Acrux
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The Acrux is a Norman Cross 42 MK II trimaran sailboat, modified
with a sugar scoup (in 2004), which lengthened it to a 48'
boat.
Acrux is a star in the
Southern Cross. This is the origional name of the boat, as far
as I know.
I first saw the Acrux in the winter of 1988. I looked it over
and decided that was the boat I wanted. So I kept an eye on
it. The previous owner had not been taking very good care of
it, and during the spring of 1989 he didn't pay the guy who was
shoveling snow off it, and as a result a heavy snow pushed it
beneath the water. I saw this when I was in Valdez caring for
the Red Rover. A couple
years later, in October 1991, I noticed an impound sign on the boat;
the harbor master was trying to collect on unpaid bills. So I
got the owner's name from the harbor master and called him to make
an offer. I told him I'd seen the sign, and would give him
$30,000 for the boat. He refused, saying he was going to pay
his harbor bill. Two months later when I was in Valdez again
the sign was still on the boat, so I called him again and offered
him $12,500. He refused, still insisting he would pay his
bill. The next month I called again and offered him
$8,000. He still insisted he was going to pay the harbor
bill. By February time was essentially out, so I called him
and offered him $5,000. He said he owed someone else $5,000 on
the boat, I replied it didn't matter because there wasn't a lien on
the boat but he insisted the other guy had to be paid. So I
got the lienholder's name and offered him a note for $5,000 or a
check for $1,500. He said 'send me a check'. I called
the owner back and he was still really reluctant to sell, but after
talking with him for a half hour I managed to find a way to make it
work: give him a buy-back option. So he agreed to sell me the
boat for $5,000 (less the $1,500 I sent the lienholder). Of
course I had to pay the harbor fees too, so by the time I had
everything all cleared up I had nearly $7,500 into the boat.
The history on the boat is all hearsay. But I believe it was
built in Texas in 1978. It was bought (owned?) by someone who
had worked on the pipeline (the lienholder), who sailed it down
through the Panama Canal and then to Alaska (by way of
Hawaii?). Then it was sold, I think to the guy I bought it
from.
It was old and in very poor shape when I bought it in the spring of
1992. I warned the city of Valdez that I wasn't going to have
the money to fix it up for 10-12 years, and they assured me that it
wouldn't be any trouble--I think they were so pleased to finally
have someone who would take care of it they didn't care!! I
ordered a new slip for it, one on the end of a dock where it wasn't
occupying 2 slips. They were very helpful and soon I had it
moved and could begin cleaning it up.
The Acrux had never been properly cleaned after being below the
water (which I was informed had happened twice). So I cleaned
it out, removed a bunch of the old wiring (which was bad), removed
the old stove and in general worked it over. It didn't have a
motor, so for the first summer I used a rickety little dingy to pull
it in and out of the harbor with. This photo is of my first sailing
trip, in May 1992 (just a little over a month after I got the
boat). There was almost no wind so I left the boat sailing
herself, took the dingy out and snapped some photos of it.
This remains one of the best photos I have of the Acrux!
I used the Acrux extensively in Prince William Sound in the 1990's,
keeping intermittent logs. In 2003 I sailed the boat to
Seattle
and PMC totally rebuilt it, converting it into an essentually new
boat. While doing the rebuild I also added a sugar
scoup, which added 6 feet onto the length of the boat. This
makes it easy to board from a dingy, and it also
improves the shape of the hull, making the boat faster.
My sailing main page.
Old logbooks from the 1990's.
In 2003 I sailed
the Acrux to Seattle to have the proposed
rebuild project made into reality.
Photo of the "new" boat.
In May, 2004 we took the Acrux out for a week long shakedown cruise to test all the changes,
putting
240 nautical (276 statute) miles on the boat.
In June (2004) we took possession of the Acrux from PMC and headed
north with the boat. When we
got to Seward we turned south, and (with a stop in Kodiak) headed
for Hawaii. We sailed a total of
5,105 statute miles over the summer. Our logbooks:
- To Ketchikan:
625 nautical miles (720 statute--normal--miles)
- To Sitka:
405
nautical miles (466 statute--normal--miles)
- To Seward:
726 nautical miles (835 statute--normal--miles)
- To Hawaii:
2,682 nautical miles (3,084 statute--normal--miles)
Between September and March we had some boat neighbors help keep and
eye on the Acrux for us. We'd call them occasionally to check,
and they always had a good report for us.
On March 1st, 2005 we flew back to Hawaii to do some more sailing.
We found everything in good shape, just as reported. Our log
for the rest of the summer is in 2 parts:
The current copyright laws protect
this page, even though not specifically copyrighted.
However if you want to use portions
of it feel free to do so, though I would appreciate it if you
would acknowledge my authorship.
Reviewed summer 2007. Modest
rewrite spring 2010
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