We are finally aboard the good ship Monkey Business

October 30, 2010:  We are settled in our slip this beautiful Saturday morning in Stuart, Florida.  It has been a long and exciting week since taking delivery of Monkey Business.  We loaded up a small Budget Rent-A-Truck on Monday the 25th and I began the drive from Hilton Head Island to Palm Beach Gardens with Judy close behind in the car.  Weather was great and we were excited.  About a third of the way down I-95, we closed on the boat by releasing funds from escrow via my cell phone.  We were yacht owners!  Arrived about 7 PM Monday night and checked into a nearby Hampton Inn.  We have given Hilton so much business lately so they upgraded us to a very nice suite.  We took a quick drive over to see the boat, about a mile away, and she is beautiful.  We elected not to stay aboard as we did not know where the light switches were and we did not want to spoil the fun of being on board for the first time by stumbling around in the dark.  We would see her in the morning.

Tuesday the 26th we were up early and began the unloading process.  A daunting task that took all day.  We brought too much stuff!  Judy was a genius in finding storage space, which is ample, for all of our items.  As usual, the normal moving events occurred, such as finding a box we did not want and should have stayed in HHI, and missing a box we needed, which we hope is in storage.  We will survive.  We already have stuff for the local thrift store!

Early on Wednesday we returned the truck and headed back to the boat to meet our broker.  He brought us more stuff!  Hats, visors, tee shirts, boarding mat, gym bag, etc. all advertising his brokerage firm, but nice items.  Great guy and I recommend him to anyone looking for a boat.  Call Paul Flannery of HMY Yachts in Stuart, FL.  He goes the extra mile and he is a pilot also, so he has to be a good guy.   Another day spent putting stuff away. 

Thursday, our rent-a-captain, Jeff, arrived about 9 AM and we proceeded to "pre-float" the boat, checking oil, systems, etc.  Judy was to drive the car to Stuart, about 25 miles away.  Jeff and I would head up the Intracoastal Waterway, out the Jupiter Inlet for an ocean run and back in at the St. Lucie River.  Jeff had me run the boat all the way (about 4 hours with lots of "no wake" zones), including docking at the Loggerhead Club & Marina, our new home until December 31st.  Jeff is a very experienced captain with about 30 years of traveling and fishing the Florida and Bahamian waters.  He is a great instructor and lets you learn by doing with very calm suggestions.  Boat is very easy to handle with two engines as well as a bow and stern thruster system.  It will pivot on a dime and its 66,000 pounds keeps it very stable, even in a good wind.  I was pleased with my first trip, but have much to learn.

We will attach pictures next time (we have to learn how first).  

At last the closing and delivery of Monkey Business!

This is Matt and I guess I will start off this blog with the first posting.  We have never done this before, so give us a break if the format looks a little amateurish at first.  We are in Hilton Head staying at the Healey's place in Wexford.  They have been more than gracious in letting some homeless people move into their home.  We got the good news yesterday that Monkey Business is finally ready for delivery in North Palm Beach, Florida.  We close on her tomorrow and we begin to drive our car and a small truck to Florida in the morning.

Some background: when discussing my retirement a couple of years ago, Judy pointed out that my life would change dramatically, but hers would be about the same.  Her big change was having me around the house all the time -- not the best thing after me being gone almost every day and traveling most of my life.  You know the saying, "for better or worse, but not for lunch."  Judy brought up the idea of shedding the large house, along with its lawn service, pool service, trash service, cleaning service, HVAC service, bug killing service, Town taxes, County taxes, State taxes, club dues and the never ending maintenance of a 13 year old house.  Solution, which I loved, was to get a boat large enough to live on and sail the East Coast from Maine to the Bahamas.  The idea percolated and when I did retire in June 2009, the quest to shed the house and its obligations began.

We listed our home for sale in October 2009 in the worst real estate market of our lives.  Something that we are actually very good at, as we sold our home in Connecticut after ten years for about a 30% loss.  Took us until July 2010 to get a deal, but we were very happy with the net proceeds and it was enough to begin the nautical adventures.

We hope to keep you advised of our whereabouts with some semi-interesting dialog and photos.  Most of all, we want to keep in touch with our wonderful friends.

More to come..............