First Contact By Windy



Del Viento's home for now

Last week I saw our boat for the first time. (In fact, it was the first time any of us have been aboard since we took ownership last June.) I arrived at the small, private marina in Puerto Vallarta where we are renting a slip until we move aboard. After the bump and surge and dust of the local bus, the marina was positively serene. It is a postcard of cozy multicolored villas, skirted by palms and giant bird of paradise plants, and with a small, still harbor home to fishing boats, sailboats, and a couple large power boats. I walked down a brick and stone path and stood for a long moment regarding our boat with excitement and a pinch of fear.

Until that moment, I don't think I'd acknowledged, even to myself, my quiet fear. What if upon boarding I realize we'd made a big mistake? What if I find the cabin dark and claustrophobic? Most of all, what if I can't imagine our family living happily there?

The long, narrow, plastic ports squinted at me. The teal canvas looked cheerful and sharp. And then I was aboard and turning the key and shoving the companionway hatch open, feeling so completely focused and thrilled to be there.



Excited to be there!

Heat billowed out of the hatch, carrying the smells of diesel, mildew, and head.  I scanned the interior. Nothing obvious was wrong, but everywhere my eyes rested there were surfaces to oil, or polish, or clean. My strongest initial impression was that this boat really needed someone to inhabit it--which is what I was there to do, if only for a week. (Note: our boat sitters are excellent and conscientious. My impressions did not stem from any negligence on their part; on the contrary, they have gone above and beyond more than once.)

My mom arrived that evening and we spent a productive six days scrubbing, inventorying, measuring, and making a few simple repairs. Each evening we rested over a delicious meal and a margarita at a local restaurant, and each morning we started up again. By the end of the week, we'd covered every inch of the boat.

Aside from adding a thousand and one items to our to-do list, I learned that the Fuji 40 has an incredible amount of storage for the size of the boat, miles of headroom, and woodwork of rare beauty and precision--after 30 years each drawer glides smoothly into place and doors close with a satisfying click. The topsides are functional and free of ornamentation, with wide side-decks and and an expansive foredeck. In short, it is a lovely boat with a superb layout, and I can't imagine a better choice, either aesthetically (for me), or functionally (for my family).

Remaining are the needling fears I have been aware of since we began our 5-year plan. I fear for the safety of my children aboard--though rationally I know they will be safe. I fear for our finances--well that one isn't irrational at least. I fear leaving everything and everyone behind, not returning. Yet, I'm comforted that these fears amount to little compared to my overwhelming feelings of excitement for the adventure before us.

--WR

Getting Ready for the Big Life Change

This week we sent picture cards to friends, family, and acquaintances. This picture card is a formal announcement of the new 25,000-pound member of our family sitting in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.
While we’ve talked about our "big life change" plans with many over the past 5 years, we’ve largely kept it behind the scenes and many are unaware. (Even people to whom we mentioned it early on, have forgotten, or doubted us!)
We are eager to keep in touch with the people who have been a part of our lives as dirt dwellers: friends, distant relatives, family, neighbors, and passersby. Hopefully this blog will help us to do that, to some extent, no matter where we are in the world.

So, you've found our blog, book mark it! Come with us, virtually. Totally upending our lives and doing something that is contrary to all conventional wisdom (and totally insane from a financial best interests standpoint) ain't easy, but it is surely going to make for good tales. You will find them here.
Of course, before the craziness can begin, we have a lot to do over the next many months. It seems as though nearly every aspect of our lives is geared towards getting ready. Time is flying by. Over the past few of weeks: 

·         We met with and hired our real estate agent for next spring’s sale.

·         We had a consultation with a designer recommended by our agent. (Life lesson: do this before spending 10 years in a home, not months before you move.)

·         I am organizing and moving digital media (pictures, videos, documents) to online storage so that we can sell our desktop computer/monitor and buy a second laptop.

·         I am learning everything I can about our Yanmar 4JH-TE motor so that I know what spares to buy and bring. (Just purchased a $42 impeller!)

·         Windy is getting ready for her December trip to Puerto Vallarta to check on the boat and take a million more measurements and pictures.

·         We are both making lists and otherwise planning for the 3 consecutive days we will spend at the U.S. Sailboat Show in Annapolis this week. (Most common question from sailing neophytes: “Why are you going to the boat show if you already bought a boat?”)

·         I am prioritizing all of my house-prep work to those things that need to be done before we paint, so that we can paint sooner and enjoy the new paint for longer.

·         I installed new struts and springs on the back of the car last week, in preparation for the trailer and extra load we will carry on our big road trip to the boat after the house sells (will do the front soon).

·         Windy is digitizing all of our contacts (she is eager to toss the well-worn physical address book, we compromised that she will keep it in a drawer for 3 months to see how her new system works out).

·         Windy is sorting through the dozens hundreds of kid books to eliminate what is no longer age-appropriate.

·         I bought several heavy-duty, watertight, ice-chest-sized plastic containers into which we are beginning to put those things that will be going to the boat, and that we will not need until we get on the boat (boat show purchases, spare parts, winter clothes after winter, etc).

·         We sold our massive computer armoire and put in place a small corner table for the office.

·         Windy is working on a categorized, master list of things to do and buy (A=essentials, B=important, C=future project).

·         I cleared out and re-seeded the front and back lawns last week so that when the house is on the market in the spring, it will have the nicest lawn for miles.

It feels good to be organizing and lightening our load, less stuff. But at the same time, we are in consumer mode too, generating a long list of purchases necessary to transition to the new life—this in spite of our joint resolve to not get caught up in the frenzy of marketing to boat owners that demands we spend every penny we have to ensure we bring the comforts of land life aboard and that we are insulated from every calamity, however unlikely.

Life changes this big require lots of getting ready. It's a process we've been involved in for the past 5 years, but which is now accelerating.

--MR

How We Came to Buy a Fuji 40

Billy Black

Hey!

My picture is in this month's Cruising World! This is the picture taken at last year's Annapolis Sailboat Show where I served as a Cruising World consumer judge; I'm the guy on the far right. This article describes the circumstances: http://www.cruisingworld.com/boats-and-gear/boat-reviews-and-previews/secret-shoppers-hit-the-show-1000080738.html

I've attended the Annapolis show each of the past 9 years, since moving to the East Coast. Being the CW consumer judge made the 2009 show a bit special, but it’s for another reason that it was better than any previous. First, I was there two days, and both days I was on my own. I missed Windy’s company, but in this way, I was able to zip around and make the most of my time. And I used that time to answer a question that had been lingering for Windy and me for most of the previous year:

Do we really need a “blue water” boat, built like the proverbial brick s**thouse? What is a blue water boat?

There are a lot of boats out cruising today, all shapes and sizes. It’s a given that some of them are full-keeled Colin Archer designs with integrated keels full of ballast and hulls two inches thick. Blue water boats, right? But this description does not fit most of the boats out there today. One look at the roster of any of today’s big cruising rallies (the ARC, the Baja Ha-Ha) and it is clear that Hans Christians, Westsails, Island Packets, and Ingrids are not well represented. Many take it for granted that "performance cruisers" are considered suitable blue water boats, and there is a good representation of boats like those built by Passport and Valiant and Taswell. But I don’t think either of these classes of boat comprise the plurality of boats out there cruising. Predominant among cruisers today are the mass-produced boats traditionally assumed to be racer-coastal cruisers (Hunters, Catalinas, J/Boats, Beneteaus, Jeaneaus). (Anecdotally, of the 99 monohulls currently signed up for the 2010 Baja Ha-Ha rally, 42 are production racer-coastal cruisers.)

One of Windy’s most significant impressions of our first cruising adventure is tropical storm Andres. Andres was the first named storm of 1997. During what became an 8-day passage from Isla Providencia, Columbia to Maria La Gorda, Cuba, we got hit by the brunt of it. During the worst of it, a 30-hour stretch, Windy remained below. During that blow, my knowledge and skills at the helm grew along with the strength of the storm. In short time, I was beyond the point of safely transferring the helm to Windy. Her primary focus was navigating us safely into the refuge of the bay at the Western-most tip of the island. My only focus was guiding us over the next wave.

Windy said afterward that the most difficult part of her time below was the noise of the ocean pounding on the hull. The crashing. The amplified sound had her questioning the integrity of the hull. Del Viento was a Newport 27 production racer-coastal cruiser, much like the venerable Catalina 27. Her skin wasn’t flimsy, but neither was she stout.

Windy during tropical storm Andres, 1997
www.sailboat-cruising-with-kids.comI wasn’t below, but I could relate to her distress. When I was a kid, we spent many summers waterskiing behind a 15-foot ski boat my dad bought in 1959. It had a fiberglass hull and I remember pounding through the chop on the lake at 20 knots, crashing down and certain each time we were hitting rocks on the bottom. Over and over my dad assured me that we were not, that it was just the sound of the water.

When we finally sold Del Viento in Ft. Lauderdale, Windy and I knew we wanted to get back out there. We were resolved to do it next time in a stout boat, a heavy, full-displacement cruising boat. We wanted to feel that come hell or high waves, none of us would be down below questioning the integrity of the hull.

That is pretty much where we were at the start of our 5-year plan to get back out there, launched 4 years ago. But times have changed. Weather forecasting is better and forecasts can be more easily obtained given the advancements in communications technologies. Many argue that it is better to plan your weather windows and be in a boat fast enough to narrow those windows, than to be in a relatively slow boat built for punishment.

As the economy nosedived in 2008, the added expense of a bulletproof blue water boat began to seem more significant. At the same time, sailing magazines abounded with stories of cruisers out there circling the globe on relatively light displacement production boats. Catalina’s booth at the sailboat show seemed to feature the words “blue water” on every sign, even displaying their “Hall of Fame:” profiles of sailors who have made significant passages or circumnavigations aboard Catalinas. The lure of the price of a used production boat became a siren.

The cost is nearly 50% less. Not only because the supposed quality is lower, but because the designs of these boats, many tailored to the charter trade, offered comparatively more space down below. Beamy to begin with, this beam extended further and further aft, beginning in the early nineties. Therefore, while a 36-foot Catalina would easily serve the cabin space needs of our family of four, a 38-foot Hans Christian would not make the cut.

By the time of the 2009 show, we were nearly resolved to buying a production racer-coastal cruiser, a bigger version of what we’d been out on before. Nearly resolved. Questions still lingered and I was determined to get answers from sources I trusted.

• Liza Copeland and her family of 5 completed a multi-year circumnavigation aboard their 38-foot Beneteau, Bagheera. She’s written a few books about cruising with a family and each year she is there at the show, in the Beneteau booth. I asked her directly: “Is it less safe to go cruising in a production boat, such as the Beneteau, than in a comparatively more stout boat of a heavier displacement?” She was clear: absolutely not (not surprising, standing there in the Beneteau booth). She cited the speed factor as a safety imperative. She cited the ability to better predict weather windows. She cited the improvements in design and construction that obviated the need for heavy displacement, doubting the notion that a production boat (such as the Beneteau) is not physically prepared to take on the ocean.



• George Day is the publisher of Blue Water Sailing magazine. In the 1980s, he and his family completed a circumnavigation aboard a Mason 43, a boat that probably straddles the line between the heaviest blue water boats and the performance cruising boats. It is stout and well-built. The Mason 43 was for a long time at the top of our list of boats we considered (see this post: http://www.sailboat-cruising-with-kids.com/2008/08/boat.html). He was gracious with his time and he and I chatted for about 20 minutes. His perspective was surprising. I acknowledged his circumnavigation and related our concerns about whether the cost of a stout boat like the Mason is money well spent. I asked him whether he would consider taking his family around the world again on a production racer-coastal cruiser. He said yes. He said that nearly all of the sailing he has done since his family sold Clover, crossing oceans and pounding in rough weather, was aboard light displacement boats. He emphasized that the most important factor is not the boat, but the sailor. He noted that any boat could be pushed too hard. But if you watch your weather windows and know not to push the boat past its limit when you do get stuck in the bad stuff, you will be fine. He said seamanship, up to a point, is more important than over-built construction.

• 
  
   Steven Callahan and Alvah Simon are sailing luminaries. I got to hang out with them at an after-show reception Cruising World hosted for we consumer judges of the Boat of the Year contest (it was cool). Steven was single handing in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean when he estimates a whale struck his boat. It sank in minutes and he spent the next 66 days in a life raft. He wrote a best selling book about the adventure, a sailing classic, called Adrift. Alvah Simon, along with his wife Diana Simon aboard their boat Roger Henry, rounded Cape Horn and froze themselves in the ice over a long dark winter up north of 60 degrees. About this second adventure, Alvah wrote an outstanding account called North to the Night. I asked both men the same question I asked George and Liza. Surprisingly, both echoed George Day’s opinion. Steven seemed a bit more emphatic in his response (surprising, given his ordeal), while Alvah agreed, but was a bit more reserved. But both were unequivocal: if money is a factor, you will not go wrong setting sail in a production boat—even for a circumnavigation—so long as you practice good seamanship.

I didn’t talk to Lin and Larry Pardee. I didn’t talk to Dave and Jaja Martin. I didn’t talk to Beth Leonard and Evans Stargazer. I’m confident I would get a different answer from them (though George Day and Steven Callahan surprised me!).

I came home to share my new info with Windy. I think that we both felt more comfortable with our new lot in <the cruising> life. We were resolute, we told ourselves…Catalina here we come!

Windy began expressing doubts weeks later, about her ability to really be comfortable on a production coastal cruiser. I countered that many of those built in the early 1980s are not as thin skinned as some we’ve seen lately. (She reminded me that the first Del Viento was built in 1980). I kept on, advancing argument after argument, until I too became unconvinced. No doubt we could make it across the pond and around the globe in a production racer-coastal cruiser, many do, many will. But for the sake of peace of mind, we are both more settled by the notion of a heavier boat. Too, what we give up in performance, we gain in sea kindliness (comfort).

But now we were in situation of wanting more boat than we could afford. The Mason 43 remained our ideal. She was stout as heck and she had a sweet aft cabin that provided space, privacy, and a distinct bunk for each of the girls. She was bigger than we liked, but we knew we would learn to manage her. She had enough space to host overnight guests for periods of time. The cheapest one we’d ever seen was offered at $99K, located in the BVIs, and needing lots of work. Practically, we were going to have to spend $139K for a Mason and then put $20K into it, minimum.

When we launched our 5-year plan in 2006, our house was worth more money than it is today. Our investments were worth more money. $160K was something we could manage. In 2010, things look a lot different. Our timeline is unchanged, but our budget is not. Our decision to go with a production racer-coastal cruiser had helped a lot. But now…?

Fantasia 35 Dreamweaver on the hard
Don and Jim

Today, my old dock mates from Ventura, California live in Washington state, having just finished a cruise last year aboard their Fantasia 35. They were thinking of selling; they wrote as much in their Christmas letter. Windy and I talked a lot about the Fantasia. We read about the Fantasia. We looked at the dozens of pictures on Don’s and Jim’s website. We decided that Dreamweaver represented a good opportunity to maybe get a solid, no nonsense cruising boat that we know is in excellent shape and that we could purchase without a broker involved, cutting costs for the seller. We made a complicated offer to our friends whereby we would begin making small monthly payments towards a $70K purchase price of the boat and they would keep and maintain the boat through the end of the year (one last summer hurrah). Starting January 1, 2011, we would begin paying slip fees and the amount of our monthly payment towards the purchase price would begin progressively increasing each month. When we finally sold our house in 2011, we would pay off the remaining balance.

Don and Jim thought about our sincere offer, but they were not ready to commit to selling. We were disappointed, but prepared to wait, as they gave us right of first refusal for when/if they do decide to sell.

We kept looking at boats. We had to be flexible. We had to look at the market with fresh eyes. Before we discovered the Mason 43 layout, we were resigned to having the girls share a v-berth. That consideration brings into view a lot of other boats. And maybe we couldn’t discount the ketch as we had. We didn’t really want a center cockpit, but maybe we could get used to it. (The Fantasia is a center cockpit boat in which the girls would have had to share the v-berth.) Maybe there are boats for sale not listed on Yachtworld.com…

Lord Nelson 41

On eBay we found one of the most beautiful boats ever designed: a Lord Nelson 41 (sistership pictured). Bidding was at $32K, four days remaining. I did a lot of research in a short period of time. The boat was owned by a Southern California boat yard going bankrupt. They had taken the boat in exchange for bills unpaid and had epoxied and awlgripped the hull. Outside she was beautiful. Inside she…could be brought back to life. She needed her wood decks cared for (not cored!) and the galley floor was “spongy.” There was not a single piece of gear or electronics on board. I talked to the yard owner. I talked to a broker who had once listed the boat. I got a copy of a year-old survey. I talked to that surveyor. I read everything I could about the LN41. We put a bid in: $41K. She eventually sold for closer to $50K.

Several weeks later, I noticed a Fuji 40 in Puerto Vallarta: $79,900. The boat looked good, and she was competitively priced (lowest of the three for sale worldwide). I’d first seen a Fuji 40 online in 2006 when we first began looking. There was one in Ventura, listed at $110K. I loved the boat. It was a mini-version of the Mason 43, but with an aft cabin every bit as large, greater headroom, and no teak decks. Hmmm.

A couple months passed and I noticed a relatively large price reduction on the Puerto Vallarta Fuji: $71,900. She was now in our range. It was mid-March, 2010.

Windy and I talked and looked and learned. We read everything we could and talked to three Fuji 40 owners here in the U.S. We loved the boat and decided we had to ensure the listing remained open until we were really ready to buy, fall or winter of 2010. How do we do this? Beyond hoping, we didn’t have a plan. We asked ourselves if we would regret this boat being bought before we could buy her. We acknowledged that all of the previous near-misses had been for the best. But I’d been looking closely at the market for years, and I hadn’t seen a boat of this quality and layout at this price. We decided we would regret not buying this boat, assuming she was everything we thought. Neither of us had ever been aboard a Fuji 40.

Del Viento as Dream Catcher in Paradise Village Marina, PV, Mexico
www.vallartayachts.netOne of the benefits of buying a boat in Mexico is not paying sales tax. We considered this and considered the cost of a trip to look at her and the cost of maintaining a boat in Mexico for a year. We ran the numbers and made our best offer. The seller countered. We countered and reached an agreement: $64K including a dinghy and two outboards that had been excluded from the listing, and a spinnaker sail we didn’t know about.

Having been down there and having closed on this deal, Windy and I are convinced she is the right boat for us at the right price. We could have paid much less for a production racer-coastal cruiser, but we could have paid much more for a comparable (and in many ways inferior) “blue water” boat. Dream Catcher, as she is currently called, is the perfect boat for our family. And while our decision to buy a Fuji 40 may seem counter to the wisdom I gleaned at the 2009 Annapolis Sailboat Show, it is not. Rather, I took this away: any boat can be knowingly or unknowingly pushed too hard, and a stout boat is no insurance against poor seamanship. We’ll enjoy the relative comfort and peace of mind offered by the Fuji 40, but will not allow this comfort to induce complacency.

Spring 2011 cannot come soon enough.

--MR

We Are Boat Owners!

Prophetic fortune cookies?
www.sailboat-cruising-with-kids.com"You will soon be crossing the great waters" and "Now is the time to try something new." A good sign, no? I know you are thinking "crossing the great waters" is a Chinese metaphor for death, but it's not.

Did I mention we are boat owners?!

--WR

Brokers and Jokers

Bumfuzzle site, Oeste pictured
www.bumfuzzle.com

One of the current themes running on the Bumfuzzle blog is a frustration with yacht brokers. Pat and Ally are incredulous following their dealings with brokers on both coasts: phone calls and emails not returned, a lack of knowledge about listed boats (and an unwillingness to pursue answers to buyer questions), and poor representations of listed boats (scant pictures and descriptions).

I’ve seen hundreds of examples of poor listings in the last few years, but I have no experience with bad brokers. (This is probably because I never contacted a broker representing a poor listing.) For this Fuji 40 purchase, the listing was very complete and the broker responsive. In fact, when I asked for a few specific additional pictures of the boat, they were posted to Yachtworld the next day. When I sent a list of 35 questions—most about the vessel’s history and performance—the broker worked with the buyer to get comprehensive answers within a few days.

Del Viento anchored off
Santa Cruz island, California,
circa 1994
www.sailboat-cruising-with-kids.com

When I bought the first Del Viento in 1993, the world was pre-internet and all of my broker interactions were face-to-face. The broker with whom I finally ended up doing business was awesome; she was very low-pressure and allowed me plenty of time aboard, alone, to check out the boat. I ended up living aboard in a slip adjacent to the brokerage for years, and I still maintain a friendship with the broker.

However...yacht insurance brokers seem to be a different breed. To date, my experience with yacht insurance brokers is poor, echoing the Bums current experience with yacht brokers. Aren’t we in a deep recession? These insurance brokers all seem to be mom and pop shops. Are they swamped with business? The companies I’ve contacted all advertise in Latitude 38, all claiming to insure cruising boats in Mexico. Yet, many of my emails requesting quotes go unanswered. Of the few who did initially respond, to request a copy of the survey and additional info, only a couple followed through with actual quotes. Of these, only one answered my follow-up questions.

It will be easy to choose an insurance broker.

It makes no sense.

--MR

Buyer in US, Seller in China, Broker in Italy, Boat in Mexico

Talk about globalization:

• We live in Washington, D.C.
• 
  http://www.flickr.com/photos/boliston/1732262369/The folks selling us the Fuji 40 cruising boat left the US in 1996 to cruise Mexico before moving to Shanghai, where they will get their signatures for this transaction notarized Monday at a US consulate.
• The broker is a US citizen living in Mexico, but coordinating this sale from Italy, where he is marrying an Italian national.
• The escrow is with Marine Documentation Specialists in Annacortes, Washington, where we have been emailing our paperwork and wiring our money.
• The boat is in Mexico, but documented in the US.
• The seller offered to include a spinnakker sail with this boat; it is in Arizona.

--MR

The Waiting

The wait for the survey of this boat to happen was agonizing. It took us outside of the 18 days we gave ourselves to perform, according to the purchase agreement. Granted, the likelihood that the seller would drop out of the deal was slim, but you never know who could show up with a better offer.

Yes, the survey did finally happen last Thurday, a week ago today. Then we waited for the report...and waited for the report. We got the report yesterday and within hours made up our minds to move forward. The survey was comprehensive and there was little we did not anticipate. My 40-minute phone call with the surveyor in Mexico was affirming.

I took a deep breath and called the escrow folks in Annacortes, Washington to tell them we were moving forward, to ask how much money we should wire that evening to settle.

"Oh, that's good, we're glad you like the boat."

"Great, thank you. Do I just use the same wire information as before? What should I send in addition to the balance due? Are there settlement charges due you?"

"Oh, hold on a sec. I'll let Sonya know when she gets into the office later, she's handling your transaction. She'll start the title search and then get a settlement statement out to you."

"How long will that take?"

"Well...what's tomorrow...Thursday, yes. If she starts the title search tomorrow, we should hear back from the Coast Guard...oh, this is a holiday weekend coming up, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"Uh, she should probably hear back from the Coast Guard by late Tuesday. It shouldn't take her long to finish the settlement statement after that."

"And she'll email that to me?"

"She sure will. Now, she is going to send you other paperwork you need to sign and have notarized and send back, but you can scan it and email it."

"So, I could wire the money Wednesday."

"That's probably right."

"And when does the settlement happen?"

"Well, she's got to wait to hear back from the sellers, they can't send their notarized forms back electronically, we need the original hardcopies from them."

I remembered the broker telling me that the seller is living in Asia and plans to go to a US consulate to have her paperwork notarized. "But the seller is in Asia."

"Oh, well, they're going to have to get a US-registered notary to certify their signatures, probably at a consulate."

"Yeah, that is what the broker said. So the seller then has to overnight the hardcopies to your office?"

"Yes, that's right."

"Then what? We close?"

"Uh, yes. At that time, Sonya will send all of the paperwork to the Coast Guard for them to transfer the title. It takes about four to six weeks for that to happen, but we'll send you copies of the executed agreement so you have something. Are you going to change the name of the boat from Dream Catcher?"

"Yes. Del Viento. D-"

"As in David?"

"Yes. Delta Echo Lima, new word, Victor Igloo Echo November Tango Oscar."

"Del Vee-en-toe?"

"Yes."

"Okay, I'll pass this on to Sonya. Congratulations."

"Thank you very much. We'll really feel like toasting once all of the ink is dry."

"Yes you will. You have a good day now."

--MR

First Impressions of the Boat

I'm not very good at it, but I know the value of recording first impressions of things as soon as possible after an event; I know that the mind is not a perfect data manager. Yet, it's hard because the notion that my first impressions will fade and be overwritten and mixed with later impressions is not intuitive. Okay, Dream Catcher:

I was about 100 yards away when I first saw the boat in her slip, from the stern. It was exciting, but not really remarkable. Yet, walking down the dock she is on, from about 30 feet away, the height of the bow formed a very strong impression. Her bow was lined up with all of the other 40+ foot boats around her and the difference was dramatic. I took this picture of Eleanor near the bow, but it doesn't really do it justice.

I tried to take it all in at that point. The impression was satisfying. Though I had not even been aboard at that point, I felt immediately like our decision to make an offer on this boat, and to spend all of the money and time to come see it in Mexico, was just right; I felt strongly it was right.

Going aboard, everything seemed bigger than I imagined. The cockpit was bigger, the decks were wider. The lines and rigging were heavier. I sat in the cockpit for a minute, in different places, and I was relieved to find it felt comfortable--large enough and with coamings high enough.

She was a little rougher than I expected. The non-skid is faded and the paint lines not as sharp as I imagined. The brightwork was not.

I'm jumping ahead, but the engine was unbelievably quiet and smooth.

Down below, I was immediately satisfied. It was much more than I imagined. Not just in terms of space, but in terms of condition. The pictures on the listing make the interior woodwork appear dingy, dirty. In person, it looks great; I would feel comfortable moving my stuff right aboard--after some light cleaning.

The locker spaces are all dingy white and need to be repainted, all of them. The painted cabin surfaces, such as around the ports, need to be painted, dingy.

The plastic ports do not open and are opaque, nearly impossible to see through. Replacing these with opening ports (with tempered glass) will be an expensive upgrade (roughly $250 times seven ports), but probably near the top of our list--fresh air and visibility are important.

The teal-colored canvas dodger and coverings topside are not my favorite color, as I imagined, but down below, the teal-colored upholstery is not too bad.

All of the drawers and cabinets are solid and open smoothly--a mean feat given the harsh marine environment they've been exposed to since 1978.

I'm naturally skeptical, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, and I really didn't allow myself to openly enjoy being aboard Dream Catcher (we'll change her name with a proper ceremony soon after we all get down there) until the following day.

The aft cabin far exceed my expectations. There is standing headroom and then some (in an aft-cockpit boat!). There are two giant lockers that were not pictured in the listing. There is ample drawer space for the girls. It was pleasant to imagine them and their things scattered about in this space.

The latch on the door to the aft cabin did not catch when we were underway.

Underway...she seemed to sail nicely. The reefing lines are all run and had to be loosened to raise the sail. The lazy jacks seem to get in the way and were maybe too loose when we dropped the main to offer any assistance. The headsail has two patches, one massive, both in good shape. The main is original and there are chaffed areas around the foot, some broken threads.

The running rigging is stiff and dirty, but otherwise looks serviceable.

The autopilot worked well. The cable that connects the knotmeter to the sending unit is broken and needs to be replaced.

The engine was built no more recently than 1989, but looks like it is in really good shape, visually. There is some corrosion where the raw water joins the exhaust flow.

There were two full logs, piles of manuals, and stacks of service records with receipts aboard. In the short time I spent reviewing them, I could tell they were all very well organized.

The battery bank appears smaller than I imagined and may be overcharging, based on the hissing I heard and the moisture I observed on the tops of the cases.

You are not supposed to fall in love with a boat until after the marriage, but I held out at least past the negotiating stage. (Sellers in Mexico are at a disadvantage in this regard. When a sale is local, buyers usually go aboard and have a look at the boat before making an offer, making it more difficult for some, I imagine, to be less emotional during price negotiations, at the time it really matters. Buyers of Mexico boats must negotiate a price before ever stepping aboard, and perhaps falling hard...)

So, what now? We're back home now and the survey and sea trial and haulout ostensibly happened today. We have heard nothing. A couple of days ago the surveyor said to expect the survey report at a PDF file, via email, first thing Monday morning--it will be a long weekend for both of us.

--MR

Speaking of Lists...

Some questions Mike had after visiting the boat:

1. There is no air filter element currently installed, one aboard? Any part number handy?
2. For the life of me, I could not identify the water pump, please include a picture of it in the survey.
3. Why are there two oil caps? One on top of the valve cover, as expected, but the other towards the front of the engine?
4. The corrosion where the raw water discharges from the heat exchanger into the exhaust line looks pretty bad. How bad and what is the best approach to fix? Cost?
5. The little drain pipes in place of scuppers looks like an elegantly over-engineered approach that introduces a potential for leaks. Cleary this has been addressed in the past, and can be further addressed, but what about potential damage to hull or deck where tubes pass through, from water over time?
6. It looks like the floor boards in the aft locker (under the ice chest) were glassed in on the port side to form a sturdy mount for the autopilot ram. Please confirm no hull repair there.
7. I forgot to note where, but it looks like the tabbing on one bulkhead separated. Please identify.
8. It looks like both battery banks are leaking (little puddles on the tops of all batteries). The two batteries, under the aft starboard berth, are hissing and squeeking like mad. Is this a condition of overcharging? Is the fault in the A/C battery charger not regulating properly, or is the solar regulator not regulating properly?
9. For many of the exposed bolt heads for deck-mounted items, there do not appear to be backing plates. For which are backing plates indicated?
10. Propane locker smells heavily of propane. Is this normal, or does this indicate a leak?
11. What is the black junction box above the cabin sole next to the mast?
12. The starboard galley footpump seems non-operational, please confirm.
13. Please let me know the sizes of all zincs. Please coordinate replacement, if needed, during haulout, and charge me, especially concerned about protecting the Max Prop. Are the zincs working?
14. Does the windlass have a provision for operating manually? Owner reports no, but the manufacturer web site seems to contradict, still researching, insight appreciated.
15. There is a vented loop/siphon break mounted in the cupboard behind the LP gas switch in the galley. How do I determine if it needs to be replaced?
16. Please include the diameters of any hoses you recommend replacing, so that replacment hoses can be brought from the US.
17. Is the massive L-shaped bar stored in the aft outside locker (under the ice chest) the emergency tiller?

The Return of Miguel and Eleanor

It sounds like they had a blast. Dolphins at the bow and all. I don't have all the details because they got in late, and now Miguel's at work. He says the boat is "bigger and nicer" than he imagined. I'll prod him to write something about their Mexican adventure here.

We're still waiting on the surveys. Ideally, all surveys would have been done while Mike was in Mexico, but our surveyor is stuck on what sounds like a nightmare of a boat delivery. Cruising writer Beth Leonard says, "You can pick the time or you can pick the place, but you can't pick the time and the place." This is our first nibble at that reality.

It's hard to believe that we are so close to buying a boat. I feel like putting a "For Sale" sign in front today. We really do need the year to wrap things up neatly though. We have long list of small home projects to complete before we sell. The animals need new homes. I'm taking a Wilderness First Responder course through the Wilderness Medicine Institute (NOLS). The list goes on. In fact the whole list business gets a little bit insane. I'll save my cynical thoughts on lists for another post.

I've scoured a few more images off the web, mostly from the Fuji site. Above is a stock photo of a Fuji 40. Only a handful of these boats were built so there's not a lot of info out there on them.

--WR


The deck plan (click to enlarge) might come in handy later.


This is the actual boat we're trying to buy.

A Yacht

I wanted to save these pictures for inspiration. "Our" Fuji is a boat, a workhorse, lots of gear sprouting out all over her, an overabundance of teal. Still, she suits us, and we think she's pretty. The pics that follow are of a sistership currently on the market. Much more expensive, not nearly as much gear, and gorgeous. --WR

"Your Offer Has Been Accepted" (!!!)

First we wire our 10% deposit. Then on Saturday Mike and Eleanor are hopping on a plane for Puerto Vallarta where they will have a very busy long-weekend. One of their most important tasks will be getting a feel for the spaces on the boat. Do we fit in the berths? Headroom? Can we all comfortably chill in the cockpit? Watch a movie together? Then an engine survey, haulout (bringing her up onto land to check everything below the water line), rigging survey, general survey, sea trial (sailing with the surveyor), taking inventory, measurements, and lots of video and pics for me and Frances. The checklist is already long and growing.

The deal is contingent on our satisfaction with all of the above. If everything looks good we'll give our official stamp of approval and wire the rest of the money. If the surveys turn up something major, or even if we find the boat awkward or uncomfortable, we can walk. We've done a lot of remote legwork, and at this point we're betting that the boat will meet our expectations. Otherwise we're out a chunk of change and we keep looking. --WR

When She Was New

In the brochure you can see how stunning her teak interior once was. The cabinetry is gorgeous, but not ornate and heavy like many of her counterparts (click to enlarge). I also like her sleek, modern-looking exterior. She's a beauty -- and it's looking more and more like she'll be OUR beauty. Yippee! Pictures are from the Fuji Owner's website (of which, I hope, we will soon be members).--WR

Over the Edge

It was a beautiful spring day in Washington yesterday. Late afternoon, the four of us walked out of a bank downtown, having just closed on a second mortgage on the house and I said to Windy: “We can stop all of this nonsense now and continue living in our home and enjoying our lives as they are, and we’ve lost nothing, only the $99 closing fee we just paid.” The thought rang hollow for both of us and reaffirmed our drive to move forward with our Plan.

You see, we’ve arrived at the precipice. For all our talk and planning of the past four years, nothing has been set in stone. To extend the metaphor, no stone has been cast…until yesterday, until we handed over that $99, the first real payment towards the lives we envision. But paying the $99 was like stepping off a curb. The precipice is represented by the much larger sums to come.

We’ve decided to make an offer on the Fuji 40. If our offer is accepted, we will soon send $500 to Doug Danielson the surveyor and $500 to Opequimar the boatyard. Another step forward means $350 to Doug Danielson the rigging surveyor, $300 to the engine surveyor, a five-digit sum to the boat owners, and $800 to the slip owner, something to a boat minder, something to the US Coast Guard, something to the Mexican insurance company, and so on. At that point, our commitment is no stronger than it is today, but certainly more tangible…and that just makes it all the more exciting.

But I left out an expense. We’ve gone back and forth about whether or not to incur the expense and disruption of a trip to PV to see and sail the boat in person. We’ve gone back and forth about who would go if we did go. Ultimately—and I lost this battle—we decided we would go and the “we” is Eleanor and me. In the end, it was our consideration for E that made everything clear. Eleanor’s sensitivity is a characteristic masked by her tough and old-soul nature. There is no question that leaving this life, transitioning to a radically new one, will be hardest on her. When the time comes, Frances may bemoan the changes loudly, but Eleanor will experience them, and hurt from them, most profoundly. The loss of friends, loss of stuff, and loss of place will not be a party for her. Because of this, we have talked often and at length about our plans around the dinner table and in the car. We have watched multiple crude documentaries made by other cruising families. We have successfully socialized our plan to the extent that both girls are perfectly aware that we are moving onto a boat. Both girls ask questions about it. But while it is, and will remain, an abstraction for Frances, it is real for Eleanor. She is already expressing her anxiety.

A trip to PV will clarify things for her by helping her to further contextualize the idea. While we’ve been aboard several boats with the girls, it will allow her to form her own real judgment about a specific boat in a specific place. It will allow her to be a part of the process and to feel a pride in being the one to report her opinions and findings from the trip back to Windy and Frances. It will not alleviate the difficulty the transition will represent for her, but hopefully, it will help this dream of ours to become Eleanor’s dream.

And it will be a fun—but costly—father-daughter experience.

Precipice, here we come.

--MR

The Next Del Viento?

Pictures from the Yacht World listing. She seems to be in decent shape. Lots of equipment. Great layout for a family living aboard. If we decide to make an offer, and it is accepted, the next step is to have her surveyed. --WR