As I indicated here I was in Newport, RI yesterday to see Impulse, Class 40 #25. Here are the pictures and a few short movies from that trip.
The boat is in fantastic cosmetic condition, really beautiful. The owner did the work himself, with competent friends here and there. Following the grounding in 2014, which did lead to water ingress, the keel was taken off, the hull repaired, and numerous structural reinforcements were put in place. All the work looks impeccable. I crawled to the stern section to inspect the auto-pilot setup and came out clean. Now, the owner did clean the boat right before I arrived. He’s the first person I see do this, which says a lot about him. Of course, a proper survey out of the water would be necessary. But it was all good news. In addition, the coachroof is very large and high, which allows me to stand inside!
Then what?
My assessment here is still accurate. What I learned about shipping the boat pretty much kills the deal unless I want to take 2 months to sail the boat to San Francisco, including a Panama canal crossing. The keel was faired then fiberglass was laid over. To ship the boat requires taking the keel off, and that would be about 1 week of 2 guys working on the boat, twice. A back of the hand estimate lands us into 30k territory!
The boat was recently listed and I doubt the owner would consider the offer that I can make, knowing all the additional equipment I need to acquire, in particular in terms of sails. I think I will wait. Interestingly, the original plan for the current owner was to prepare the boat to try and beat Guo Chan’s round the world solo non stop circumnavigation of 132 days. Other plans seems to have lined up for him. So he wants to sell the boat to focus his resources somewhere else for the next 2 years.
Next for me is looking into this boat in Hong Kong, which also has a grounding history.
