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REAL MOUNTIE

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Last Activity: 18-08-2019 14:53

About Me

About REAL MOUNTIE

Vessel Make/ model

PILGRIM 40

Vessel Name

REAL MOUNTIE

Location

Bromont, Quebec, Canada

Occupation

RCMP Staff-Sergeant (retired)

Interests

Sailing, boating, Volunteering

Biography

My wife Lise and I had lived respectively a long and exciting careers. We wanted a new way of living in seeking a pleasure craft that could provide us the ultimate retirement adventure, an alternative home and a memorable summer residence as a reward to our hard-working and successful life.

Current retirement alternatives do not offer much to those who have achieved something in their life and are just ready to be put out to pasture.

We had a need for a boat that could put a sense of freedom into our retirement adventure. There is a camaraderie in a boating community that is non-existant in a cement high-rise cities and or suburb.

Our need was also to become more involved the heartbeat of life as we are more aware of Mother Nature and her ever-changing moods something you lose with big cities.

We needed more that a summer cottage so we bought a condominium for Skiing during the snow season and we wanted to buy a kind of a Canal Barge like a Boataminium for the rest of the year.
As a Sea Cadet I have sailed since the age of 14 then became a Sailing Instructor at Cornwallis Base in N.S. during the summer as a Navy Reserve Second-Lieutenant.

Since then I chartered sailboats until 1995 and around 2001 I was tired with the handling of huge headsails, getting soaked wet in an open cockpit and living in a expensive submarine, all this at a 15 degree heel. After a 3 year of research, we made that eccentric choice : Buy a Boat with Confidence in order to find a liveaboard for that ultimate retirement experience in order to escape the jungle of traffic, jammed bridges, construction, concrete and asphalt of big cities like Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

We wanted a Boat that fits our needs and this is why we are so grateful to Doug and Brenda Dawson for all their publications that educated us in finding the appropriate boat.

Doug, Brenda thank you for helping us to make the appropriate choice in order to realize our dream!
NOTE: We had to refer to First Mate 101 in order to resolve issues that could turn the Dream into Nightmare...

With those publications we have interpreted our Research into Reality. We then established all the criteria for safety, economy, character, comfort, style and why not grace. We were attracted by a classic look Motor Yacht that did not look like a Clorox bottle or Wedding cake type of Motor Yacht (No offence to anyone who choose Low maintenance and Bigger budget Yacht).

We did not want high performance as we have worn out the thrill of rattling our kidneys and our dishes. We wanted to save our pocketbook in keeping our fuel tanks filled so we would spend it visiting area to discover. Comfort was a personal choice. We wanted to equate comfort with pleasure and enjoyment. This is one of the area's that occupied most our our research and study. We don't enjoy weathering through a storm although we did encounter some bad weather and put up with Mother Nature during our trip from Fort Pierce to Lake Champlain.