Boat Pickup and Delivery

[newlazydays]

Just a delivery story.


Back in the early 90s I flew to Panama to be the engineer on a "75 foot motor yacht" for a delivery trip back to Florida. We crossed to Colon by taxi and arrived close to midnight. It was pouring with rain, so by the time we got to the boat we were soaked. The 75 feet had shrunk to 55 feet and the boat that were about to trust our lives with was certainly no deep sea, rough seas boat. As we stood there debating if we should pack it in and go home there was automatic gun fire somewhere behind the club house. Suddenly the boat looked damned good to us and we hurried to board!


We did get it back to Florida without too much trouble!

[Lauderdaler]

Do yourself a favor and look up SV Delos. Brian is my cousin and has been cruising the world on his 53' Amel and has documented the entire equivalent of three circumnavigations. Some 80k nautical miles, there isn't an ocean he hasn't crossed or island he likely has not vsited.
More importantly and specifically relevant is that he has done so very intelligently and incredibly. For your purpose he has a significant following and has done many educational episodes and has exactly what you want, lists, tips, advice and more, an open line to him and his considerable experience and rock solid insight.

Do yourself a favor and visit his site and get into his YouTube videos... i dare say youll thank me for turning you on to this .

SV Delos

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by Auspicious

Really having trouble wrapping my head around eight crew. I've done big crews before. They've all been as much training as staffing. In a COVID-19 world extra bodies are moving parts that could go wrong. I'd go with four. I could be talked into five if a good, experienced underway cook was found. There would be a test. Too many people think they can cook and mac & cheese comes out of a blue box. *sigh*

Hey Auspicious, how about an experienced underway bartender as the fifth mate? As to a test, would you like that neat or on the rocks? Shaken or stirred?

[Auspicious]

Originally Posted by Montanan

Hey Auspicious, how about an experienced underway bartender as the fifth mate? As to a test, would you like that neat or on the rocks? Shaken or stirred?

Now we're circling back to the boy's cruise version. *grin* I would have to sub out the test for that. I'm a man of simple tastes. Interested? I'll meet you at the Table of Wisdom at Boca Marina, Bocas del Toro Panama. I'm a member - just ask for me.

I have done big crews. Unfortunately a bartender position didn't every occur to me. Based on how one of my mentors operated and with permission from the owner (who has to foot the food bill for extra mouths) I'll take less experienced crew. I see it as a combination of paying it forward for people who have helped me over many years and a self-serving investment in the future.

Eight heads would be me, three watchstanders, three bridge watches, and a cook. "Full crew" for me is four. Bridge watches overlap two watchstanders so with watchs 12-4, 4-8, 8-12 the bridge watchs are 2-6, 6-10, 10-2. That means the less experienced crew get one-on-one time with two watchstanders and with me. Chance at the end for a full crew sit down for after action discussion. The logistics pulling that kind of thing off go up, particularly at international borders, stowing provisions, and avoiding having three people doing a one person job which slows progress. This works best on bigger boats. Big Swans set up for offshore racing with blue and gold crews work great.

Story: sitting around the salon of a big boat with a big crew waiting for the tide so we could get over the sill many years ago someone asked what everyone brought. This was before smartphones with GPS. Running around the room and counting what was on the boat we had something like eleven handheld VHF radios and nine GPS receivers. Got to me and they asked what I had. I brought an immersion "stick" blender. Guess what we used? *grin* That experience was the genesis of my "topic of the day" email to crew in the couple of weeks leading up to departure. There is one email that focuses on what to bring and what not to.