When I first setting out to buy my current boat (forced to do so
because my family got larger and no longer fit aboard) I discussed the
various offerings available in the commercially-built sailboat world
with my friend Capt. Ray Jason. He asked me what I was looking for in a
sailboat, and among other things I listed “a sauna, and room for a
pony.” (I didn’t mention that I also want to be able to ride a bicycle
around the deck, or hang a hammock on deck while the boat was under way,
but I do.) And then the pony became a running joke between us. When I
complained that, for instance, it was hard to plot a reasonable,
traffic-free coastwise course that would allow me to sleep because there
were always radar contacts bleeping away at me, Ray would helpfully
suggest that I ask the pony to keep watch while I sleep. And so on.
But
now I am happy to report that we have finally succeeded in designing a
sailboat with “a sauna, and room for a pony”—and much else besides. Nor
is it a huge boat: it’s half a foot shorter than my current one. Nor did
I have to sacrifice much to achieve this effect: various tests, in
software simulation and using a physical scale model, have shown that it
will be just as fast and just as stable as my current boat. It will
also be reasonably cheap to build and to maintain.
To achieve these results I followed a certain recipe.
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