Cabo Rico 38: One Man's Boat

Many American cruising yachtsmen believe the Cabo Rico 38 is the finest moderately-sized cruising yacht that acclaimed Scotlan-born (edited 31-1-2013) yacht designer William Crealock penned during his long career mainly in the US.

Large enough to take two couples comfortably on a long cruise and small enough to be single-handed by an experienced skipper, the yacht also has one of the prettiest profiles around. The classic clipper bow, low topsides and traditional stern attract admiring looks whenever a Cabo Rico drops anchor.

At any given time, dozens of the yachts can be found pottering around the Bahamas and the Caribbean and up and down the US East Coast with relaxed owners aboard.

Tasmanian-based marine surveyor Alan Gluyas, 57, fell in love with the design when he first saw photographs in a cruising magazine in the early 1980s and the appeal never left him. So, a couple of years ago when he decided it was time to buy a yacht that would take him into his retirement years, Gluyas immediately started looking for a Cabo Rico 38. Then based in Perth, he couldn't find a model locally, so he turned his sights on America.

After searching the web and talking to dozens of American yacht brokers, he came up with a short list of three yachts -- and flew off to America to give them a very thorough going over. Being a marine surveyor allowed him to make critical judgements that would be beyond the ken of most yachtsmen.

Gluyas’ search ended in Deltaville, Virginia, with Herb Davis’ much-loved Brite Star. Davis had owned the yacht for 19 years but it looked almost new. Like many US yachtsmen, Davis sailed only in the five northern summer months. For seven months every year, Brite Star was hauled from the water, placed in her cradle and covered for the winter.

"There is no doubt that lifting a fibreglass yacht onto the hard for more than half of every year, and allowing it to dry out completely, has a very beneficial effect," Gluyas told BoatPoint.

"It was a time when the Aussie dollar was buying only about 85 cents, so I could have saved about 30 per cent on the price if I had known the dollar was going to soar over parity with the greenback. But the condition was remarkable. There was a manual bronze anchor winch on the bow and I’ll swear it had never seen a chain in 20 years. Herb had his own 100 metre dock where he moored the boat in summer and he just sailed to docks in other towns in Chesapeake Bay."

When the deal was done, Herb came up with a bonus -- a full set of cruising sails that were virtually unused and two full sets of fitted winter covers.

Gluyas had a Melbourne yacht importer ship his new baby, as below-deck cargo, to Perth because they had such expertise in the transfer of boats from the US to Australia that they could do a better job, and at a cheaper price, than he could alone.

"I only made one mistake," Gluyas says, "I shipped the yacht home as soon as I bought it. I should have spent a couple of months cruising the US East Coast before bringing the boat back.

"That’s actually the reason I’m selling Brite Star now. My wife has decided she doesn’t like long ocean passages, so we are going back to America, buying another yacht, and doing three months of coastal cruising and following the Intercoastal Waterway."

Gluyas says the landed price for Brite Star when she was back in the water in Fremantle was $230,000. He then spent a further $35,000 replacing all the standing and running rigging and replacing the gas stove and installing new gas sniffers.

A self-admitted perfectionist, he also installed an electric anchor winch, HF radio and bought a new dinghy.

A couple of years ago he moved from Perth to Tasmania and, over 12 months ago, sailed Brite Star across the Bight to its present home near Hobart. He says he is willing to sail the yacht to any port on the East Coast for a new owner.