We are now the proud owners of our PDQ 34 “Magic”. Officially, we’ve been proud owners for 2 full days, even if she became gradually ours in the last few weeks. The long process that led us here started some 18 months ago, and we’ve had ample time to prepare ourselves. Everybody helped us, the boat was close to ready-to-go, Atlantic Yacht Basin is adding some finishing touches… Yet, do we fell relaxed and confident?
A big YES!
Our surveyors found no major deficiency to the boat, and we felt encouraged to go ahead with our purchase. We went back and forth a couple of times with Bob-the-broker, and Bill-the-owner, because we felt that Bill should resolve a few deficiencies before handing over the keys to the boat. He gracefully said yes. We asked to postpone the planned closing date, to allow for fund transfers, and that was okayed too.
So we signed the final Purchase Agreement today. Beach Magic will soon become… Magic. We will soon start the loooong list of things to do next. But first, a round of phone calls and emails to family and friends to spread the good news.
Chesapeake, VA, Sept. 25. We arrive at Atlantic Yacht Basin a little jet-lagged, but eager to start the survey of Bill’s power cat Beach Magic. The boat has already been hauled out, and we start right away.
We visited Norfolk for the first time while we attended the AGLCA 2016 Spring Rendezvous. This is what we saw from our hotel room. Not my idea of a cosy marina where I would spend some time relaxing. I didn’t think we would come back eventually. But we were back in August to survey the boat we had chosen for our Loop…
We started preparing for our Loop sometime in May 2015. Of course, our first source of information was the great website of the AGLCA, the America’s Great Loop Cruiser’s Association. And immediately we found dozens of blogs published and maintained by cruisers of all origins and cruising on all kinds of boats, an invaluable source of information. And we thought: “Why not us?”.