Over the years Kim has owned & sailed a number of dinghies. It all started when he worked out in Oman and bought his first boat, a single handed Laser
in 1981. Kim basically taught himself to sail off the coast of Oman. Whilst the water was warm and capsizing had the advantage of cooling one off, there
were a few things in the sea that one would not want to encounter - sea snakes, jelly fish and potentally, sharks. He soon learnt how to right a capsized
Laser!
On his return to the UK, having sold the Laser in Oman, he bought an International 420 - a two man trapeze/spinnaker boat, which he sailed at Grafham Water Sailing Club in Cambridgeshire with first wife Melanie. They soon outgrew this boat as it was only a youth trainer and progressed to an international 470. This was basically the same as the 420, but bigger - 4.7m long as opposed to 4.2m long! The extra half a metre delivered considerably more speed and as a consequence the boat has been an Olympic Class Dinghy for several decades now.
The thrill of sailing the 470 never quite replaced the pleasure of a single handed boat and the 470 was soon joined by a another single handed Laser. By the late 1980s Kim was club racing both boats at Grafham. Then came a move to Warwickshire and membership of Draycott Water Sailing Club. The 470 sailing waned as indeed did the Laser, albeit to a lesser extent.
Looking for new challenges and perhaps as an indication of future aspirations, Kim then bought a Laser 16, complete with a 4hp outboard engine. This was
a cruising boat as opposed to the racing boats he had previously sailed. This boat initially was not kept at a sailing club, but trailed
to different locations such as Rutland Water, the Solent and Derwent Water in the Lake District. The culmination of this long range cruising was
Lake Garda in Italy.
In the late 1990s the Laser 16 was joined by an aging Mirror dinghy, which was kept at Boddington Sailing Club in Oxfordshire as Kim found he missed having a two hander to potter about in. He still had the single handed Laser and this was now kept at Boddington as well. The fleet had grown to three boats! There was also a wind surfer, but we won't go there!
A change of life circumstances saw the Laser go, the Mirror end up in a garage, before being given away to a "good home" and the Laser 16 moved to Bewl Valley Sailing Club in Kent. The Laser 16 had a few outings but by now, 2004, Kim and second wife, Wendy, were starting to think about cruising in a boat that you clould sleep on. In 2004 the Laser 16 was sold and Maggie-Jane, the MacGregor 26X arrived.
However that was not the end of dinghy sailing for Kim. As he has always said:-
"I still like to get my arse wet!"
In 2005 Kim bought a Laser Pico. The idea of this boat was that it gave Kim something to have a bit of fun on and provided something for Kim's boys, James & Stewart to sail when they came to stay. It was kept at Redoubt Sailing Club near Hythe, but it never really worked out and so it was sold when Emjaytoo was bought. We did have one sucessful holiday at a Centre Parc in Port Zeeland, the Netherlands, which was the catalyst for moving the MacGregor to the Netherlands in 2006.
Again, this was not the end of dinghies. In late 2007 Kim bought a Miracle. This is a bigger version of the Mirror and the boat was kept down at Bewl Valley SC. Being a two handed boat, it was not sailed that often and Kim then bought a very old Solo. This is a "project" as it is in quite a state and is currently in the garage in bits! Kim hoped to rebuild it over the winter, but didn't say which winter! In Marh 2011 the Miracle was sold as it had not been sailed at all during 2010 and when the Bewl Valley SC membership came up for renewal the decision was taken to get rid of it.
The Solo is now under serious reconsideration as no work has been done on it in over a year and it is taking up valuable space in the garage!
A word on boat names. Dinghies do not always have names, whereas yachts do. The 420 bought in the mid 1980s was funded by some money Kim was left by his maternal grandmother Maggie-Jane (so there's the connection, but not yet). This dinghy was already called "Wishful Thinking" by its previous owner and so the name was retained. The 470 had a naff name, so was renamed "Wishful Thinking Too". Other dinghies did not have names. When we bought the MacGregor we didn't realise the previous owner had given it a name as it hadn't been registered, so we registered it as "Maggie-Jane". The idea being that it was Kim's grandmother's will that had ultimately led to buying the MacGregor, albeit some 20 years later. Maggie-Jane was sold to some people up in Scotland and as far as we know she is still "Maggie-Jane". When we ordered the Bavaria 30 Cruiser, we had to think of a name and some derivative of Maggie-Jane seemed obvious. Since Maggie-Jane was affectionately known as "M-J", it was a simple progression to "M-J 2" or more specifically "Emjaytoo". Will there be an "M-J 3"? Probably not, well not in the foreseeable future anyway!