Maiden Voyage

On Thursday the 17th, the sails were hung for the first time. Up went the fully battened main and the 135 Genoa. The Genoa is very large, if fact the simple observation, everything on this boat is big, much bigger than our HR34 and well just a little intimidating.

We, John, Brian and myself, moved the boat from Essex to Mystic, CT as she is to be used in a weekend boat show. The first real spring day in the tri-state area with temps in the 70's, gorgeous sunny day. As one would expect the wind was on the nose, however, as we rounded Bartlets reef we were about 35 degrees off the wind of 11 knots. We rolled out the sails..... and flew along at 7 knots with 15 degrees of heel (ok a little current to help as well). Absolutely glorious.

Everything seemed to work, with the normal teething pains like needing a shorter winch handle to operate the in mast furling. The AIS worked a little too well, as apparently it was mis-programed to indicate we were a 700 foot freighter. The USCG was not pleased and supposedly diverted a plane and sent out a boat to check us out (part of home land security policy), though we never saw either and were in contact with them on the radio to clear up the misunderstanding.

We are down to 1 week left to leave Switzerland, Rae Ann has everything well organized so should be smooth, though no doubt a fair bit of work.

The Spice of Life

We thought we had our car sold, an important step along the way of getting rid of all of our land based possessions. We got a good price a little too good. The buyer wanted to take it to Russia for his in-laws.

We missed the warning signs. So in a version of the well tread Nigerian lottery/money scams, we received an "international check", all very colorful with two well know international banks listed, dully made out to us for the price of the car plus just a little more. We promptly deposited. We waited. We checked with our bank. We waited.

Meanwhile, not minutes after we confirmed that we had received the check, an associate of the buyer was after us for the difference as this money needed to be sent via Western Union as soon as possible to cover the costs of him coming to pick up the car. A while later we received yet another urgent message that importation was a long legal process and that the lawyers fees needed to be paid. Again asking us to please send the excess funds.

To many times this is where the story goes from bad to worse, the first excess cash is sent back, then just a bit more, which we would get back as soon as the buyer can free up his funds.

Wisely we never wavered from saying - "no car, no money, no nothing" until the check clears. Needless to say at this point the check never cleared, it was counterfeit.

Again we have a car for sale, with only a few weeks left. We have also learned a very good lesson - namely watch the warning signs. So to all those that will follow in our wake - if ever approached by someone who is buying something of significance for their in-laws - you know it is a scam.