Buying Grace: Survey and Move to SMN Grimaud

Survey

Audrey and I returned for our third trip to the Grimaud/St Tropez area.

Now we met the owner and looked over every inch of the boat (still untidy) with the surveyor. The owner spoke no English (not that I expected him to) and my French is basic at best but we got by. We asked 100 questions. We got 100 answers with the owner, surveyor and Frank the broker in attendance.

Grace (not called Grace at this time!) was lifted and pressure washed off for hull tap testing and inspection. No osmosis, no grounding. I was amazed at how clean the hull was.

Trial sail in Hyeres bay. Smooth engine! Quite boat, quiet power. This is no Dufour (sorry).

I tacked the boat a few times. We had some F4 wind so nice to see how everything worked under pressure. The running rigging was a bit of a mess. Sail trim was way out. Furling systems all worked faultlessly. Electric winch made everything easy for Audrey. Stupid sailing biminy in the way of all winches and sight lines of the rig (that came off quickly!).

Grace's Old Sails . Now in the bin! We got a season!

Sails were the original UK Sailmakers laminate jobs. They where "working" but delaminating internally and mildew stained. UV'd to death. I knew these would be good for a season only for us.

I have the full survey, down to the engine oil analysis. I will sum it up with the Surveyors parting comment to me that day: "If you do not buy this boat, I buy the boat".






Long story short over the next few weeks. VAT status paperwork complete. French legal stuff including Act De Vente (final sale agreement). Proof of French de-registration done, all handled by Frank at SMN. A heap of money transferred meeting stupid deadlines imposed by pissed owner (as I said.. he remained that way throughout).

Grace Goes to Port Grimaud

Mark and Ashley. RS400 Racing

The deal was completed. Myself and Ashley (close friend, discovered sailing recently) returned for my 4th visit right at the close of November 2015 hoping for a weather window to sail Grace back from Hyeres onto the hard at SMN's yard for winter works and preparation for 2016 transport back to the UK.

When we returned, Mr Pissed Owner has striped a few things off that I would have assumed should stay on. Some of the details are minor, and to the letter of the law they were not on the inventory of sale.

Note to self... next time I survey a boat (maybe never!) I would demand that the owner accept that anything I find goes on my inventory that he signs.... If you don't want me to have it, get it off my boat pre survey.....

Its not all work :-)

The main bone of contention was a nice (and expensive) carbon access ramp. We had discussed this very thing with the broker who indicated that it was staying. Yet it was off the boat (actually tied to the boat next door!). Short of stealing it back, what could I do? Audrey would have exploded on the spot but she was not here.

Mr owner wanted us to tow his solid bottom tender back to Grimaud so SMN could sell it for him. I untied it and left it for him on his berth. That was the only payback I could return. I'm not your taxi.

The sail to Grimaud with Ashley and Frank was perfect. F4/F5 downwind in bright sunshine.
Ashley and I had our first experience of sailing a proper blue water boat in some proper swell with pressure. A Najad 380 is very different to a Dufour 380 :-)

Goosewinged on the pole. Smiles all round. We arrived in the dark. Frank is a top sailor. He knows St Tropez and PG like the back of his hand (as do we now!).

By the end of the sail we had blown the UV strip off the genoa. The sails were going to need some serious love over the winter. That and other jobs......

Grace was lifted onto the hard at SMN, Port Grimaud. Ashley and I tidied her up. We took a detailed inventory and threw away a lot of junk. There was some celebration.

One of my favourite's is a drunk and "reasonably new to yachting" Ashley trying to remember my knot lesson (sorry Ashley!).

Home for the winter

Buying Grace: Doing the deal

Port Grimaud. Home of SMN

Port Grimaud (PG) on the coast is one of these "make believe" faux Venice yacht havens with waterside villa's and boats parked outside. My dad calls this sort of thing "never never land". Actually as far as these things go, this is quite a nice established and weathered version of "the dream" and the South of France sunshine can shed a sharp beautifying light on anything.

The Real Grimaud

Grimaud for real (inland) is a most fantastic medieval town built own a hill. We had a great time and would have loved the area even if we had not scored the boat. St Tropez around the corner, quiet sunshine at the end of the season and French food. Audrey knew this was a trick to go see a boat but it was one of my better tricks.

We met Frank running sales at the local PG broker SMN www.smn-port-grimaud.com 

It turned out that SMN was more than just a broker with a full service boat yard, stores, woodworking and a Hamblesque set of supporting yacht industries surrounding. A little hive of activity that would become a home to us for a while in 2016.

Mark and frank at SMN

I do business and I know people. People are what make business work and it was obvious to me that Frank (sales) and Patrick (tech and service/refit boss) were people that you can trust. From that point forward, it was not nessesarily going to be "easy" (mainly due to a difficult owner!) but we felt in safe hands.

Grace as we found her

We visited the boat with Frank in Hyeres. Audrey and I arrived early and found the boat. We had figured out where it was from pictures. First thing, decks looked great. But the boat was clearly a bit neglected, a bit dirty and pretty much everything topside was cooked by UV. This is the South of France. The other effect is brown sand contamination in everything! This

stuff blows across the med from Africa and then comes down with the rain.


Later down below we found an untidy boat with signs of recent "un-love" but all on the surface. The owner had obviously been very fastidious in the past. I had manuals on everything files, history. I could see through the surface grime. This was a very nice boat. The history made sense. Divorce. Second wife... second wife hated sailing. Sailing children all grown up and left home, moved away. Failing health. No sailing. Neglected boat.

Clean... very clean.

760 engine hours on a 10 year old boat! You could eat a meal off the inside of the engine and generator bay. Good Raymarine electronics, Radar, generator, bow thrusters. Its a buyer.

This boat is not selling here. Its expensive as a second hand boat in the Mediterranean scene. It is not a large white "plastic fantastic". Northern European sailors get off on teak decks, Scandinavian workmanship, heavy keels, oversized rigging. The latin mentality .. white teeth, sunglasses and "mine is bigger than yours"! This Najad 380 is a fish out of water here.









Our owner is pissed off. He remained pissed off at every stage of the deal. He already had a strop on because he felt he was selling too low. One year pervious he had had a chance to sell at a bigger number but pulled out, wanting an even bigger number. Frank at SMN knew all the history. He had sold the boat new in the first place and was really trying to work with his clients best interest in mind, as well as ours.

Tidy Electronics

We had no ability to horse trade the price (we tried). Our owner was snarling at the bottom of his pit. At the time (pre Brexit vote) we had the £ to Euro riding high. Audrey is skilled in currency buying through her experience at work and we had the best possible exchange rate running in our favour. We had the Euros locked in if we needed them.

Audrey is not good at being forgiving of inflexible people. It becomes a red rag to her bull. I ended up in the middle with Frank trying to do a good deal. The right deal. We knew the exchange rate was not going to last. In the end we sucked it up and settled at the asking price with SMN helping with some cost price offers of the boat yard services we would need later.

We left France with a deal in principal subject to survey and trial sail.
Nothing is certain here. The owner has "previous" rep on backing out.

I found a French surveyor. Early November booked in for a two day trip back to Hyeres.....

Buying Grace: Signpost to France

Audrey is a brave lady

2015 and a lot is going on in our lives. At the end of Feb Audrey had an operation to donate a kidney to our son-in-law. Thats a long story in itself but it was all successful. Both are healthy and doing well.

We were looking to sailing more and had already committed to start with Flexisail www.flexisail.com on Riversong (a Dufour 380) out of Port Hamble as soon as Audrey was feeling well enough. We started that journey at the end of April 2015, stepping on Riversong for 2 days of training and orientation.

Flexisail. Top People

We were going to trial a year of sailing based in The Solent to make sure we could flex our lives around the agenda of a boat.

Audrey and I had done a bunch of charter together in Greece and Turkey with a fair amount of tidal stuff in the UK. We were green but growing in confidence. We still are green and growing in confidence! 

With us both looking at a 3 year taper to early retirement at 55 we both needed and were looking forward alternative narratives in our lives to replace the work scene. Flexisail and Riversong provided a good test bed for these ideas.

Audrey on Riversong

It all happened more quickly than either of us suspected it would. It was largely my fault! I enjoyed walking the marinas as we travelled about on Riversong looking at other peoples boats and chatting to owners. It became obvious to me that the "Hallberg Rassy" type of centre cockpit (CC) boat was the one that made me stop and stare for longest. 

Unknown to Audrey at this time, I already had a complex net browser bookmark system detailing features of CC boats including HR, Najad, Malo, Moody, Island Packet, C-Yacht. I was researching.....

You know this image! Classic Najad 380 Stock Photo

I had one of these intense "stop and stare" marina moments where I was transfixed by the lines of a boat and its deck layout asking myself "now what is this?". Turns out it was a Najad 380. Beefy rigging, hard glass cockpit, teak decks, not too big, not too small ... weak knees! I went and got Audrey and we both stood looking at it. An emotional deal was done. That was the boat. Never seen inside one at this point!

This was accelerating. 

The list of things that you should 100% not do to keep control at this point are:

• Don't go to Berthon in Lymington and have a look round their stuff. That is bad. Very bad.
• DeValk brokers in Holland. Stay off that website! Don't register for boat emails!
• yachtworld.co.uk is just really bad for you because you now have a world view of bad things.
• Do not go down below when invited on a HR 42 or HR 39.
• Absolutely do not go to Chichester to see a lovely man with a very expensive and mint Najad 380 for sale that you cannot afford.

The last one did it for Audrey. She loved the boat (Najad 380 called Starfish in Chichester). The layout below, the kitchen area and its separation from the main centre cabin. The rear bedroom for us. The length of the forward cabin for guests. The winter cover for the cockpit. She decided that N380 for her was big enough but not too big. She was not intimidated by it. That was an important moment for us because we arrived on the same page. 

Bad Decks. Nasty. Expensive

So.. long story short. We looked at plenty of HR 42's, generally for what we could afford, they were all a bit tired and you could smell the money pit as you went on the boats.

We eliminated the HR39 in the end as I can't sit behind the wheel and keep my kneecaps. We can't afford Malo boats (simple).

So many of the "more affordable" HR's have decks that look like a future nightmare to me....

I kept bringing Audrey back to HR42 or HR43 but she was basically intimidated by them. Too Big.

The Moody 42 is very cool for the money and we very nearly pulled the trigger with Alan at Berthon.

In the end we went to France.

I had spotted a "fish out of water" (don't look at yachtworld, I said this already!). A Najad 380 in Hyeres, round the corner from St Tropez South of France. 

I "constructed" a late September 2015 1 week holiday in the Port Grimaud area where the broker was based (SMN). Audrey saw straight through it and sussed out that this was all an excuse to go see another boat! 

The next post will tell that story but needless to say we got to know the Port Grimaud area quite well through late 2015 and spring 2016!