Ready or not...

Plan B: Cornish Shrimper

The boat's not going to be ready this summer. I'm convinced. Positively certain. We visited Roeboats in April, and while things were coming along nicely, I just don't see how everything that remains to be done is going to get done between now and the beginning of July. Tiernan seems confident that we are still on schedule, but surely he is being over optimistic. I've spent the last year looking forward to sailing our own boat in West Cork this summer and I just can't bear the thought of standing on the quay in Baltimore, boatless. I need a Plan B. 

I start looking at adds for small boats in Ireland. Maybe we could buy a second hand boat for this summer and sell it again next year, by which time our Cape Henry would be finished. The most suitable candidate I can find is a Cornish Shrimper for sale in Waterford. If I could negotiate a good price I might not lose much money when it came time to sell again. Depends on how eager the seller is to sell. And how eager I am to buy. I could end up being very eager...

I share my nightmare scenario with Eileen and she tells me I'm being ridiculous, that Tiernan knows what he is doing, and she'll even bet me a pint the boat will be ready. We shake on it. I'm convinced she'll be buying me a pint this summer, but in any case I still need to prepare for Plan A, just in case. 

Boating in the British Isles is remarkably free of bureaucracy. Nearly anyone can buy a boat of nearly any size and simply head out to sea. Still, there are a certain number of hoops to jump through. I need to find more information about things like boat registration, VHF licensing, and insurance. 

My dealings with officialdom are never straightforward, and this is no exception. The Irish insurance companies I contact will only insure Irish residents. The French companies want their boats based in France. Eventually I come across Transmer, who will insure the boat but are not crazy about the fact that she won't be kept in a marina. They adjust their prices accordingly. 

I contact the Irish Department of Transport who inform me that my French VHF license is not recognized in Ireland. Only Irish, Finnish and German SRCs are accepted in application for "authority to operate" which is needed to get a ship's radio license, which I will need to get an MMSI for a VHF-DSC radio. Strange, because the French are trying to make it easier for people to use VHF, concerned that leisure sailors will just use their portable phone instead. The Germans seem determined that leisure sailors meet strict professional standards of practice. I'm with the French on this one. It's better if people are not put off buying VHF radios. But the Irish are with the Germans, and the end result is that I will have to redo the exam in Ireland. 

Photoshopped image of Cape Cutter "Halcyon"

On the boat building front, we've picked Sunbrella Natte "Carbon Sky" for the interior upholstery, but we still need to decide on a colour for the hull, and to choose a name for our future boat. I mocked up some different possible colour schemes on a photo of a white Cape Cutter, and we have a short list of possible names (current front-runners in bold):

• Curlew

• Bainne (milk)

• Relativity

• Gosling

• Leoithne (breeze)

• Cromadh Amach (to lean out)

• Claonadh (leaning towards, inclination)

• Mo Chroí (my dear, my darling)

• Drithle (sparkle)

• Teaspaigh (exuberance)

• Treo or Threo (direction, bearing, of drift, current etc.)

• Figary or Fegary or Figairy (folly or crazy idea)

Somehow the last one seems most appropriate ...