Advice for new owners from Australia coming to Europe to collect a boat

[The Miss]

Originally Posted by Toys_with_time

BTW I found (as many others have) that getting the boat prepared in France is a slowwwwww process. We picked her up from factory in La Rochelle in March and left beginning of June. As the weather warmed up all of the contractors were increasingly busy and even though there are about 10 chandlers they never seemed to carry any decent stock. if interested can give you copy of my spreadsheet of all that we bought to complete the fit out and some tips on La Rochelle.

TwT

Hi TwT,
Currently fitting out the boat at moment and have a fantastic friend and contact in La Rochelle who is assisting. It seems better to purchase most of our gear from UK and have moved to boat rather than buy from La Rochelle as price difference was significant on most items. We were surprised to the lack of response to emails from different agents in the city when looking for quotes maybe being so far away is too tricky, so it is so nice to now have someone on the ground to assist.

I would be very interested to see you spreadsheet and any tips are always gratefully accepted.

Cheers
The Miss

[Barra]

Originally Posted by Toys_with_time

BTW I found (as many others have) that getting the boat prepared in France is a slowwwwww process. We picked her up from factory in La Rochelle in March and left beginning of June. As the weather warmed up all of the contractors were increasingly busy and even though there are about 10 chandlers they never seemed to carry any decent stock. if interested can give you copy of my spreadsheet of all that we bought to complete the fit out and some tips on La Rochelle.

TwT

Yep we too have been caught by the many many public holidays in France in spring. It really slows down any work you need done especially if it takes more than one attempt as the second one is usually on the other side of yet another holiday. 2 1/2 hour siestas and a 5pm knock off (best off both words eh?) dont help much either.

Plan for around double what you would expect time wise and then you might only be out by a week or 2!

[goboatingnow]

2 1/2 hour siestas

Thats Spain, in france thats the time for lunch ! ( I like it)

You cant saviour that food in 30 mins

Dave

[Barra]

Agreed the french lunch is worthy of 2 1/2 half hours!

My beef is that (unlike spain) the french have their long lunch AND only work a 9 to 5 day as well. With boats so many jobs get spread over multiple days as the contractor turns up at 3 after lunch looks things over then says ill see you tomorrow as not enough time to start and finish a job in 2 hours. Similar in the mornings, locate the guy around 9.30 to see how far off he is (usually finishing a job he started the day before) then he gets to your boat in time to give it a once over then "all see you after lunch"

all good fun unless your on a tight schedule - so dont be.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Barra

Agreed the french lunch is worthy of 2 1/2 half hours!

My beef is that (unlike spain) the french have their long lunch AND only work a 9 to 5 day as well. With boats so many jobs get spread over multiple days as the contractor turns up at 3 after lunch looks things over then says ill see you tomorrow as not enough time to start and finish a job in 2 hours. Similar in the mornings, locate the guy around 9.30 to see how far off he is (usually finishing a job he started the day before) then he gets to your boat in time to give it a once over then "all see you after lunch"

all good fun unless your on a tight schedule - so dont be.

Launched and commissioned three boats in france over the years. You just have to go with the flow, not found it much better in the UK either, just different. The whole marine industry is far too laid back for its own good, because people know its a "leisure" thing to you.

having said that they seem to make the best trains, planes etc

dave

[The Miss]

Siestas sound wonderful until we have a 5 week turnaround from Tassie to France and getting our boat from Cantel to Turkey and then being in Istanbul to fly home.

We have to have the boat fitted out before the Catana Yard can sail from La Rochelle to Cantel so this aspect is all happening now so hopefully most will be sorted when we get to France. Our agent in Australia has been very helpful and the yard seemingly so thus far. If dollars were no issue you would get the yard to fit out your boat with extras but as they seem to charge double market price for anything it seems better to outsource.

This process would be so much harder without advice and assistance from others, this forum included. So from one who knows very little thanks to all.

Cheers the Miss
Homepage | Miss Catana

[The Miss]

An health insurance question and following on from previous comments above as looking into options at moment.

Travel insurance seems to be available for one year but have to go home each year to renew. What happens if we don't want to go home in 12 month period? What do others do. Do most people keep there health insurance from home as well as travel insurance? I presume that travel insurance is essential for moving about different countries...

Plus follow on from when this forum started I have spoken to Pantaenius in Australia as a first point and thus far very helpful. I now have to provide a transit agenda and noted that a previous post has suggested a route. How accurate do you need to be for this aspect?
Insurance will certainly be a significant cost each year but as always with insurance a necessary...

Cheers the Miss

[simonpickard]

Hi 'the Miss',

Yep we're also talking with Pantaenius here in Sydney. Very helpful people and pretty much the only company in Oz I could find that would insure us in the Med.

As for Heath insurance I'm talking with Medibank this weekend so will report back. I've also been looking at one of those, 'extreem sports' insurances (which sailing seems to be classed as). You can get yearly cover from those pretty cheaply and I see no reason why you can't just renew after 12 months.

Regards,
Simon

[The Miss]

Hi Simon,

I will be very interested to hear how you go.
Extreme sport....hmm I wont tell my mother that one she already thinks her daughter will die at sea!

Cheers
the Miss

[b_rodwell]

A few Ideas from a Pair of Newbie Liveaboards

Lorraine and I have recently taken delivery of a new Lagoon 400 S2. We can tell you what worked for us so far re comms and $. Obviously there are lots of other solutions. Most of the stuff you can set up from Oz and, because it can become complex, we recommend doing this. We only partly did this and it was more difficult sorting it out from here.


On $ we tried to do 2 things before we left Oz. Firstly we tried to set up a French Bank Account. This was not successful. I think we could do it now we are here (with some problems about our residential address) but we haven’t bothered because it now does not seem to add a lot of value.



The second thing we did is for both of us to get Travelex Debit Cards. We loaded the cards up with Euros before we left. These work fine. We have used them for payments in a wide variety of places and have got Euros from ATMs. As far as I know all ATMs are supported, there is no fee and on one day I got a total of 1500 Euros out. I have recharged the card a few time now using BPay transfer from a Westpac account. This incurs a fee of 1%. The exchange rate seemed competitive (0.4% worse than the Westpac rate).



The only downside is when we used the card as a deposit on a car hire. We returned the car, Eurocar made the credit entry but Travelex keeps the money for a month! What a rip off but forwarned we will make the deposit differently next time.


The only other thing about the money is to organize your overseas mobile number (see below) to be used for the verification code for Westpac to bank (Oz or overseas) internet transfers. We used this facility to pay to a French bank account for a large marine electrician invoice.


Internet is pretty important to us. We use this for Skype to Skype (hours and hours), Skype to local call (usually short and often to set up a Skype to Skype call) and almost all of our weather forecasts. The key bit of technology here is Bad Boy Extreme and Bad Boy Unleashed which is installed on the boat.



Bad Boy Extreme has a short aerial on the back of the boat and it is a wifi receiver/amplifier. It takes signals from local wifi hotspots. There are the local restaurants, chandlers and the local Capitainerie. You just need their password. The La Rochelle Capitainerie gives you this for Euro 6/week.



Bad Boy Unleashed is the second part and takes the signal from Extreme and sends it to a boat wireless router. This means you don’t need wires to your computer and several users can use the facility at the same time.


Lorraine set up paying a small ($10) monthly fee to Skype to support making local calls through Skype. Skype to Skype is free.


SIM cards are the next puzzle to solve. Based on a recommendation from a Vodaphone sales person, we checked out the Woolworth’s Roaming Card. You can buy them from any Woolworths store but the staff there know nothing. They do, however, have a 24 /7 support desk in Ireland. The cards connect to a local carrier in lots of countries and the rates are a lot less than other rates we were quoted in OZ for roaming cards. This avoids the need to buy new SIM cards in each country.


We bought 2 SIM cards in Woolworths for our mobile phones. Subsequently we bought a nano SIM card from Woolworths online (not available from the stores) for my new ipad. We have them all set up for internet (Do this before you go because it takes a while). Also you will need to set up the automatic $ top up for the accounts.


Brian

[The Miss]

Hi Brian,

Awesome post and perfect for us right now. A couple of weeks ago we got photos from Catana and one of these included a photo a bad boy box but I didn't know what it was but knew it would reveal at some point so left for that time. Now I know.

So much good advice - thank you. I am about to retire to bed after a top day as I have booked in for my first ever sailing course next weekend. Boat then sailing lessons seems reasonable.
A Good Day | Miss Catana

I will reread your post tomorrow but very grateful!

cheers the Miss

[mark_morwood]

Originally Posted by The Miss

Siestas sound wonderful until we have a 5 week turnaround from Tassie to France and getting our boat from Cantel to Turkey and then being in Istanbul to fly home.

Homepage | Miss Catana

Did you manage to find an experienced skipper to help you with the move? Given your tight schedule, having someone experienced that you trust aboard, will help you decide when and when not to move, and help you to deal with some of the inevitable teething problems you will have with a new boat. The med is relatively benign, but the combination of a tight schedule, a new boat, and inexperience could make for a very stressful first "cruise". It might be particularly helpful if they could spend time helping commissioning the boat and then do the delivery to Canet, so that someone on board with you already has experience with all the newly installed gear and systems.

Mark.

[The Miss]

Hi Mark,
We did find a chap to assist which has put our mind at ease. Mike lives near the boat yard in La Rochelle so is going to do the maiden sail from La Rochelle to Canet and then accompany us on the trip to Turkey. His experience and knowledge thus far is already proving invaluable to us.
Cheers the Miss

[Prairie Chicken]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Why , where is the boat registered. Do you wish to leave it there for more then 18 months, if so consider getting into taken into bond.


dave

The boat is registered in Canada but will remain in the Med indefinitely. I'm familiar with sealing the boat--putting her in bond--and it may be an option but I don't think that is a long-term solution. We're still hoping to get our hands on the original bill of sale showing VAT paid.

Barra, Spain has also been cracking down on document checks. We see them practically every Sunday in the busy anchorages of Mallorca. Last fall we watched them board a Scottish boat owned by friends. They had all their docs on board but the Aduanas didn't recognize the Scottish VAT-paid document. Fortunately the owner's son had enough Spanish to argue with them. The Aduanas gave them a lot of grief and it ended with the Aduanas demanding the owner provide their documents to their office in Palma the following Monday. In the office there was no problem; they recognized the Scottish documents as valid. Still, if the son hadn't had Spanish I think it would have been a much larger hassle.

We've been boarded twice ourselves by the Aduanas in the last 10 years and it's not a good feeling. Fortunately they were most concerned with how long we had been in the country and weren't concerned with the boat--those times.

These countries are hurting for money. I believe we have to have our documents in order.

[mark_morwood]

Originally Posted by The Miss

Hi Mark,
We did find a chap to assist which has put our mind at ease. Mike lives near the boat yard in La Rochelle so is going to do the maiden sail from La Rochelle to Canet and then accompany us on the trip to Turkey. His experience and knowledge thus far is already proving invaluable to us.
Cheers the Miss

Sounds like a good plan. Maybe we'll see you in the spring. We are wintering in Sicily and will be heading to Turkey in the spring.

Mark.
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