PDQ 34 catmaran
"Bob/Myrna Siegel" asked on 30 Jul.:
Anyone with experience trawlering in this vessel? Experience? Livability
aboard? Bob Siegel 36'MT sundeck "Shalom" Annapolis
"Jeffrey Petty" mentioned on 1 Aug. regarding the PDQ power catamaran:
I would be interested too. Any input on West Coast use?
Howdy
I've just recovered from an acute case of laptopitis, replacement
flatscreen necrosis (and probably the boogey-woogey blues too) that had
me off line for nearly a week. Sorry about the late reply.
The Admiral and I 'mess about' in our PDQ 34 "Stray Cat" (hull #12)
which is based here in Portland, Oregon. We picked our boat up in
August '02 in Whitby Ontario, Canada-eh?, and as our first ever boat
trip crossed Lake Ontario, the Welland Canal, Lake Erie from Buffalo
(customs) to the Detroit River, up Lake Huron and down Lake Michigan to
the Palmer Johnson yards in Sturgeon Bay Wisconsin. PJ had the lift
capacity for our nearly seventeen foot beam. An 'interesting' truck
trip to Portland completed the western odyssey. We now cruise up and
down the Willamette and Columbia rivers, over the notorious Columbia
bar, up and around the Washington coast, up and down the Straits of Juan
de Fuca, all around Puget Sound, and are extending well into Canadian
waters next summer.
We were the first PDQ on the West Coast, followed in January '04 by a
Dockwise delivery who had taken their boat with the factory cruise you
read about in Passagemaker to Annapolis, thence down the ICW to Ft.
Lauderdale and loaded it there onto the Dockwise ship. The owners
reported that when they picked their boat up in Vancouver, BC the
Dockwise captain asked why they didn't come along on the delivery! I'm
told that the captains have that discretion. That boat is home ported
on Orcas Island (the San Juans), and if you go to the PDQ website you
can check out their wonderful Alaska and Inland Passage trips.
Experience trawlering? Go to the PDQ website for accounts of numerous
trawler style jaunts (and all the sales stuff you could ever ask for):
Very seaworthy, no body roll at all, just lifting hulls with big beam
waves. Very slender hulls mean it can hobby horse pitch sometimes, but
that's pretty easy to avoid. Slender hulls also account for the nice
turn of speed -- cruises anywhere up to WOT at over 19 kts. (I have seen
22 kts. with flat water, tail wind and exceptionally low weight). Fuel
economy is generally 4 gal/hr at 17 kts. -- give or take for nasty
weather and waves, etc..
Livability aboard? Sure, why not. More room than most monohulls in the
low to mid 40 foot range. Living space is wonderfully bright and open,
has virtually 360* visibility, is 'socially compact' (meaning you can
carry on a comfortable conversation from anywhere in the galley,
saloon/dinette area, the Admiral's lounge, lower helm station and the
dressing/computer station area in the stbd hull (opposite the galley) --
eye contact most of those places. Two queen bed staterooms aft in each
hull, with engines below each bunk. Nice shower and head forward of
that stbd dressing area. Deep, almost standup 'lazarette' like holds
below nice hatches forward in each peak, and the smaller inboard hatches
on the foredeck reveal nice bucket high storage over genset fuel or
water tanks. Not surprisingly, real liveaboards will want some things
the factory doesn't fit on every boat. I know of one liveaboard couple
in Florida, easily found on the PDQ website.
Would I recommend these boats to anyone prepared to live aboard a
similar sized boat? Yes, enthusiastically. Would I suggest that just
anybody could live aboard this, or any other similar boat, of course not.
I am crazy wild in love with our boat, and think it is the finest
possible choice in every conceivable way, but then that's as it should
be for one's own boat. Feel free to contact me privately by email, or
in this forum if you like, and I will rattle on as long as you like.
Free tours and boat rides are cheerfully upgraded to first class if you
care to bring a nice bottle of Pinot Noir.....
Admiral Candy and Captain Gary
aboard PDQ 34 Powercat "Stray Cat" currently lying alongside our 80 foot
sidewheel paddleboat/future retirement home in Multnomah Channel,
Portland, Oregon
Captain Gary:
What have been your experiences in obtaining long term or transient docking
space for your wide beamed cat?
David