How a Burrito Changed My Life

Bob Bitchin

Never Say Never

Never say never! Those were the words of wisdom from my friend “Sluggo” down on the docks. The problem we were discussing was the fact that in the previous issue (we never say “last issue” in publishing!) I spouted off in my editorial about how Jody & I sold Lost Soul partly due to the fact it was out of our financial comfort zone. You see, in this issue, just 30 days later, I have to try and maintain my composure as I write that we have just completed negotiations with my personal hero in this business, and that’d be Walter Schulz, to build a project Shannon. Okay, I know, Shannons are not free. Here I was blubbering about how we couldn’t afford to maintain our 26-year-old Formosa 56, and in the very next breath (issue?) I come back and say I am building a Shannon.

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Starboard Attitude Thus the pearls of wisdom dribbling from the lips of my friend Sluggo on A Dock. I should never say never. It is the sure way to have something happen. Now I have to tell you how this all happened, because we did not just run down to the Shannon booth in Annapolis and say, “Here’s a handful of money, build me a boat.” We actually went hat in hand to my old friend Walter Schulz, and asked him about what to look for when we were going to Xaimen, China, to find an unfinished hull to complete, I figured that was about the only way I’d ever have a boat again. After we’d sold Lost Soul we took the money we got from the sale and paid off the Vulture Capitalists and SBA loans we had against the magazine. Now we could sleep, but not on a boat. We didn’t have one.

I knew that somehow, by hook or by crook, I would find a way to get back out on the water.

So here I was, sitting in the cockpit of a Shannon 47 with Walter. Now, if you have never met Walter, let me try to explain just who he is. Close your eyes and try to conjure up what you think Wolfman Jack looked like (for those of you old enough to remember his radio program!). Now put an intense look in his eye as if he were a sailor on a whaling ship looking out to the horizon, tinge the black beard with a little

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Bob Bitchin grey, stick a pipe in his mouth and you have Mr. Schulz. He is a Boat Guy! I capitalized those words on purpose. Here’s why. Walter builds boats not for a living, but for the joy of it. Since the early seventies he’s built hundreds of them, for people who like to go places in safety and comfort. Ask Morgan Freeman on his Shannon 43, or a hundred other Shannon owners. But the sign of his true passion for building boats is what he does when he’s not building boats. He buys old boats from pre1930 and restores them! Now what other boat company has a CEO who designs the product, takes an active part in the actual construction of each boat, and in his spare time helps maintain the nautical heritage of the boats that came before? So here I am, sitting and talking with the only man in the industry that wears a tape measure on his belt while at a boat show selling boats he’s designed, built and services. After I’d explained what I had in mind to do, he looked at me like I’d just slapped his puppy. Why would I go and buy a castaway hull? He was shocked. Boats are an art form, and here I was telling him I was going to go behind a company and check their dumpster to build a boat. We discussed things like design, sailing characteristics, and before long he was saying “We can build it.”

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Starboard Attitude For the rest of the weekend, while working the Annapolis Boat Show, we would grab a few seconds wherever we could, and we worked out a way that I could afford to participate in building a hull, which soon became a boat. Before I knew it, we were shaking hands as I handed him a $1 bill that said “One Shannon Yacht” and signed it. As many of you know, we just underwent a three-year refit on our old boat. We know how tough that was. This new project will dwarf that project, and add to it the fact that Walter and his crew want to have the new “Bitchin Cruising Special” in the Annapolis Boat Show next year. That is just one year to build from the ground up a cruiser built to take on the world. And he is paying special attention to making it strong, because on the third day I think I may have shocked him a little. You see, I have always said I want to go around the Horn. I’ve wanted to say it, but I don’t think I ever really wanted to do it. But in a moment of weakness I mentioned to him that we might just take possession of it and sail it home around the Horn. .... and he, in a moment of weakness, said he’d go on the voyage!

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