Daily report #88

The beginning.

The idea of sailing across an ocean just struck me one beautiful day. Probably partly because of seeing so many nice YT videos, but there it was. At the same time I was also looking at boats, imagining what to do with them until I saw an advertisement for an affordable Bruce Roberts 53. When that boat turned out not to be sold and I had now learned a few things about that boat, I decided at some point to buy that boat. To do that, I sold everything I thought I could get rid of. My racing sailing boat, my motor, my Van der Stadt 34. With enough money in my pocket and a provisional purchase contract concluded, I went to inspect the boat abroad. Ultimately, that was affordable but not viable. Preparing such a large boat would cost me at least 3 years of investing, doing jobs abroad and in the meantime bearing all the costs of ownership; not a good idea. Didn't buy the boat. However, the seed had been planted. It was mid-2018
In order to still be able to participate in club competitions and to practice sea sailing, I successively bought a half-tonner and one tonner. So I still had two boats. Just no more engine. And little money.
In the meantime, my good friend - 31 years old - had also started participating in the competitions and we sailed in the club competitions in the half-ton boat. We also went to sea together with the one-ton ship. He also thought it would be quite a challenge to sail across the oceans. So, after extensive consultation, we decided to buy a boat overseas - abroad. This is with the idea that if you buy a boat far away you are always sailing home and there is a much smaller chance that you will stop. A stick behind the door.
Looking for a boat again. It was early 2020.

Browsing the internet, all over the world, I found a steel Bruce Roberts 53 ready to sail in Australia in May 2020 and a one off classic aluminum sailing yacht the Sandmeier 51. After consultation with my old school friend - we call him Rembrand - we decided to try to purchase one of these two ships. But how do you do that when the whole world is locked down due to an epidemic? The answer came with the help of someone I regularly encounter in my work. An email asking who knew someone who could purchase one of these ships in Australia resulted in Boating Solutions from Nic Doig. After asking him, he was happy to take on this job. Rates were agreed and Nic went to look at the first boat with our directions in his pocket. The Kalosini II.

Now Nic is an awake man. Always been in boats, also as a broker. The Bruce Roberts was ready to sail and had to cost E 90k, the Sandmeier 86k. When Nic had boarded and done his rounds, he managed to get in touch with the owner. (The builder's widow). Before he got off the ship the price had been halved. An aluminum yacht of 15.24 meters for 43k.
Look no further, buy the thing. We had also agreed with Nic that if he could get even more off the asking price, he would get half of that amount. We paid him an extra 3k.

At that point you have a boat you've never seen in Australia being looked after by a man you've never met and by the time you get to look - two years later - you've already spent 40k per person on mooring fees, insurance, maintenance and new sails and it hasn't even sailed a meter.
We were optimistic. But not otherworldly. We had Nic request quotes for much-needed maintenance jobs and actually only had the sails, generator, general maintenance and engine maintenance done. We would do the rest ourselves on location or on the road.

And then Australia will open again in February 2022. We were on a plane in April. On the way to the big surprise. The plan was to leave in October for a trip from Sydney to New Zealand, to Cape Horn and up to the Netherlands. Things turned out differently.