Felicity Ain't Happy No More

 Felicity Ain't Happy No More

Felicity: the state of being happy, especially in a high degree; bliss:

The Listing broker wrote this description on Yachtworld:
Pride of ownership shows in this 2002 Catalina 36 that has been well maintained and kept in excellent condition throughout the vessel inside and out. She is a capable cruiser and well equipped with Diesel Heat, Dodger and Bimini cover on cockpit with full navigation package and seating at helm station with plenty of room for crew.  She is very clean and her cabin is spacious with a large fold down table in the salon and plenty of seating for quests, full galley,nav station and plenty of storage. There is a large double cabin aft and a forward owners cabin with separate entrance to a spacious head. She is priced to sell and like new condition and if your looking to start cruising now come take a look you will not be disappointed.

Tuesday we drove down to Tacoma to go on the Sea Trial and Survey. We met the Broker, the Owner, and the Surveyor at Tyee Marina on a fine October Morning 

Tyee Marina was described to us as the Marina Time forgot. An old school place where the moorage was cheap.

 Felicity, a 2002 Catalina 36. We were cautiously excited as this sailboat appeared to be in perfect shape and had very little to do to make her our own.

 We motored down the channel early that morning to have the boat hauled out at Hybelos Marina and boat yard. We had to slow down and wait for a tug pulling a log boom.

We squeaked by the log boom, amazing that they have been transporting logs like this for nearly 200 years.

While I was in the cockpit with the brokers and owner, The Admiral was down below with the surveyor. They called me down to see some Cracked fiberglass laminate in forward keel sump (starboard side to).

Along with unexplained weeping abaft the mast step potentially caused by owner reported grounding.

Just as we approached the haul out channel I said "Stop the boat and turn around, we are done". The soft groundings the owner told us about were obviously not so soft. An undetermined amount of work would be required to do this and most likely the keel would have to be removed. A job that cost $20,000- $30,000 or more. John the Surveyor told us that every vessel system on a boat is guilty until proven innocent!

The owner apologized and began to process his own misfortune. We discussed his making a claim with his insurance company and I was very glad it would be a very short motor trip back to the marina. The bridge we had to clear opened immediately and we were soon docked. The Admiral and I wasted no time collecting our stuff and exiting the drama.

On the way home the Admiral mentioned that Felicity is not so happy anymore. I guess that sort of stuck with me. Countless hours spent researching this vessel on the internet, trying to make sure we had all of our questions answered, notepads full of notes, lots of emails, text and calls, scheduling the surveyor and making arrangements with the haul our yard. We were numb to say the least as our third attempt to buy a boat had failed.

About two in the morning my mind would not let me sleep, I decided to turn my stress into a Blues Song. I went into the living room, turned on a light and wrote the following lyrics.

Felicity Ain't Happy No More

Felicity ain't happy

Felicity Ain't happy no more
Felicity Ain't happy

Cause on four dark sailings

Her captain sailed her to close to shore
Sailed her on the rocks once more.

Felicity ain't happy
She's gone away from me
Felicity Ain't happy no more
The thrill is gone away from me
Although, I will still sail on
For I will never
Take Felicity to Sea

Felicity aint happy no more
The Broker aint happy no more
Her captain aint happy no more
Felicity, the Admiral
and I shall sail no more
The thrill is gone

You know I'm free, free now Felicity
I'm free from your spell
Oh free, free, free now baby
I'm Free from your spell
And now that it's over
All we can do is wish you well

Felicity ain't happy

Felicity Ain't happy no more
Felicity Ain't happy no more

Cause on four dark sailings

Her captain sailed her to close to shore
and sailed her on the rocks once more

The lyrics are sung to B.B. King's The Thrill is Gone https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPlsqo2bk2M

Felicity was our third time to make an offer on a vessel here in the Pacific Northwest, and the third vessel to fail. We are certainly learning a lot about all this, one thing is for sure, a lot of people run their boats into the Rocks!

This pic shows a couple of spiral notebooks and couple of small note pads each full of notes from researching the three vessels. Several yacht listings from various brokerages, and other miscellaneous stuff we put together to try hard as we may to learn the history of the vessels as well as all other data including scheduling surveyors and boat yards for haul outs requiring hundreds of emails and text messages. Fortunately in each case we were able to reveal the structural problems just before hauling the boat out. This saved us the expense of hauling the boat out and who knows what all drama that would have brought?

We will take a mental break before getting all worked up to the point of making another offer. But the hunt continues for the "Most Perfect" Pacific Northwest boat.

There is a 38' Ericson in Anacortes, a 37' Jeaneau on Lake Union and a Mainship also on Lake Union. These are our next targets. 

When Puyallup Begins to Sound Normal

When Puyallup Begins to Sound Normal 
You know you have lived in the Pacific Northwest for three years.

Our September in Seattle has been consumed with our continued search for our Pacific Northwest Sailboat. We have pretty much determined a 36' is the best size for our needs but we would not count out a 34', 37', or a 38' if it met our needs and goals for this next vessel. After our offer on the 1981 CS36 ran into an unsolvable issue for us we turned back to searching for a Catalina 36. We found one in Port of Brownsville that was very clean and loaded with updated gear. We made an offer and even went as for as the Sea Trial. During that trip an issue with the keel came up and after a discussion with the yard who did the repair and a engineer at Catalina Yachts in Florida we threw in another towel.

During the sea trial we learned the keel had a repair to the aft end of the keel. Also the yard had torqued the keel bolts to 2X the specifications. After a call to an engineer at Catalina Yachts in Florida we decided to let this one go.

Our strategy was to find what brokers call $50K boats. Vessels in the $40-$60K range. you can expect all of these vessels to need some kind of fix up but we just wanted to avoid any major re-fits. 80% of sailboats have bolt on keels so the keel bots are one of the major areas of concern along with the Mast Step.  We figured that if we could find a boat with good keel bolts and a solid mast step  that only required the small stuff we could spend about $10K additional on it and make the boat the way we like.

We even checked out this Beneteau First 375. The owner had taken very good care of it and it had a newer engine. Even though it was made for racing the accommodations down below were pretty nice. After further thought we let this one slide by the wayside as well, what would we do with 12 sails anyway?

I took a quick look at this one in Tacoma and later brought the Admiral back for a closer look. It had an original engine but it seemed to run ok, We thought if we bought it we would just we just save some boat bucks up and if needed just re-power the boat with a higher HP engine.After closer inspection we discovered this on e had one of the major issues.

After this experience we decided to leave the 80's behind. Catalina stopped using wood in the mast step after 1989 so that would keep us from having to deal with mast compression issues. The Admiral became more pro-active and started calling Brokers we had worked with to let them know exactly what we were looking for and to please notify us when they knew of a boat coming on the market. One Broker told her of a 2002 that had not been listed yet but he could show it to us. 

After seeing this vessel for the first time we made an offer. The vessel had just one owner and was immaculate. 

There are several different types of boat evaluations: there is Market Value, Insured Value, and Replacement Value. Those are the official of business end of evaluations. Then there are the subjective evaluations, Like the listed price which is some type of derived price between the owner and the yacht broker. Then there is the Buyers price which is derived from the past experience of the buyer and how savvy he or she is in dealing with all the various players in the purchase of a boat. The selling price is determined by the constant jockeying of the players sort of like a large group of gulls fighting over a single squid.
I use BucValue.com to determine the  market value. It is the same site Brokers use as well. I like BucValue since it gives a range of values based on the condition of the vessel. I also use a free service to BoatUS members on the BoatUS site. It is good to have an idea of the "insured value" since you do not want to be to far above the insured value of the vessel. Of course this is fully determined at a Condition and Value Survey but since Boat US is a major insurer of boats across the US they give a pretty close estimate, however, their value is always lower than BucValue. Using this and the knowledge that most vessels are marked 5% - 10% above market value on yachtworld,  you can come to a pretty close number of plane old "value". I was willing to go a little higher on the 2002 C36 for more than one reason. Especially since bringing a boat up from California could add $3500 to the bill. However it seems the owner and I could not see eye to eye on this one and it will take a buyer with deeper pockets or less boat sense to by this one.

We did a lot of other stuff in September in and around Seattle but right now I am just headed out the door to look at some more boats at some brokers on Lake Union.

Seattle August 2016 or Not Summer

While the Admiral was in Texas I drove down to Tacoma to see this Catalina 36 I found for sale on the C36 Owners site at  Foss Harbor Marina. It was pretty clean

But it had the Original engine and the owner who only owned the vessel for a year had no Idea how many hours were on the Universal.

While I was down there I also drove over to the Tacoma Yacht club to check out a trawler in a boat house. These boat houses are self contained barges and individually  owned by the boat owners.

They just hook them up to the dock with chains, and if they go to some other marina they just have a work boat tow the whole thing to the next spot!

A Southern Transplant for sure, the owners Admiral that is.

At first look I was very interested in this little ship.

This was the Trawler Straw that broke the Trawler Dreams Back.

They all have automated curtains that raise and lower with a remote.

A Tacoma View of Mt. Rainier.

Fleet Week but I have already been on lots of war ships, so I passed this one up.

But this one looks interesting, I never made it back for the tour.

August is the Height of Cruise Ship Season, There are 6 ships that cycle through here on a weekly basis.

Pokemaon Go is going crazy just a few days after it's debut.

I wondered why this Alaskan Fishing vessel was headed for the Port of Seattle, maybe to fuel up?

Usually the fuel barge comes to them, perhaps she is going to a terminal for repairs.

Nope, by that night Katie Ann was headed out of the Strait to Alaska I am sure.

This is every day stuff, several times in a 24 hour period two tugs towing a ship into port.

Finally Puffins Boiler is fixed and she is being readied for Public Sail!

These were the winds for Drew's 1st Sail. We departed at ten and he took the helm for the entire downwind leg to Gas Works Park., and then I Sailed us back to weather as the winds increased and he loved going FAST!

"I got this!"

They must have drove up from Austin.

Groovin on some Reggae, 

The Thursday evening Free concert's all all August Long at the SAM Sculpture Gardens, just two blocks away.
See: https://youtu.be/PcphhUmIChY

Then on Every Friday evening in August you just walk two blocks the other direction.
See: https://youtu.be/NVK9aPNBpOM

We are so incredibly Proud of our FIRST Grandaughter who lives in Austin and is starting her Jr. year in High School. She was in LA with her dad checking out USC for future reference.

Yet one More Amazon building going up.

Those segments are really big when your just a few feet from them.

Takes one small and one medium crane to build the big one.

These boys have put up and taken down so many cranes in Seattle in the last three years this is like building Legos.

That day is coming sooner or later.

Our Marina Eagle Harbor...sooner or later.

We have been wanting to return to Port Orchard. We docked Wand'rin Star just on the inside of this dock for our first Seatrial.

It is not exactly the way we remembered it but we were in a very different state of mind then.

Just across from Port Orchard is the Bremerton Navel Ship Yards, Way bigger from this perspective.

There are about three old Carrier type vessels over their, When we drove around to Bremerton to catch the Ferry you could tell they were long ago decommissioned and just being used for parts.

Takes a brave soul to take an old tug and turn it into the family cruiser.

We stooped by our marina to see how the new owners were coming along., Wow here is a creative way to make yourself a dingy dock out of PVC.

Our next Vessel will be moored in the slip right in front of that trawler.

Along the Gulf of Mexico you needed to keep a $100 worth of quarters to do the Laundry, up here you need them for the Showers. These Islands seem to be short on H2O.

Drew getting ready for his second Sail.

Seattle August 2016 

Or Not Summer in Seattle 2016. Our first two summers here had warm to even Hot July and August days. This year there were just a very few of those mid 80's to low 90-91 type days. That was just fine with us since the temps were more like 65 to low 70's and we do not have AC so sleeping at night was not bad at all this Not summer. Usually on the weekends there would be very little wind to teach sailing. This year there was always wind and plenty of it. The cooler days brought on by small weather systems moving through really providing perfect sailing days.
Big "D" went for his first and second sail and I was not surprised when he took the tiller and sailed all the way to the North end of Lake Union with just verbal prompts on a broad reach. He has now learned the verbal commands for tacking and jibing.
The boat hunting really heated up though as we kept busy every weekend trying to search out our next vessel. We even found one that looked just right so we made an offer on a CS 36 over n Liberty Bay. After several trips to Pouslbo the vessel failed the best intentions to buy her. The good thing though is a new vessel popped up on Yachtworld in the Port of Brownsville.
Syringa looks promising.