After a very long road....We own a sailboat !!!

Danielle and I first decided to buy a boat back in April. The first step in the process was fund raising....I cashed out some stock, sold my Mariners season tickets (that hurt), my Bill Stewart surf board (even more), two cars, and everything else that I could get my hands on.

With our bank account flush with cash, We started boat shopping locally in May. After looking at a number of different types, We decided on a Catalina 36. We did a walk through on a 1984 Catalina and loved the layout. However the asking price was high and the boat wasn't in the best of shape...but, we knew what we wanted at that point.

The problem was that there were only 4 on the market here in the Northwest and two of them were in Canada. I expanded my search and found that there was over 20 available in California....all of them newer, and priced lower than the anything we could find locally.

I found a boat broker in San Diego and we selected 7 boats to view. Six of the boats were in San Diego and one in Long Beach (110 Miles from San Diego). I flew down there on June 21st for a marathon boat shopping expedition. It was 100 degrees on Saturday and we spent the day driving from marina to marina in the San Diego area. Two of them were dogs and we walked away from them after 2 minutes on board. Of the four remaining boats I viewed that day, I found one that I was inclined to buy.

Come Sunday, I wasn't sure that I wanted to make the 110 mile journey to Long Beach knowing that there was a 1 in 3 chance the remaining one would be a dog and most likely not any better than the one I already found. I decided to go just to be sure that I looked at all the options...and that is how I found my boat....Her name was 'Aw Geez and she was obviously well cared for and meticulously maintained. This one was leagues above anything I had previously seen. The asking price was a bit out of my range, however my broker thought we would be able to negotiate the price down...bad economy and such.

I told my broker to put out an offer on the drive back to San Diego and that is when the real fun started. It was a full scale barrage of insurance agents, mortgage brokers, surveyors, USCG pilots, title/escrow agents, freight carriers...etc.

After we settled on a price, Danielle and I returned to San Diego for Sea Trials (That means "Test Drive" in boat talk) on July 12th. The sea trials went flawlessly, and after the brokers left, we hung out with the owner and he went over every detail of the boat....he is a super nice guy.

The survey was completed on July 21 and the boat was found to be in excellent condition...no surprise there. We closed the deal on July 23rd

A happy ending...not quite, the boat was still in Long Beach

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