Moving the Mountain

The saying is, “If the mountain won’t come to Muhammed, Muhammed must go to the mountain.” With no intentions of moving to California, we needed to move Fregata to our home waters on the East Coast. Dan had a hip replacement in January so he was unable to sail the boat. Fasten your seatbelt for the solution!

We decided to have the boat shipped. The shippers specialized in boat transport are mostly foreign flagged and therefore not allowed to load and unload within the USA. So, to start, we needed to move the boat from Sausalito, Califorinia to Ensenada, just below the Mexican border in Baja California, to be loaded on the DYT Yacht Express.

Although Dan is a licensed delivery captain, he was confined to a chair and a walker for most of January, so that wasn’t an option. Therefore, after several interviews and credential verifications, we hired Rod, a California-based captain with vast experience on this route. We intended to have him set sail in late December, but California was being battered by freak 25-30 foot waves. This caused a delay until mid-January. Rod and his crew then sailed the boat to Ensenada, including an overnight stop in San Diego.

In Ensenada, we booked a dock at Marina Coral. We were introduced to other boat owners there who helped keep an eye her, and we hired Edgar, head of a local yacht services company, to start the engine, and to keep her secure and clean.

Edgar is a kind, meticulous and reliable person. He was very fair with his fees, and he communicated proactively. Although we never met in person, we’ve stayed in touch since then via WhatsApp and agreed we’d try to meet some day.

On February 16, Edgar and a local captain, Dario, moved the boat from the dock to the ship when it was finally time to load on February 16. The ship is called the “DYT Yacht Express”. It’s an amazing vessel, It allows water into the hold, causing it to partially sink such that the boats being transported can float on. Divers then swim under the boats to put stands in place. The water is then pumped out, which gently lowers the boats onto the stands.

To add to the freak waves in California, another natural phenomenon occurred, causing further challenges. Due to a drought, the Panama Canal was only operating at 1/3 of its normal capacity. This caused a slight delay, but the shipper bid for a priority slot and was able to transit the canal more or less on schedule.

On March 6, Dan flew to Fort Lauderdale, Florida to “greet” the ship as it pulled into Port Everglades. Early the following morning, he, along with Jean and Jeff, the brokers that assisted with  the project, who are also experienced captains, boarded the ship in order to unload Fregata. The ship was still being flooded when they arrived. After going through importation paperwork, we were instructed to climb across two other boats onto Fregata. She was near the stern of the ship, so one of the first to be unloaded. We barely had time to get her ready when the ship’s load master announced over the VHF radio that divers were out of the water and that we could start our engine. Minutes later, the load master announced that it was Fregata’s turn to float off. We backed her up, turned her around and off we went.

After a stop to fuel up at Dania Beach, we set out to motor approximately 100 nautical miles up Florida’s Atlantic coast to Fort Pierce, where we’d scheduled a haul-out and several services to get her ready. During this trip, we became aware that Fregata had a few technical issues that needed to be resolved. Despite a survey and sea trial, these were intermittent problems that only manifested themselves once underway.

Among other things, after a few hours at sea, the autopilots (there are two) both stopped working, and the depth instrument started showing random numbers. The coast of Florida and its harbor inlets are very shallow. Navigating requires careful attention to charts and carefully monitoring (you guessed it) depth. To make matters worse, we arrived after dark during an ebbing tide. But thanks to careful navigating, which Dan gladly delegated to Jeff & Jean who are familiar with local waters, we arrived safely.