Sternpost When delivery trips go right A trip on a temperemental trimaran ends up on the beaches of the Algarve for Dave Selby
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ay be it’s just proposed. In short, me, but in my Max floats boats, and personal if he’d been on the experience I’ve found that Titanic it would have there are few more been the iceberg that desperate sea creatures sunk. than the delivery skipper, And so to Portimao as virtually everyone who in Portugal, where the has ever asked me to crew sardines are lovely and on a delivery has turned everyone speaks out to be desperate, English, because even sectionable, certifiable, the Portuguese struggle self-medicating and quite with Portuguese. The clearly unhinged. After other thing about taking these qualifications Portugal is that it’s in into consideration I then Europe, and we’re not ask searching and any more, which meant pertinent questions such as that Max had to stop ILLUSTRATION: CLAUDIA MYATT “will it sink?” and “if we eating sardines and get don’t, will we stay in nice marinas with showers and nightlife a 50ft (15.1m) trimaran out of Portugal in a bit of a hurry. nearby?” Come to think of it, the second question makes the first Mere seconds after we launched one of the two engines in the one redundant, but if the answer to the second is the least bit outer hulls failed. In Max’s book this barely rates as a to-do, as he’s equivocal or does not contain key words like “Saint-Tropez,” I more used to engine failure on boats with only one engine, and with normally turn them down flat. one left, he performed a series of elegant reverse spiralling pirouettes Anecdotally, this scientifically proves that the only sea-dwelling and triple axels to gently nestle in a 60ft (18m) gap alongside the organisms more desperate than the delivery skipper are delivery fish dock, then said: “Sardines, anyone?” Halfway through my crew, certain limpets and me. However, when my mate Max asked second sardine, Max poked his head into the saloon and said if I fancied crewing for him on a delivery trip from Portugal to the calmly “All hands on deck, we’re sinking,” so calmly I fact, that I UK I spared him the inquisition and simply said “yes” – once I’d had a third one before ambling on deck to find that we were indeed ascertained that Portugal was in the Algarve. You see, crewing is a sinking. In no time Max put a stop to this kerfuffle, locating a leap of faith and there’s no delivery skipper in whom I have more water intake that had come adrift, and after several hours bailing faith than I do in Max. What transpired was the most successful we got the water out of the massive lazarette in the central hull. delivery trip I’ve ever been involved in. As we headed west into the Atlantic, further minor and routine You see, Max’s track record speaks for itself. Years ago he sailed teething troubles arose, including slack rigging, a swaying mast, his own concrete boat to the Caribbean where, upon lifting it exploding genoa cars, four steering failures as the hydraulic unions ashore, a great big lump of Essex mud dropped out of the hull to burst in sequence in 30-knot winds, and a perilous shortage of reveal what is known, technically, as a bloody great hole. Max, sardines. All of these, apart from the sardine crisis, Max fixed ever the optimist, and a keen environmentalist, is continuing his magnificently, but it was only when we ran out of hydraulic fluid experiments with Essex mud as the sustainable that Max decided to return to port – for more boatbuilding material of the future. sardines. “Countless Moreover, Max has made a career out of Like I said, it was the most successful delivery trip delivering suspect yachts that other skippers have I’ve ever been involved in because it was round about times, Max has turned down. On countless occasions he has handed then that quite by chance (Facebook) I rediscovered handed over over leaky boats to the astonishment and old friends who lived in the Algarve. So as Max got leaky boats to disappointment of very well-insured owners who’d on with repairs I settled in with Karey and Bob and disappointed already filed their insurance claim. It’s a matter of their two Westie terriers, swimming in crystal waters, great pride to Max that most of these boats sank basking on golden sands, eating sardines and owners who’d within two hours of hand over. And when they watching the sun go down over the sea from their already filed discovered the wreck of the Mary Rose in the Solent, roof-top terrace for a week. In fact I might make it an insurance Max put in a very competitively priced tender to sail two. That floats my boat. claim.” it into Portsmouth. That would have saved English More importantly, when I parted from Max I Heritage a fortune in salvage fees, not to mention a hugged him and said: “I know you better and like you percentage of the income from day trips Max more.” Isn’t that what sailing is about?
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CLASSIC BOAT MAY 2022
