BB marine
Well-known member
- Joined
- Feb 1, 2016
- Messages
- 2,916
- Fluid Motion Model
- C-26
- Non-Fluid Motion Model
- Grady White 208
- Vessel Name
- PORT-A-GEE
My Wife and I finally finished a Bucketlist item. In 2015 my search for a small comfortable Loop boat started. We narrowed our search down to a Ranger Tug or Cutwater. We found a good deal on a discontinued model 2016 C26 and purchased it. We started segment Looping as we were both still working.The Cutwater was the perfect boat for this style Looping. I did make many modifications that I considered upgrades to the boat adding to our comfort. We continued taking little bites at looping for the next few years, Lake Michigan to Grand Rivers Kentucky, the head waters Tennessee River to Ohio River, Georgian Bay and the North Channel, Ontario Canada. Our final trip with the Cutwater was Grand Rivers Kentucky to the Florida Keys and north to the St Lucy River (Stuart Florida). At this time we decided that the C26 was getting small and the capacities, water, fuel, battery, were limited. The amount of equipment and supplies onboard was over loading us reducing our fuel economy and ability to get proper performance when needed. We could have easily finished the trip in this boat but elected to sell and purchase a slightly larger boat with more room and capacity. This was 2021 the year that everyone was purchasing a boat and the price of boats sky rocketed. Good time to sell but if you returned to the market it was a tough time to purchase.
We were fortunate to find a lightly used 20 year old Mainship Pilot 34' with twin 4LHA STP Yanmar 240 hp engines, 80 gallon water, 250 gallon fuel 12' 4" beam, enclosed pilot house with a top side that had clear view to the sky and room for 600 watts of solar. Plenty of room on board for 650 AH of house batteries, with additional 200 AH thruster bank, and two back up engine start batteries at 105 AH each. The additional water line length and beam plus extra power from the engines allowed for the addition equipment on board during the trip to not be an issue with performance and fuel economy. The engines would hit governor even fully loaded and gave us an average fuel economy during the trip of 2mpg. Very close to the same as we were averaging with the Cutwater 2.3 mpg.
We purchased the Mainship and after a winter of going over the boat and preparing it for the Loop trip we launched the boat in middle of August 2022. We left on August 21 and never looked back. My wife has a full blog of the trip that we call the trip of a life time. We crossed our wake September 10,2023. We anxiously awaited a week in Ludington Michigan for Lake Michigan to settle down for our 84 mile trip across Lake Michigan to Port Washington Wisconsin and prepared to cross our wake 40 miles south at Racine Wisconsin. What a trip!!! We did see and meet a lot of Ranger Tugs and Cutwaters during our travels. All doing the same thing that we were doing and doing it safely and comfortably. So I know the old PORT-A-GEE C26 could have too. I will never regret the purchase of the C26. I'm also happy with the decision to move on to an older but incredibly dependable Mainship 34 Pilot.
We are not sure what the future holds for us to do next. I do know that a trip to the PNW is in the plans. Maybe even cruising in a Ranger or Cutwater!
The PORT-A-GEE trip blog is listed in my signature. My wife always says if you want to take a nap read my Blog. I think she did a good job describing our adventure.
We were fortunate to find a lightly used 20 year old Mainship Pilot 34' with twin 4LHA STP Yanmar 240 hp engines, 80 gallon water, 250 gallon fuel 12' 4" beam, enclosed pilot house with a top side that had clear view to the sky and room for 600 watts of solar. Plenty of room on board for 650 AH of house batteries, with additional 200 AH thruster bank, and two back up engine start batteries at 105 AH each. The additional water line length and beam plus extra power from the engines allowed for the addition equipment on board during the trip to not be an issue with performance and fuel economy. The engines would hit governor even fully loaded and gave us an average fuel economy during the trip of 2mpg. Very close to the same as we were averaging with the Cutwater 2.3 mpg.
We purchased the Mainship and after a winter of going over the boat and preparing it for the Loop trip we launched the boat in middle of August 2022. We left on August 21 and never looked back. My wife has a full blog of the trip that we call the trip of a life time. We crossed our wake September 10,2023. We anxiously awaited a week in Ludington Michigan for Lake Michigan to settle down for our 84 mile trip across Lake Michigan to Port Washington Wisconsin and prepared to cross our wake 40 miles south at Racine Wisconsin. What a trip!!! We did see and meet a lot of Ranger Tugs and Cutwaters during our travels. All doing the same thing that we were doing and doing it safely and comfortably. So I know the old PORT-A-GEE C26 could have too. I will never regret the purchase of the C26. I'm also happy with the decision to move on to an older but incredibly dependable Mainship 34 Pilot.
We are not sure what the future holds for us to do next. I do know that a trip to the PNW is in the plans. Maybe even cruising in a Ranger or Cutwater!
The PORT-A-GEE trip blog is listed in my signature. My wife always says if you want to take a nap read my Blog. I think she did a good job describing our adventure.
