The start of it all...

When we decided to put our life plans on hold and make a new last-minute plan to sail the oceans of the world for three years, we trawled the interwebs for advice on what to do, how to do it, and why.  What we found were several YouTube channels of couples who had decided to quit the rat race, sell everything and sail around the world – and they made it look glamourous, they made it look easy and it just helped to validate our decisions.  What most of these YouTube cowboys left out were the dirty, hard, grueling, frankly miserable hours and days that would pass between the occasional highs that come from a sailing life. At least so far….

I will tell you that we bought this boat and this lifestyle with eyes wide open, especially Dara, since she has glimpsed this existence before. We sealed the deal on the Lagoon 440 - Elektra I, knowing that it was a sadly neglected puppy, but one that with all the love and attention we were willing to pile in, would become a faithful companion for as long as we needed. And so, it transpired…we had an aggressive plan to start living on the boat immediately we closed, around January 10^th, and then spend maybe 6-7 weeks refitting, carrying out all the essential work needed to make this a safe, comfortable, and frankly beautiful vessel to make our dreams a reality.

But we had no idea.

Really.

How hard it would be.

The first thing on the agenda was a battery bank, the heart of the beast.  When we surveyed the boat, the existing sealed lead acid battery bank was so old and tired it couldn’t even power the salon lights.  I had researched a great deal on this subject and knew that lithium batteries, similar to the ones used in electric cars these days, were the way to go.  We opted for 900 Ah of battery power – that’s three 300 Ah Lithium batteries wired in parallel to give us the ability to supply 900 Amps for an hour, or 300 Amps for three hours. It’s a huge capacity no matter how you look at it, and was a steal at $13,000. Ouch.  But that’s just the start. To feed this hungry monster we needed a large generator on board – luckily the one already present is a good one – a Cummins Onan 11.5 Kw diesel that purrrrrrrrs.  Then we had a small solar panel already, but we added four 160W flexible panels that generate up to 25 Amps of continuous charge when the sun shines. On top of this we bought upgraded fancy alternators for the twin diesel propulsion engines that will provide 180 Amps of charge when motoring. In terms of power consumption, we are pretty demanding – we have reverse osmosis watermaker, a washing machine, a dishwasher (we don’t use it much), a water heater, electric winches, electric toilets, induction hotplates, toasters, electric kettles, TV, computers argghhhhhhh my head is exploding!!!!!!! 

All in all, a complicated arrangement that allows us to stay off the grid for extended periods – in fact as long as we wish.  The engineer in me loved designing and executing this part.

Next on the long list was the standing rigging – an essential safety part of the boat.  Catamaran india is 10 years old, bless her, and we knew that the standing rigging should be replaced every ten years so budgeted that into our numbers.  The standing rigging is the stainless steel wires and fittings that brace and hold the mast upright against the incredibly powerful winds that drive the boat along.  Don’t underestimate the forces at play and the importance of a serviceable rig.  When you are crossing the Pacific Ocean in the middle of the night and a 40 knot squall comes from nowhere you might think about what would happen if the mast broke – but if your rig is new, you’ll worry a little less.

Anchor and chain. The photo below shows the sorry state of the rust-welded mess of chain we found on the boat.  We had fun cutting it into sections and pulling it out of the chain locker with the main halyard – the new chain weighs almost 800 lb and is essential for safe anchoring and sleeping at night.

Sails – the things that power the boat forward – these were ten years old and tired, so we found a great sailmaker in Rolly Tasker/National Sails that would fabricate a new mainsail and Genoa (the fore-sail) for india. We had the sails made in a sail loft in Thailand in hi-tech 10.88 oz Dacron and finished in the US.  Oddly we still haven’t fitted our mainsail, it sits in its bag in the cockpit waiting for a really calm day, but we fitted our Genoa today and it looks fantastic!! It has a beautiful blue Sunbrella coating to protect it from the UV and I can’t wait for you to see it.  Dara and I celebrated its hoisting with a tasty rum cocktail, as one should.

Next on the list was a couple of major, and important tasks – sanding and painting the hulls, and overhauling the sail drives (he main transmission units that drive the propellers).  Both tasks that we knew we needed from the pre-purchase survey, but required a haul-out.  So, we sailed from Fort Lauderdale to Palm Beach – our first real sail on our new boat, and not without some drama (another story) to Cracker Boy boatyard, where we were to spend probably the most miserable three weeks of our lives.

During that three weeks, we sanded the bottom of both hulls, primed and painted the same, completed the installation of air conditioning, had the sail drives removed and rebuilt, and made a trip to the UK to visit family including the imminent arrival of TWO new grandchildren.

Anyway, without boring you with the details, we made it all happen.  The culmination of which was the launch (or splash as they call it). We had had ten new holes drilled in the hull of the boat so it took a while after india was lowered into the water to check all those new holes and bilges for leaks. All was well, so we set off once more for Harbour Towne marina in Fort Lauderdale to continue the refit...

Back in Fort Lauderdale we finished up the long list of projects. This included checking and replacing most electric pumps on the boats, fitting safety equipment like EPIRBs, life rafts, fire extinguishers, new anchor and anchor chain, installing  bimini hardtop etc etc. During this time Dara took care of final provisioning – three trips to Costco to fill our two new freezers with goodies like steak, mince, cheese and many other staples.

To cut a long story short, what we thought would take six weeks, took ten weeks, mostly because it just hard to pin down contractors to a solid schedule in the boating world.  Especially in Fort Lauderdale, where your average customer wanting ‘something’ done on his boat/superyacht is ready to pay $100,000 whereas we, on the other hand, are counting the pennies against a budget.  We found some gems in the dirt pile however – Mabru, our air conditioning suppliers worked with our ever-changing dates to do a superb job of shoe-horning three A/C units into india. And Nance and Underwood who changed the standing rigging then gave us a furler for free, and also changed out our main halyard as a favour.  Nice people.  Shout out also to Lester’s Diner on 84, Hunan Palace in Dania Beach and Pauli’s pizza who all kept us nourished during this ten week ordeal.

So, in early April we finally felt ready to leave the umbilical cord of the marina to venture out on our own. We sailed down to Miami to spent a few days in Biscayne Bay to wait for a weather window to sail to the Bahamas.  Finally, we felt safe and comfortable on this floating home of the last almost-three months.  More importantly we were longing to feel that we were transitioning to a new phase.  We had spent the last ten weeks making a huge investment – financial, physical and emotional – for the next three years, and we were ready to start feeling the benefits of that pain.  Hell, we needed some fun finally!!!  And so it was, that really did mark a turning point in this adventure – we really did start to fall in love with india, with ourselves and each other again, and with our dream.