S/V Farraige

Farraige is a 1992 Catalina 42, Mk1. We’ve owned Farraige since 2011.

Some may wonder what Farriage is, as did we, and we’ve come to learn it is Old English or Irish for sea, billow or swell. Despite not being superstitious, we chose not to tempt fate and rename her. It was also an expense seemingly unnecessary between Coast Guard fees related to a documented vessel, paint removal and professionally repainting her new name.

We didn’t purposely set out to buy a Catalina 42 after deciding to sell Terrapin, our Ranger 33. However, after viewing a handful of boats in the 40 foot range, we were attracted to the value. There has been quite a bit of debate regarding the build quality of Catalina, a production sailboat. For sure, it’s no Pacific Seacraft. However, in over 9 years of ownership, I have no complaints. The sailing conditions of San Francisco Bay can be quite challenging with winds regularly exceeding 30 kts during the summer months across the “slot”. Outside the bay, we’ve felt secure in the same winds in 10 foot seas.

As an electrical engineer of almost 30 years, I’m well aware that past performance does not gaurantee future performance especially with such a small dataset. However, given that I looked at two Catalina 42’s around the same time and each had a history of some fairly hard-core sailing, I don’t have anxiety over it. One Catalina 42 had just returned from a long-term world-wide tour with a family of 4 and Farraige, had made at least one trip to Hawaii and back. I know of another Baym area Catalina 42 that has done the Pacific Cup (Tesa) at least one and is also regularly sailed in the OYRA circuit.

Of course, this is not to say there aren’t things I’ve love to change, or at least, wish were different. I’ll be addressing what I can over the next handful of months in preparation for a 3 year (or more) counter-clockwise navigation of the United States, making passage through the Panama Canal. This site will be capturing the work that I have done as well as be the diary of my future travels.