Prospective new owner/member signing on!

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Valkyrie

New member
Hi everyone!

My name is Nick Rukavina and my wife, Marcia and I are planning on buying a 22 Cruiser at the Baltimore Boat Show in two weeks. We just sold our sailboat (Jeanneau Tonic 23) a few months back and are looking forward to getting our C Dory.

I first encountered the C Dory 22 about ten years ago when I was the Midwest editor for Boating World magazine. I wrote the article titled Cruiser with Character that is on the C Dory website. I had a ball running it on Lake Superior and it's been on my mind ever since.

Although my 100 ton license is in power, sailing has predominated my life for years. I was project editor/ sales manager for a magazine I helped get off the ground in the 80's, called Great Lakes Sailor. After selling that I singlehanded my Jeanneau from Lake Erie to the Keys, Bahamas and back in two years. We're looking forward to reprising parts of that journey in our C Dory, named not yet decided.

We live in Norton, OH, outside of Akron and we'll use it on Lake Erie, the Erie Canal, off South Carolina with my in-laws and in the Keys in the winter. After sailing for years, an easily-launched and rigged boat is very welcome, indeed.

I'm retiring from the teaching field after thirty years this June, but my wife, who is a specialty vet, will continue to work for a while longer, but with much longer vacations in the next few years.

Your forums have been a great help to us so far in deciding on options (I think we're just about getting them all!), but rest assured that we'll be back for more information.

Best regards,

Nick and Marcia Rukavina
 
Enjoy! These things are almost addicting. Put the plug in, drop 'em, and go. It's hard for me to think of the midwest as a boating center. I went to school in Indiana, but all I learned in 4 years was that the midwest was a wide place to hitchhike across in order to get to my girlfriend in New York. Such is youth.
 
welcome to the club , group, cult ,what ever we are calling it this week. I have read your article and sure wish that more of them were written about are wonderful c-dorys. I just wrote a letter to go -boating magazine last week about not including any of the c-dorys in their buyers guide. they can not use the excuse that c-dory does not build enough boats because they did include the skaget orca, which is built by c-dory. any way welcome aboard.
 
Bearth:

Re the Midwest as a boating center: when we did our homework before starting a sailing mag for the Great lakes states, we discovered that 37% of the boats in this country are registered in the Great Lakes states.

The first time I went to the Brainered, MN area on a story, there were so many cars towing boats that I was just about convinced that if I went to a car dealership, every vehicle would be equipped with a boat and trailer!

Nick
 
Valkyrie,
Sure will be nice to see another 22' Cruiser here in the Buckeye State. I'll give you a few words of warning about a C-Dory in Ohio, though, be ready to talk to a lot of people. Since they're seldom seen around here, most people want to talk to you about them and have a bunch of questions for you about the boat. I bet we talk to at least 6 different people every time we take the Cruiser anywhere. We've talked to people at gas stations, launch ramps, restaurants, you name it, they come up and talk to you about them. Almost every person is totally intrigued and interested in learning more. But, as you've experienced before, they're a great boat to go out on Lake Erie with. I'm planning a trip on the Erie Canal with the Cruiser for the fall of 2006. My wife and I spent our honeymoon on one of the Canal Cruisers back in 1997 and are very anxious to use our own boat this time around.
 
We're about 15 miles north of you, west a bit at 77 and 82. A mini 16 Cruiser, but a C-Dory nonetheless. I've yet to see another C-Dory period, so am looking forward to seeing one (finally!).

I trailer over to West Branch for stuff like propeller testing and the like. Easy in and out and flat water so I can get some work done. Launch in Cleveland normally at Edgewater (at the public ramp). Still maintain a membership at EYC but don't need the dockage with the C-Dory.

A great change from our much larger cruising sailboat. We've been on several inland lakes in addition to Lake Erie. Been on the Ohio River and the Muskingham (thru the locks). Longest run on The Lake is to Fairport Harbor to eat dinner at Brennans Fish House -- becoming an annual trip. This was a 6, sometimes 7 hour sail. Well under 2 hours if the lake is pretty calm.

-- Chuck
 
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