Recently I had a day of work due to having a full blown cold, which was doing the rounds at work, I don’t often take time of work being self employed. I had been in bed from the early hours and I was wide awake by 3.30 in the morning. A copy of Multihull review had been delivered the day before, a British magazine, which is specific to multihull boats.
One of the articles was about the Southampton boat show and the La Rochelle boat show, both of which were on at the same time. The article goes on to explain about an offer running at the show from Fountaine Pajot, due to the fact that Lagoon had also come up with a boat show deal on it’s 380 S2 range making it very competitive against the Mahe. Fountaine Pajot’s reaction to this, which is said to be unheard of, was to create a boat show package to compete with the offer from Lagoon.
Back in June when we placed our order for the boat, we were willing to wait and see if any offers did actually come out at the boat shows. Carl from M.I. Cats clearly explained to us that Fountaine Pajot have never before created a boat show package, therefore there no reason to wait for the boat show. So, we paid out 10 percent deposit on the understanding that should there be a boat show deal that we would be eligible for the offer.
After reading the article, I was soon in contact with Karen from M.I. Cats to try and get further information. Karen confirmed that there had been a show offer which started only at the end of the Southampton Boat Show.
The offer was the Mahe with additional extras thrown in for free…!
The additional extras are:
Additional Water Tank
Lazy Bag
Folding Props
Bimini Top
Dinghy Davits
Holding Tank
2.7m Dinghy
6hp Outboard
Antifouling
E-pack 1 (Instruments, GPS, VHF)
After a couple of conversations with Karen, it was soon established that we could take up the boat offer if we wanted it.
Now then, you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to work out what the answer was.
Basically, it is 20,236.00 Euros of additional equipment, we would have to waver our previously agreed discount of 5 thousand Euros and accept the boat show price of 176 thousand Euros for the package, against the original price of 173 thousand Euros, 168 thousand with the discount.
We are both pleased with our new additions to the boat, some of the options are very nice but not a must have, now we have the best of both worlds.
The other options we are going to add to our list, to bring the boat up to our specification are:
220Volt System
1 x 12/220V 500W Inverter
Spifurl Bowsprit & Gear
2 additional Jammers next to current ones on the helm
Raymarine electronics as discussed with Didier at Pochon
Hopefully, Pochon will swap out the E-pack option for the equivalent Raymarine kit.
The above should now bring the boat up to a very high specification.
This month has gone really quickly for us both and it now feels as though we are on the home straight.
Won’t be long now…!
Sunday, 23 December 2007
Saturday, 22 December 2007
Merry Christmas!
Well the last big milestone is here and I think that the reality is very slowly starting to dawn that this will be our last Christmas in the UK for quite sometime. Kevin went to his last Christmas party at the company he has worked with for the last 12 years last night (and has been recovering since!). I even almost took a picture of the frosty white ground outside to keep as reminder on the way round.
I still find that because I cannot tell anyone in the office yet that the reality only really hits home at weekends when Kevin and I continue our preparations. Whereas for Kevin it is getting extremely near as the 3 months to the end of his contract and the collection of the boat will I’m sure, be here sooner than we know it once we get through the New Year. Christmas seems really to have crept up on me this year, despite being organised for the first time ever and having bought every present on the internet a few weeks ago, now it is here I’m beginning to panic a bit that there must be more that we should be doing in order to get ready.
However, I guess the main update since our last post is that we have decided to make life easier by moving the wedding to Sunday 10th Aug. Ironically, the only weekend date available on HMS Warrior (the venue) and coincidentally the end of my contract (the previous date was the end of Kevin’s). The main aim of this replan is that we will literally be sailing off into the sunset the day after the wedding (weather permitting!). This now gives Kevin four clear months to prep the boat for our trip, we are even contemplating bringing it back to the UK briefly to make that job simpler and reduce the amount of time we have to spend apart. We are great believers in fate and we hadn’t paid the deposit on the previous booking because things just weren’t lining up as planned, this way works out better all round. The deposit though is now paid for Warrior and the Registrar and caterers booked – there surely can’t be much more to it can there?!
We are now able to space out nicely the preparations and it allows us to concentrate on the immediate requirements for the boat. It is very difficult to plan what goes on board when the boat is not in front of you to measure up etc, so we are aiming to only buy those things which are required for delivery before we collect e.g. liferafts etc. We are planning to do this shopping during the period of the London Boat Show in the New Year in case there are any deals available. We haven’t bothered with Christmas presents for each other this year with all of that to buy soon, to be honest there is nothing else that either of us wants now but the delivery of the boat!!!
So, Merry Christmas one and all, especially to family and friends who are kindly reading the updates to our progress and to those friends we have not yet met who are kind enough to contact us and wish us well in our ventures. I hope that the festive season brings much cheer to all (but I hope you’ll forgive us for yearning for a somewhat warmer one next year which will, we hope be spent in the Caribbean!).
I still find that because I cannot tell anyone in the office yet that the reality only really hits home at weekends when Kevin and I continue our preparations. Whereas for Kevin it is getting extremely near as the 3 months to the end of his contract and the collection of the boat will I’m sure, be here sooner than we know it once we get through the New Year. Christmas seems really to have crept up on me this year, despite being organised for the first time ever and having bought every present on the internet a few weeks ago, now it is here I’m beginning to panic a bit that there must be more that we should be doing in order to get ready.
However, I guess the main update since our last post is that we have decided to make life easier by moving the wedding to Sunday 10th Aug. Ironically, the only weekend date available on HMS Warrior (the venue) and coincidentally the end of my contract (the previous date was the end of Kevin’s). The main aim of this replan is that we will literally be sailing off into the sunset the day after the wedding (weather permitting!). This now gives Kevin four clear months to prep the boat for our trip, we are even contemplating bringing it back to the UK briefly to make that job simpler and reduce the amount of time we have to spend apart. We are great believers in fate and we hadn’t paid the deposit on the previous booking because things just weren’t lining up as planned, this way works out better all round. The deposit though is now paid for Warrior and the Registrar and caterers booked – there surely can’t be much more to it can there?!
We are now able to space out nicely the preparations and it allows us to concentrate on the immediate requirements for the boat. It is very difficult to plan what goes on board when the boat is not in front of you to measure up etc, so we are aiming to only buy those things which are required for delivery before we collect e.g. liferafts etc. We are planning to do this shopping during the period of the London Boat Show in the New Year in case there are any deals available. We haven’t bothered with Christmas presents for each other this year with all of that to buy soon, to be honest there is nothing else that either of us wants now but the delivery of the boat!!!
So, Merry Christmas one and all, especially to family and friends who are kindly reading the updates to our progress and to those friends we have not yet met who are kind enough to contact us and wish us well in our ventures. I hope that the festive season brings much cheer to all (but I hope you’ll forgive us for yearning for a somewhat warmer one next year which will, we hope be spent in the Caribbean!).
Sunday, 2 December 2007
Ugrib
One of the good things about running a blog is that from time to time you make contact with like mined people, guess that is the point of running a blog.
The other day we received an email from Steve Hayles who turns out to be the author and developer behind Ugrib the weather forecasting software, which I have been using for some time now and I think it’s brilliant!
Steve has informed me that the software is written and serviced from the UK. So apologies from my last mention of this as I described them as a bunch of American sailor / developers.
Steve comes from Christchurch on the South Coast of England and is a professional racing navigator. It’s good to know that the person behind the development of a product has a very clear understanding of its requirements.
Below is a link to Steve site, which is not bad either.
http://www.grib.us/Home/tabid/36/Default.aspx
Steve keep up the good work and I will be keeping a close eye on Ugrib, which as far as I concerned is the find of the century.
The other day we received an email from Steve Hayles who turns out to be the author and developer behind Ugrib the weather forecasting software, which I have been using for some time now and I think it’s brilliant!
Steve has informed me that the software is written and serviced from the UK. So apologies from my last mention of this as I described them as a bunch of American sailor / developers.
Steve comes from Christchurch on the South Coast of England and is a professional racing navigator. It’s good to know that the person behind the development of a product has a very clear understanding of its requirements.
Below is a link to Steve site, which is not bad either.
http://www.grib.us/Home/tabid/36/Default.aspx
Steve keep up the good work and I will be keeping a close eye on Ugrib, which as far as I concerned is the find of the century.
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