Monday, February 18, 2008

Good news but still waiting...

So the good news is that the Surveyor has sent a quick email saying the new boat is basically OK but saying he is busy writing up reports from other prior surveys so we should not expect our full written report until Tuesday.

Having spent good money on the survey it would be ridiculous to go ahead without waiting for the full written report so I will just have to be patient.

The list of jobs to do before we set of seems to be growing including

Arrange for new boat insurance
See the bank to sort out how to pay for it
Passage plan the delivery trip
Arrange for her to be antifouled and probably rectify any minor gel coat issues and polished
Arrange for her to be lifted back in.


On the passage planning front I have already got some good advice as ever from ybw.com

I was surprised to find that someone has put in a roundabout in the middle of the Thames Estuary! I kid you not. We will be planning to avoid these but for your amusement they are described in the below Notice to Mariners.

Roundabout NTM and Roundabout picture

What next, traffic cones and contra flows ?

On Saturday we attended the MacGregors Owners association AGM. We did think this would be for the last time but to be honest they are such a nice friendly bunch we will probably stay associate members. In fact the last two “commodore”s have brought another non Mac boat before finishing their terms in charge ! But they are both still members. I am thinking of organising a non Mac Owners association cruise if that makes any sense !

We had a useful day as we met some new members who haven’t brought a boat yet so might potentially want to buy ours. And we borrowed some charts from the association chart library that will help us with our delivery trip.

The frustrating element of the day was when the subject of “Risk Assessments” was brought up for our Rallies. The guys who brought it up were well meaning – just really passing on guidance from the RYA. But this is the kind of rubbish I have to put up with at work and go sailing to avoid.

A typical rally for us might be might be

1. Meet in Portsmouth
2. Sail to the Folly for dinner and a beer
3. Sail home.

Hardly Ellen/Joyon material?

Are skippers not capable of making their own assessments of boats, crew and conditions? Has anyone calculated the risk of “drowning” in paperwork !
I will be most disappointed if I don’t get a 100 post reply to this ;-)

I know exactly the place where people will enjoy venting their frustrations on this one.

YBW on risk Assessments !