Introducing….

“SOPHIA”, the goddess of wisdom, seemed like a lovely name for a boat back in September 2007 when I bought her.  A bit ironic perhaps in that the pursuit of a silly dream of a “vagrant gypsy life” would be associated with wisdom.  Later, I found that “Sophia” was also the name of one of Elena’s favorite cats and the her picture became our symbol.

The Baba 40 is a Bob Perry design built in Taiwanese Ta Shing shipyard, known for its quality workmanship.   As shown on the line diagram, she is a cutter rigged sloop, meaning she has three sails: main, genoa, and staysail, with the latter two forward of the mast.  She carries a full keel and 15,000 pounds of ballast.  Overall displacement is 30,000 pounds.  She has three cabins (forward and aft sleeping compartments and the main cabin area), a full galley, and head with separate shower area–comfortable living for Elena and I.  (see About Sophia page for more details).

The poem is the third stanza of “Sea Fever” by John Masefield, British poet and merchant seaman.  He was British Poet Laureate in 1930.  The first two lines of the first stanza are more well known:

But the third stanza is the one that applies to Sophia more, especially the “merry yarn from a laughing fellow rover”, which describes Elena to perfection and “vagrant, gypsy life” which describes our lifestyle quite nicely.     The picture shows Sophia’s “laughing fellow rover”, celebrating our arrival in Yorktown VA in 2011.