Is 5 foot draft very restricting around the east coast?

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NealB

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After several decades away, we moved house back to the east coast last July.....and are loving it.

All those years ago, we always had small boats with bilge, or lifting, keels. We had great fun pottering from the Crouch, exploring the creeks and swatchways (yes, I was brought up on a reading diet of MG, Frank Cowper and Charles Stock).

Since then, we've had a rather embarrasing, but interesting, number of boats, from sailing dinghies up to 33 foot fin and skeg designs (eg Moody 33, Westerly 33, Westerly Discus, Carter 33.....to name just a few).

Our current boat, a 32 foot Comanche catamaran, is in many ways an ideal east coaster...very shallow draft, fantastic cockpit, loads of room, very decent performance off the wind etc.

However, I can once again feel the familiar promiscuous yearnings for yet another change.....and am toying with the idea of going back to gaff rig (I love: the look, all the bits of string to play with and it's language).

I've seen a long keeled old gaffer that I rather fancy, but she's got a draft of 5 feet.

What does the esteemed panel of east coasters think.....would we be severely restricted in our local explorations?

Thanks in advance for your wise thoughts!
 
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not severely restricted - we draw 2m (6' 6") and go most places, you just have to time your tides accurately if you're going eg to the Tidemill or Heybridge basin etc.
 
Strangely enough we've just bought a Comanche. At present she's down on Hayling Island, but we plan to bring her round to keep on the north kent coast in April. Looking forward to exploring the kent, essex & maybe suffolk rivers over the summer. It would be great to meet another Comanche owner!
 
Agree with Marmalade.... we're 6' 5" and can't say we feel particularly restricted... we can go pretty much where we want with the exception of getting rigth up a few rivers to where they dry out.... but then we balance that against never worrying when it kicks up rough in the middle of the north sea!

So much so, that we are half thinking about a new boat... and its slightly deeper draught than our current one.
 
julian295 said:
Strangely enough we've just bought a Comanche. At present she's down on Hayling Island, but we plan to bring her round to keep on the north kent coast in April. Looking forward to exploring the kent, essex & maybe suffolk rivers over the summer. It would be great to meet another Comanche owner!
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Very fine boats, the Comanche!

Ours is still on the Tamar, as last year's work commitments combined with the house move, conspired against us bringing her round last year. We hope to bring her to her new home (Burnham), this spring.

We've had her for about 5 years now, and have cruised the south coast from London to Isles of Scilly. We really do make use of her shallow draft and ease of drying out....eg in Porth Cressa, we just motored slowly into the head of the bay till we touched a nice, clear, sandy bottom, then I jumped overboard to dig the anchor in. A few hours later the whole crew could walk to/ from The Turk's Head.

So we're not at all sure about whether changing is the logical choice.......but I really do love the aesthetics of gaff rig.
 
Ours is no. 34; Two Bears. Which is yours? Maybe we'll see you around in the summer; the Crouch is definitely on our list of places to visit.
 
julian295 said:
Ours is no. 34; Two Bears. Which is yours? Maybe we'll see you around in the summer; the Crouch is definitely on our list of places to visit.
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I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that I can't remember, offhand, which number she is! All the boat paperwork is down in Devon.

We bought her in Amsterdam, from her very first owner. Until we took her to Devon, she had never left the Ijsselmeer (she was delivered there straight from Brightlingsea).

She was known as 'Comanche 32' (no idea of how they thought that one up!). We renamed her 'Aileen', after Joscelyn's late Mum.

I'll let you know when we're bringing her round.
 
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I would say a shallow draft on the East Coast does allow you to be a bit 'lazier' with your tidal calculations and, especially with bilge keels, if you get it wrong, you sit on the mud and have a cup of tea whilst you wait for the tide to lift you off and crawling up the top of the Colne etc is easier with the shallow draft.

However, normally I leave a fairly healthy amount of water under my bottom so you shouldn't have any major problems with a 5ft draft.
 
Fire99 said:
I would say a shallow draft on the East Coast does allow you to be a bit 'lazier' with your tidal calculations and, especially with bilge keels, if you get it wrong, you sit on the mud and have a cup of tea whilst you wait for the tide to lift you off and crawling up the top of the Colne etc is easier with the shallow draft.

However, normally I leave a fairly healthy amount of water under my bottom so you shouldn't have any major problems with a 5ft draft.
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I'm not sure that it's laziness, so much as having more flexibility in terms of tidal windows for getting in and out places, or exploring the upper reaches of creeks and staying there at low tide.

So no need to hang around outside for so long whilst waiting for the tide to rise, or being able to leave later, or not worrying about whether you'll get neaped in places like Tollesbury.

As you can tell.....I'm still in at least three or four minds!
 
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NealB said:
After several decades away, we moved house back to the east coast last July.....and are loving it.

I've seen a long keeled old gaffer that I rather fancy, but she's got a draft of 5 feet.

What does the esteemed panel of east coasters think.....would we be severely restricted in our local explorations?

Thanks in advance for your wise thoughts!
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A whole five feet! Just the ticket for the east coast - it's what we all do: you put the tiller down and plough over the shingle banks, listen to the sigh of the keel as you slice through the mud. And what more could you do with 4 or 3 feet draught? Just slip up a few more mud strewn backwaters..?

No, the truth is we love to play up the lack of water on the east coast - it's the best defence against the hordes from W of Dover. So buy with confidence but please keep stumm...

PWG
1.95m draught and loving it!
 
PeterGibbs said:
A whole five feet! Just the ticket for the east coast - it's what we all do: you put the tiller down and plough over the shingle banks, listen to the sigh of the keel as you slice through the mud. And what more could you do with 4 or 3 feet draught? Just slip up a few more mud strewn backwaters..?

No, the truth is we love to play up the lack of water on the east coast - it's the best defence against the hordes from W of Dover. So buy with confidence but please keep stumm...

PWG
1.95m draught and loving it!
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You're all as mad as each other (meant in the nicest possible way, of course!!).
 
Morgana said:
Agree with Marmalade.... we're 6' 5" and can't say we feel particularly restricted... we can go pretty much where we want with the exception of getting rigth up a few rivers to where they dry out.... but then we balance that against never worrying when it kicks up rough in the middle of the north sea!

So much so, that we are half thinking about a new boat... and its slightly deeper draught than our current one.
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Just my £0.02

Guapa draws 7' - 2.1m
Whilst we're not physically restriced from going some places, we are restricted in another way: time.

Sure, you can get (almost) everywhere when you get your tidal calcs right, but time can be an issue.
There can be times when you're faced with two options: either get up at silly o'clock in the morning or wait till late afternoon for the tide.
Not fun, even less so when you live quite some distance away.

So, we stick to places where I know we'll always be afloat - even at LWS.

A self-imposed restriction.
 
sailorman said:
do they sail well in a North Sea Chop then :rolleyes:
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Off the wind........most definitely. We'll leave most monomarans absolutely standing (eg when we took her from the Thames to Devon, we had over thirteen knots on the gps reaching round North Foreland).

On the wind is, it is true, a different story. The Comanche is a 1970's design, with a long, low aspect ratio keel on each hull, and no centreplates. She will get to windward, but not in the same, glorious style as, say, my mate's She 31b.

Having said that, we'll probably find a gaff cutter won't be in the same league as a She, either.

If I want to do something so ungentlemanly.....I can always blast to windward in my Laser, Solo or Graduate!
 
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NealB said:
Off the wind........most definitely. We'll leave most monomarans absolutely standing (eg when we took her from the Thames to Devon, we had over thirteen knots on the gps reaching round North Foreland).

On the wind is, it is true, a different story. The Comanche is a 1970's design, with a long, low aspect ratio keel on each hull, and no centreplates. She will get to windward, but not in the same, glorious style as, say, my mate's She 31b.

Having said that, we'll probably find a gaff cutter won't be in the same league as a She, either.

If I want to do something so ungentlemanly.....I can always blast to windward in my Laser, Solo or Graduate!
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Off the wind........most definitely. We'll leave most monomarans absolutely standing (eg when we took her from the Thames to Devon, we had over thirteen knots on the gps reaching round North Foreland).

in those conditions with the tide + 20 kts of wind we could be in the high 9s
 
We're looking at a boat with 5'4" draft this weekend. It's 2' 8" foot more than we've been used to which is about an hour and a half of tide. Doesn't sound too much but I bet it feels a lot in practice.
 
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