D
Deleted User YDKXO
Guest
This is a post I meant to do a couple months ago but due to work commitments and general idleness, I never quite got round to finishing until now.
As some of you know, I left Majorca late last year after 5 happy seasons with my Ferretti 46, Infinito, because I had been caught up in the matriculation tax purge there. To cut a very long story short, I ended up paying the tax itself but when rumours started to fly about substantial fines being levied on top of the tax already paid, I decided that I had spent enough of my tourist Euros in Spain so I arranged for my boat to be delivered to Sardinia. I had had Infinito on the market for sale in Majorca for many months but despite a couple of offers, one of which I accepted, she still hadn’t sold.
I wasn’t expecting her to sell in Sardinia either but I decided to keep her on the market, just in case. But, shortly after LIBS this year, out of the blue, I received an e-mail from Ventura, the UK Ferretti dealer, offering to p/x Infinito for a Ferretti 53 which was lying in Lignano, Italy in the northern Adriatic. I had already decided that a F53 was probably going to be the next boat for me because the F53 addresses both of the major shortcomings of the F46. Firstly, the F46 lacks storage space for larger items. Like many Ferretti designs, the engines on the F46 are located well aft driving V drive gearboxes located forward of the engines from where the propshafts exit aft under the engines.
This arrangement frees up more space for accommodation which is what attracted us to the boat initially; the F46 is one of the roomiest boats in it’s class. But it does mean that the engines are located where a lazarette normally is and storage is limited to a void under the bathing platform and a tricky to get into crew cabin off the cockpit. SWMBO and I had wanted to store folding bikes, golf clubs and more water toys but there just wasn’t enough space. The F53 addresses this issue because it has conventional shaftdrive leaving a storage area behind the engines (although still no separate lazarette) large enough for bulky items. Also the 4th cabin is entered off the galley and is more easily accessed due to the larger doorway so it’s much more usable for storage.
Actually the conventional shaftdrive and location of the crew cabin on the F53 does mean that the sleeping cabin accommodation is not appreciably larger than the F46 but since we were happy with the space we had in the cabins in the F46, this wasn’t a big prob. The second issue with the F46 was that the it is a bit underpowered; with the standard Cat 3208TA engines fitted, I’d never seen more than 27kts out of my boat in the Med with a lot less after a few month’s fouling. Speed wasn’t a big issue itself but I’d always felt that economy would have been better with larger engines. The F53 has Cat 3196 660hp engines as standard and should be good for 31-32kts. I was also hoping with the 3196 engines being electronically controlled, that economy would not be appreciably worse than the F46. Another attraction of the F53 was it’s reputation for seakeeping. The F53 is reputedly the last design Norberto Ferretti penned himself for the company and it supposedly has one of the deepest V hulls Ferretti have produced and, as a result, it has a reputation for being a good seaboat.
After some investigation, it turned out that the F53 was actually being brokered by the Croatian Ferretti dealer, MennYacht and the boat was owned by a man who had himself taken it in p/x against a larger Ferretti that he had sold. The offer intrigued me because it almost felt like it was meant to happen as, following a motorbike touring holiday with some mates in Croatia last year, I had been wowed by the stunning coastal and island scenery and had promised myself that I would cruise the area in my own boat one day. Now it looked like it could happen a lot sooner than I expected.
Anyway, we came to what I thought was a fair agreement on the money with the only point of disagreement being the F53 owner’s insistence that I delivered Infinito to either Lignano in Northern Italy or Novigrad in Croatia where the exchange would take place. Late in January, I found myself at a dark and freezing cold marina in Lignano looking at this F53 which turned out to be called Guru (that will have to be changed, I thought straightaway). Although there were some issues with the boat, I decided to go ahead with the deal. The major issue was the lack of a holding tank; when I inspected the boat initially, I couldn’t find any sign of plumbing for a holding tank (essential in the Med where there are strict regulations about waste disposal in many harbours) although the holding tank itself was moulded into the bilge; when I mentioned this to Menn Yachts, they intimated that I was an idiot and of course there was a holding tank on board. This was not to be the first problem I experienced with Menn Yachts. Later it transpired that I was right and, as some kind of compensation, Menn agreed to fit one ‘at cost’. I’m still amazed that the original owner of the F53 did not specify a holding tank preferring to spend his money on more essential gear like a sternthruster and sat dome!
I tried my hardest not to have to deliver Infinito to the Adriatic to complete the deal, even offering to increase my offer for Guru but the owner wouldn’t budge. Ventura investigated the cost of transporting Infinito by road across Italy to shorten the distance but it was prohibitively high due to the cost of the necessary permits. So, with some trepidation, I authorized a skipper and mate, arranged by Menn, to take Infinito from Sardinia to Novigrad, a journey of some 1000nm to be undertaken in early March. I reasoned that if the deal fell through, at least I’d have Infinito in an area that I wanted to cruise anyway. Much to my relief, Infinito arrived in Novigrad having completed the trip in 5 days without a hitch and in mostly good conditions(why are we selling her if she’s so reliable, said the SWMBO!) and a few days later I travelled to Novigrad to complete the paperwork and transfer the balance of the cash. There was some argument with Menn Yachts who claimed that the 53 wasn’t mine until they’d received the money in their account but I pointed out to them that Ventura UK were named as the lead broker in the sales contract and title to Guru transferred to me as soon as my money hit Ventura’s account. The fact that Ventura’s money hadn’t hit Menn’s account wasn’t my problem.
Anyway by Easter, I was the owner of a Ferretti 53 and I spent a leisurely 3 days swapping belongings over from Infinito to Guru before my SWMBO and son arrived with the idea of doing a few days cruising, only that we couldn’t.
Spot the difference
Menn Yachts mentioned in passing that we couldn’t leave the harbour until we’d bought a Croatian cruising vignette and we couldn’t get one of those without the boat being registered in my name. Why they didn’t mention this before, I don’t know. Anyway after a few frantic phone calls to the UK, Ventura managed to get us a SSR document couriered to Novigrad but that lost us another 2 days. For the registration document we had to make a quick decision on a name change, because I really didn’t like Guru, and we decided to rename the 53 ‘Sumianda’ which is a name my mother in law originally came up with and which I’ve felt obliged(!) to use on a number of other boats we’ve owned. Finally we were able to troop off to the local harbourmaster’s office to buy a vignette and a silly bit of bureaucracy called a Crew List, where we were fleeced for insurance. Anyway the best part of €500 later, we were finally able to go to sea
Part 2 to follow
As some of you know, I left Majorca late last year after 5 happy seasons with my Ferretti 46, Infinito, because I had been caught up in the matriculation tax purge there. To cut a very long story short, I ended up paying the tax itself but when rumours started to fly about substantial fines being levied on top of the tax already paid, I decided that I had spent enough of my tourist Euros in Spain so I arranged for my boat to be delivered to Sardinia. I had had Infinito on the market for sale in Majorca for many months but despite a couple of offers, one of which I accepted, she still hadn’t sold.
I wasn’t expecting her to sell in Sardinia either but I decided to keep her on the market, just in case. But, shortly after LIBS this year, out of the blue, I received an e-mail from Ventura, the UK Ferretti dealer, offering to p/x Infinito for a Ferretti 53 which was lying in Lignano, Italy in the northern Adriatic. I had already decided that a F53 was probably going to be the next boat for me because the F53 addresses both of the major shortcomings of the F46. Firstly, the F46 lacks storage space for larger items. Like many Ferretti designs, the engines on the F46 are located well aft driving V drive gearboxes located forward of the engines from where the propshafts exit aft under the engines.
This arrangement frees up more space for accommodation which is what attracted us to the boat initially; the F46 is one of the roomiest boats in it’s class. But it does mean that the engines are located where a lazarette normally is and storage is limited to a void under the bathing platform and a tricky to get into crew cabin off the cockpit. SWMBO and I had wanted to store folding bikes, golf clubs and more water toys but there just wasn’t enough space. The F53 addresses this issue because it has conventional shaftdrive leaving a storage area behind the engines (although still no separate lazarette) large enough for bulky items. Also the 4th cabin is entered off the galley and is more easily accessed due to the larger doorway so it’s much more usable for storage.
Actually the conventional shaftdrive and location of the crew cabin on the F53 does mean that the sleeping cabin accommodation is not appreciably larger than the F46 but since we were happy with the space we had in the cabins in the F46, this wasn’t a big prob. The second issue with the F46 was that the it is a bit underpowered; with the standard Cat 3208TA engines fitted, I’d never seen more than 27kts out of my boat in the Med with a lot less after a few month’s fouling. Speed wasn’t a big issue itself but I’d always felt that economy would have been better with larger engines. The F53 has Cat 3196 660hp engines as standard and should be good for 31-32kts. I was also hoping with the 3196 engines being electronically controlled, that economy would not be appreciably worse than the F46. Another attraction of the F53 was it’s reputation for seakeeping. The F53 is reputedly the last design Norberto Ferretti penned himself for the company and it supposedly has one of the deepest V hulls Ferretti have produced and, as a result, it has a reputation for being a good seaboat.
After some investigation, it turned out that the F53 was actually being brokered by the Croatian Ferretti dealer, MennYacht and the boat was owned by a man who had himself taken it in p/x against a larger Ferretti that he had sold. The offer intrigued me because it almost felt like it was meant to happen as, following a motorbike touring holiday with some mates in Croatia last year, I had been wowed by the stunning coastal and island scenery and had promised myself that I would cruise the area in my own boat one day. Now it looked like it could happen a lot sooner than I expected.
Anyway, we came to what I thought was a fair agreement on the money with the only point of disagreement being the F53 owner’s insistence that I delivered Infinito to either Lignano in Northern Italy or Novigrad in Croatia where the exchange would take place. Late in January, I found myself at a dark and freezing cold marina in Lignano looking at this F53 which turned out to be called Guru (that will have to be changed, I thought straightaway). Although there were some issues with the boat, I decided to go ahead with the deal. The major issue was the lack of a holding tank; when I inspected the boat initially, I couldn’t find any sign of plumbing for a holding tank (essential in the Med where there are strict regulations about waste disposal in many harbours) although the holding tank itself was moulded into the bilge; when I mentioned this to Menn Yachts, they intimated that I was an idiot and of course there was a holding tank on board. This was not to be the first problem I experienced with Menn Yachts. Later it transpired that I was right and, as some kind of compensation, Menn agreed to fit one ‘at cost’. I’m still amazed that the original owner of the F53 did not specify a holding tank preferring to spend his money on more essential gear like a sternthruster and sat dome!
I tried my hardest not to have to deliver Infinito to the Adriatic to complete the deal, even offering to increase my offer for Guru but the owner wouldn’t budge. Ventura investigated the cost of transporting Infinito by road across Italy to shorten the distance but it was prohibitively high due to the cost of the necessary permits. So, with some trepidation, I authorized a skipper and mate, arranged by Menn, to take Infinito from Sardinia to Novigrad, a journey of some 1000nm to be undertaken in early March. I reasoned that if the deal fell through, at least I’d have Infinito in an area that I wanted to cruise anyway. Much to my relief, Infinito arrived in Novigrad having completed the trip in 5 days without a hitch and in mostly good conditions(why are we selling her if she’s so reliable, said the SWMBO!) and a few days later I travelled to Novigrad to complete the paperwork and transfer the balance of the cash. There was some argument with Menn Yachts who claimed that the 53 wasn’t mine until they’d received the money in their account but I pointed out to them that Ventura UK were named as the lead broker in the sales contract and title to Guru transferred to me as soon as my money hit Ventura’s account. The fact that Ventura’s money hadn’t hit Menn’s account wasn’t my problem.
Anyway by Easter, I was the owner of a Ferretti 53 and I spent a leisurely 3 days swapping belongings over from Infinito to Guru before my SWMBO and son arrived with the idea of doing a few days cruising, only that we couldn’t.
Spot the difference
Menn Yachts mentioned in passing that we couldn’t leave the harbour until we’d bought a Croatian cruising vignette and we couldn’t get one of those without the boat being registered in my name. Why they didn’t mention this before, I don’t know. Anyway after a few frantic phone calls to the UK, Ventura managed to get us a SSR document couriered to Novigrad but that lost us another 2 days. For the registration document we had to make a quick decision on a name change, because I really didn’t like Guru, and we decided to rename the 53 ‘Sumianda’ which is a name my mother in law originally came up with and which I’ve felt obliged(!) to use on a number of other boats we’ve owned. Finally we were able to troop off to the local harbourmaster’s office to buy a vignette and a silly bit of bureaucracy called a Crew List, where we were fleeced for insurance. Anyway the best part of €500 later, we were finally able to go to sea
Part 2 to follow
.
