Hobie Turbo 14 to Laguna 18 Windrose

I spent my first summer sailing my Hobie Turbo 14 in Tempe Town lake and in Lake Pleasant. I used to visit San Diego occasionally to visit my friends Scott & Christine so I took my Cat with me and sailed in Mission Bay. Winds were westerly coming off the ocean steady and true. Sailing north and south in the bay was just a pleasure.

By this time my second summer had arrived and I was ready to learn to trapeze off the hulls. I also wanted to go faster (go figure) so I started looking for a spinnaker…yes for a 14 foot Cat!!! That’s when I found my next boat. I was browsing in the Phoenix Sailboat Shop’s lot on McClintock just north of the 202 freeway. That lot has closed now and they are located at Lake Pleasant. I found the sweetest Laguna 18 Windrose. It was a monohull fixed keel sloop. It was about 20 years old but had been garaged for almost 10 years and in excellent condition. So for $3500 I hauled it home on a titled trailer. It needed nothing really.

So for a short time I had a fleet in my yard what with both the Hobie and Laguna parked next to each other. As my buddy in San Diego volunteered to sell my Cat there, I took it to him and it went in about a week.

The Laguna was named “Second Wind”, a name I still use once in a while but, being a devoted fan of Martina McBride, Country songstress extraordinaire, I renamed the boat “In My Daughter’s Eyes” after one of her songs to match my truck license plate “I M D E“. 

The new boat was like going from a wet Go Cart to a Chevy Suburban. It was 18” off the water with a dry cockpit and stability that I never imagined. It was a real pleasure to sail, fast and responsive on the tiller. I spent a lot of time in it, again on Tempe Town Lake and on Lake Pleasant. The cover photo beneath this blog is of the Laguna on Lake Pleasant.

As the Laguna had a small cabin/galley, I started thinking of living aboard. Even though it was way to small at the time, with a bit more experience and reading, I now know that it wasn’t much too small, just a bit too small. By now Sailing was truly something I was bound to do, one way or another for the rest of my life.