JW talks about buying the boat.

The idea of spending time on a sailboat and spending less time working picked up steam when I had a conversation with a colleague about Social Security. I spent my 64^th birthday packing up our belongings at the office we were losing (us trying to get refinancing just as the real estate market realized what they had done and went “oh, shit”) and prepared to move some of them home and some of them to an office generously offered by another colleague. It seems that my idea of waiting another year till I was 65 to “retire” and collect 100% of my social security was nixed by the government, who changed the retirement age (100% of benefits) to 66 for people born in my part of the baby boom. In April 2008 I got all the documents together and headed over to the Social Security office to get them to start giving me some, if not 100%, of my money back. I had been working non-stop since I was 15 years old and was tired of it. The sailboat was sounding better and better.

The bookmarks on my web browser started filling up with all things related to sailboats and quite a number of yacht brokers, who described all manner of shiny boats, some with out of control prices. The “sailboat” search on my ebay account also took a jillion hits as I looked at whatever I could find. Lara and I knew that we wanted to live aboard the boat, principally in a harbor in the Keys, but with some extended cruising as we moved more toward retirement and became more comfortable with the limited resources we would have. The following is the mental list that became important to us as we looked for the right boat:

1. I remember a quote from one of my books about sailboats that opined “you’ll never like the way a boat sails if you don’t like the way it looks”. So, number one on the list of what we were looking for was a sailboat that looked good.

2. Since the Keys, Bahamas and Caribbean were going to be the principal cruising and living grounds, the boat needed a shallow draft – less than 5’ was what I went looking for.

3. The boat manufacturer needed to have a reputation for building stout boats. Since we wanted to have the option to do some open water cruising, we wanted a boat that had a reputation for being stout enough to go cruising, not just day sail around the lake somewhere. Of particular help were the websites maintained by groups of owners of boats that we started to be interested in. Most of those people were pretty honest about what they liked and didn’t like about their boat and we took their advice to heart. We were pretty obviously interested in a used boat – most definitely something over 20 years old.

4. Not wanting to spend all of our time working on the boat, the boat needed to be fiberglass, not wood or some other building material.

5. From a living aboard perspective, combined with the idea that we wanted a boat that could be easily sailed by the two of us, as well as a purchase price perspective, we settled on looking for boats in the 30’ – 35’ range.

6. Comfortable berth for the two of us; private head with shower; compact galley and limited sleeping room for guests (we definitely wanted guests to join us, but for them to get tired of the arrangement before we got tired of them) were other things we were looking for.

7. Cost. I can’t count the number of conversations Lara and I had about how to finance this new dream. I shall forever be indebted to her that she kept an open mind, came up with good suggestions and was willing to continue massaging the possibilities until we figured out what to do. Sell the house; refinance the house; sell other properties we have bought during our time here in New Mexico; a dozen possibilities. One thing we knew was that we were planning on coming back to New Mexico for a good part of the year (we truly love our life here in the mountains and our friends and colleagues at work), so we wanted someplace to live when we came back.

8. In line with the item above, it turns out that we had a bit of luck related to cost. We were looking for a boat at precisely the time that the economy headed south. The best advice that we had from the woman who became our “yacht broker”, named Jan, was “if you see a boat you’re interested in, go ahead and make an offer, no matter how ridiculously low it seems to you”. We took her advice to heart when we made our one and only offer.

9. Knowing that we wanted to live with our boat on the hook, as opposed to at the dock, in the Keys, we wanted to buy a boat that was within sailing distance of her proposed home by a couple of novice sailors and didn’t have to be trucked down Rte. 1 to the Keys. So, we were looking for a boat in Florida.

Keeping in mind all of the things above, we began to focus our attention on Endeavour yachts; in the 32’ to 37’ range. As it turned out, we settled on an Endeavour 32, the owner of which was represented by the broker mentioned above, Jan. One of the things that intrigued me about this boat was that it was a one owner boat. When I went down to Florida to see this boat and another, I had an opportunity to meet its owner, Benny. He had been there at the manufacturer in the Tampa Bay area that day in 1978 when the hull of the boat was unmolded (and I am convinced that he had probably been there every day of its construction). He loved that boat and it showed. He knew every square inch of his boat and was more than willing to share all that he knew with this novice (I should say that I have owned two sailboats before this one; a 16’ day sailer that I bought new and a 22’ sailboat that I bought new in the 70’s and sailed on Lake Michigan; Lara’s nautical experience was on power boats in the midwest). Benny had named the boat Eye Quit while looking forward to his future retirement.

I had placed a small refundable deposit on the boat before flying to Tampa to see the “Eye Quit” and called home to have the “this is it” discussion with Lara. Lara’s only comment, “if this is it, go buy it”. Benny is in his 80’s and as the broker’s ad for the boat said, “the owner has completed his voyage and needs to pass on this gem to someone ready to make that journey a reality”. Benny was in love with his boat, but understood the necessity of the timing of passing it on to someone who would enjoy it. The boat had been parked in the canal behind his house for a few years without being sailed. That has caused some minor problems (they all seem major at the time they’re happening), but all in all, the boat is a beauty. My hat is off to Benny for the love he showed that boat over the years.

I returned to Albuquerque with a camera full of pictures and a million questions. Benny always took my phone calls and was patient while describing what needed to be done. Lara and I planned to go back to Tampa a month later to take possession of Eye Quit and to move it to the Keys. More later!

To view the boat and the Yacht Central web site go here: http://yachtcentral.us/yachtcentral/index.html