Indiantown Florida USA, 12 february 2006
2:nd letter, overseas bank wire transfers and boat preparations
After arriving to Miami in late afternoon we headed for IndianTown in our rental car. Once there we asked for the marina that nobody seemed to know about. After several roaddirections we found it and it was with a bit nervous feeling combined with excitement we finally entered Indiantown Marina. Our minds were full of questions and thoughts; what's the boat going to look like, is it really there, what’s the condition and so on. We went to the marina office and asked for Martin, the broker of Bond Yacht Sales that we had been in contact with over the phone from Sweden. Martin came driving in his big 4 wheeler and it was time to give Windwalker a visit! Martin was a big nice friendly guy with large beard that meet up with us, I guess he was just as surprised as we were that we really were here. We jumped into his car and took of towards Windwalker.
The first impression of the boat, a Hallberg-Rassy Monsun 31, was that it’s really nice and a gem (as in the ad), but after paying the surveyor a lot of money the feeling was not totally perfect and satisfying. We realised quickly after paying him that this was going to cost a lot to get this boat project going. He also maid us nervous by asking questions about US customs and leaving the country. In this uncertainty and mixture of all feelings the owner of the boat showed up. A man with wavy hair introduced himself as Terry. After a shorter conversation on the boat with this easygoing man we realised that Windwalker is the perfect boat for us, safe and strong. Terry and his wife Marcia have had the boat for 24 years and done a whole lot of things on the boat, really taking good care of it. We decided to go for the boat, and with confidence we called Dan up in Sweden and asked him to fax the letter of acceptance. It’s just the payment left (which turned out to be a tough one) before Windwalker is ours!
There are many things to know about a boat, and Terry started right away telling us everything about the boat. We spent a couple of days with both Terry and Marcia to cover it all. We also got a huge list of things to buy and look up, which also made things much easier for us. During these days together with Terry and Marcia we hade a great time. We will especially miss Terrys fishing and shark stories. We wish the best to both of you, and thanks a lot for your patience and help!
After closing on the boat, which turned out to be a nightmare due to overseas bank transfers from two different people making mistakes and a bank having technical problems for almost 2 days, we moved Windwalker to the work yard. After 2 days of hard work with scraping, sanding and federing the boat was finally ready to get some paint on it. This was all new to us as well, and we got a lot of help from everybody in the work yard and especially from Kelly the “dock master”, which is the boss of the Marina. It’s a short cool woman helping us with everything and keeping our starving bellies full. Cheers to you Kelly, without your help we would be stuck in the work yard forever! The bottom painting is now done and tomorrow we are doing the launch. Believe it or not, we are now ready to raise our sails and head for the Bahamas!
/Jonas and Fredrik
