to make them.
I suppose ugly is as ugly does and whatever floats your boat is what you should sail. My only request is to keep going with your great adventure.
Nitejazz
the slug is proving to be a tough little seaboat that is true
and a mac is so far out of my price range
it was just a little intellectual excercise to see how poeple would react
but to some extent what you sail is not important – as long as you know your limitations and those of your boat
Alaska though – your season must be short but spectacular
I assume you have heating on the Bristol
Dylan
Al Holman,
I know this is a sailing website
but surely there are other things that are of interest to you
sailing books, beer, women, sunsets, dolphins
Dylan
google wanderer 34 second entry click on the anchor symble to convert to english and start dreaming
big bit of real estate to own and maintain
as I have said elsewhere – better to have the boat you can afford now rather than dreaming about one you hope to own in the future
I shall never own anything as big as that
not unless I was o rich that it was my second boat
tubby as the Mirror Offshore is Van De Stat did give it a salty look and really get a lot in just 19′. Certainly better looking than a lot of similar cheap 20’ers that just seem to spend all the time squeezing 5 -6 berth in the hull! (rig on the Mirror is a little dull though it does have a spinnaker!)
The Macgregor which were ‘Ventures’ years ago in the US, changed the name to Mac’s and resold the same boats to a new generation. The Mac’s do give you value for money but are or were lightly rigged and need work to make safer, the hulls were fine actually I can’t really talk about the 26 but I can’t imagine Rodger M. ever changing the way he makes boats.
The Cheap Mac’s (used) do get folks on the water here, which is a good thing, but It can also work against that too because poor sailing small boat do not do anything to keep folks on the water. I often see people that buy a small dinghy that looks cute at the boat show or showroom but as soon as they get on the water and they sail so badly that the owners rarly gets the feel of a well tuned boat (like a race boat) and cannot get the feel for a boat and understand what they can do. They often move on to the next fad and the boat rots in the back of a marina for years….sorry off subject. (worse is when the owner ends up scaring the ‘family’ in this poor sailing little boat and it’s all over).warren
well they certainly introduced a lot of epopel to sailing – as did the Mirror offshore I guess. I have few worries about the seakeeping abailities of the slug – not the Mac either. As for the rig on the slug – unexciting is the word, but I am happy with that too. You don’t hear that much about rig failures on macs and the accidents thjat have happened usually seem to involve people mishandling the water bouyancy thing. As for boats that sail badly….not even usre what that is anymore. I think its a bit like cars – you get used to what you have. I am currently sharing a 120,000 mile old polo with my daughter. When I first get i n the polo it feels terrible – but after ten minutes I have fogotten what I am driving. When I go back the escort, whcih is old but better, I thinkooh nice, power steerings, but within ten minutes I have forgotten what I am driving.
people often offer me sails on their lovely boats – I usuallly make an excuse for not sailing with them, as it will remind me how slow the slug is.
The Slug is a boat built for a purpose – to sail in Britains tidal estuaries and safely take the ground when the tide goes out. As such it does it’s job and provides an enjoyable way of exploring these otherwise difficult to access areas.
The Mac is a compromise between a power boat and a sailing boat which does neither very well.
Can’t agree more
My MO would not take the ground without tipping over to about 30°. At such an angle, life onboard was almost impossible and I had to, reluctantly, sell her.
The slug had extensions on the keels and in mud they settle level anyway. I am currently saving up for a fall-over boat – not sure how I will get on