I contrast this with people like Nat's daughter and boyfriend that bought a sailboat to both sail and live on. And cruisers that stop for a season and enjoy and area. Those are sailboats owned by sailors, you can tell at a glance.

As I participate on a few other sailing boards, live-aboard/cruising catagory's seem to be mostly about living-aboard. And on a large sailing and cruising Facebook page(like it or not, facebook is a tell all today), there's a huge audience that is live-aboard with little or no sailing involved.

I went sailing for a couple of hours yesterday by myself. I timed myself to see how long it took to go from stepping on deck to motoring out in the channel with the sails raised. I didn't kill myself but tried to do it quickly. 15 minutes, I was underway and ready to sail(it takes twice that to reverse the process-newish main eating up most of the time increase).

The boats, once cruisers-now neglected- are cheap. The need for affordable housing is great so it could be a win-win in the right situation. On the other hand we've seen the effect down south of closing off anchorages due to derelict boats. More and more online, I read, "We're ready to live the dream, and live-aboard! What boat should we buy?" WTH? Will we see this trend(if I'm right), move North? If so, will it take place in regulated marina's that allow(and are equipped) live on a boat or will it begin to effect our anchorages?

It's not fair cherry picking these live-aboards(wouldn't Jon have loved this one?). But there is a vast difference in going sailing in a boat like this - or anyone you live on, that is used as a home.

Sailing is out of the question with this boat turned into a home(although it deserves a PHD for converting a boat into a dwelling).

In live-aboard communities, sailing is far, far down the list of priorities. My fear is that the endeavor of sailing - a skill and sort of craft on the water - that takes time and work to learn, will suffer.