DaySailer.org Forum

Hey Day Sailors! It’s been a long time since I have checked in, but I am heading out today on my fourth annual weeklong Maine island cruise, and thought folks might want to hear about it and ruminate on the ups and downs of the Daysailer as a camp cruising boat! I have been sailing my O’Day DS1 # 2077 for a few years now, mostly on 2 to 10 day voyages. She’s pretty well rigged up as far as I’m concerned for cruising, sleeping, living, eating aboard, rigged to handle almost any sort of weather, and as you all know, a joy to sail!
I left Blue Hill harbor today around noon under light and fluky southerly winds. The route out to the islands is south so there was a lot of tacking back-and-forth. OK by me, as it’s my first sail of the season and it was a good chance to make sure everything was working smoothly on the boat, and in my head. So far so good, I made it about 12nm and anchored for the night off of the southeast end of Long Island. Predicted thunderstorms petered out before they hit us and hopefully this light northerly breeze now will keep the mosquitoes off as the sun sets!

Funny story, as I was leaving the mouth of blue Hill harbor, got talking to a couple of folks in their moored sailboat cleaning and prepping for a race tomorrow. “Look out ahead!“ They said. “Rocks! How much do you draw?“
“Oh she’s got a centerboard.“ I said. “No worries!“
I drifted out of talking distance and they went about their business. I sat back to enjoy the view. A few minutes later, all of a sudden the rocks appeared below and the centerboard was grinding, and the rudder kicked up! I almost thought I was gonna have to jump out and push her off the rocks!
Lesson learned, don’t get overconfident just because you have the draft of a canoe! Luckily the folks I was talking to were distracted and didn’t hear the grinding!
Here’s a couple of pictures from today:

Nice. What's in the yellow bags? Flotation or gear?

Perfect, just the sort of thing want to do.

I would just like to appreciate how just about everybody that you run into when you’re out in your Daysailer recognizes your boat and has a story about one… In the last 24 hours I’ve had Daysailer conversations with at least three different people in my travels The dock boy whose family had one growing up, the guy sitting on a dock who’s mooring I borrowed while I was setting up to leave Bucks Harbor, a fellow passing by in a Whaler who remarked, “I never knew you could row a Daysailer!“ I replied, “you can row anything if you got the right oars!” And he went on to mutter something about milking a bull just cause it’s got nipples…
Anyhow, no wonder about the widespread fame of the Daysailer. Over the last 48 hours, she has handled all sorts of conditions with ease and confidence and I wish I could truthfully say that I slept in comfort! But I actually did sleep OK, and was not much bothered by mosquitoes, thanks to my Cuddy screen, which only requires knocking off the last few that sneak in before the screen I’d set up.
Speaking of set up, here’s a picture of my cuddy top with control lines from left to right:


Jib downhaul
Jib halyard
Topping lift
Main Halyard

That’s it, above I think you can see the 8:1 boom vang, simple gooseneck downhaul to a cleat, and the mast cleat on the port side is a continuous flag halyard. I don’t run a Spinnaker, Cunningham, Barber haulers, anything else. Just seems like too many more lines and complication for laid-back cruising…


The yellow things are flotation port and starboard and towards the middle is a big yellow dry bag full of gear…

Thanks for the updates! Making me impatient for my own fall cruise!

What's your setup for sleeping aboard? Sounds like you're in the cuddy somehow?