I'm considering buying a used carver. I like the room and layout and there doesn't seem to be any shortage of them. I'm mainly interested in coastal cruising and maybe doing the loop one day. The only thing I know for sure is that I want diesel. My main question. Are carvers suitable for coastal cruising? I'm getting many mixed signals when reading online. Thoughts? I would also appreciate any tips for my search...
There are many Carver owners here. I think they would all agree, coastal cruising only on good days. They look good and offer lots of benefits. Sea boats, HA.
There are approximately 4 bazillion Carvers in coastal service. Decent Chevies, near as I can tell. Have at it. Ref Ralph's "only on good days" -- think I could say that about many (most?) boat brands. The Albemarle Sound, for example, doesn't much care what brand you chose. -Chris
In defense of Carver. What pleasure vessel goes out in rough seas? Not that Carver would be better or worse at handling some chop and whitecaps, but - what idiot takes a personal yacht out and gets beat to hell just for grins? As said in another thread, Carver; horses for courses. If one wants to go fight the demon wind and 12 foot waves - well choose the boat you want, and have at it. To me - a yacht is an escape on a nice weekend when there are no likelyhood of small craft warnings or Beaufort scale 8 conditions. I think that Carvers are built up to EU standard B, which is for 200 miles offshore, and in Beaufort scale 8 and waves of 4M. Who the hell takes a __________(insert pleasure yacht name) out in scale 8? People who buy Carvers don't HAVE to be 200 miles offshore with a crew or family, weather be damned. People who buy Tollycraft, or Viking, or any make of pleasure vessel aren't out there when it's s(h)itty either. In case it's not clear, I just bought a Carver. If I'm out in a squall on a summer afternoon, I'll deal with it, and have no concern that my chosen make is going to go 'sous-leau' the minute I take some water over the gunwale. It's got four pumps, and 6 batteries. I think I'm going to be just fine. YMMV