Hi to all. My name is Bill and I am new to this site. Like some others in our world, I am getting older (61) and wanting to try to complete bucket list b4 I depart this world. A few years ago I bought a
Beneteau 43,took it from NZ to
Fiji, had a great 6 months there, and on the way back the
boat got knocked down and after up righting itself we found the
rudder had gone,(we watched bits of it float away in the wash at the back of the boat) so could no longer steer the
boat. Long story about after that, but got back to NZ on a container ship and Club
Marine paid out for total loss. Thank you Club
Marine. The joys of an unprotected spade
rudder. So here I am again wanting to spend some time sailing
offshore, this time thinking of across to
Australia up inside the
Great Barrier Reef up to the bottom of
Asia.
I am thinking of
buying an Amel Super Maramu because it has a reputation of being like the land rover of the sea. It has a skeg hung rudder that they say is very strong. May not be the fastest thing around but pretty bulletproof. Having been through what I have been through, I try to think in front. I have seen a few stories about the bowthruster on these
boats and wonder if anyone else that has one of these, has thought about replacing the existing bow thruster with a more modern type of thruster which is not a drop down type of thruster but a fixed type in a tunnel.ie one that does not have to go up and down with
seals etc. I have looked at an Amel recently that I found out after, had sank on its
mooring due to a leaking seal. Any thoughts on this would be appreciated. Thanks. Regards Bill.