Open Yard 2017

The last weekend of August the boat yard at Ellös Sweden comes alive for 3 days with Scandinavia's largest sail boat show (According to the website :) ). Anna and I were there last year and were introduced to Najad and fell in love with their boats. At the event last year, Öppet Varv August 2016, we were introduced to the Najad 395cc. This is a new design for Najad and at that time it was mostly in the design phase. At that time there were no pictures or any real information available.  The info we received was mostly generalities. Like, the new boat is like this boat over here but a little bigger in the aft cabin, or you will have more room here and this has changed, etc. During the year, we have been in regular contact with Najad. Getting updates on options for the 395cc, receiving renderings and just a few months ago, the official brochure. Najad also informed us that they had more info about the new 395cc so Anna and I could not wait to get up there to talk to them more about the new boat.

Öppet Varv opened on a Friday and since we have to both work, that is until we win the lottery, we decided that we would leave early Saturday morning and then stay the night. This way we could get two full days, Saturday and Sunday, checking out the boats and vendors.

It is about a 4hr drive from Malmö to Ellös, so at zero dark 30 we stated the drive up to Ellös. It is mostly freeway but the last part is on a two lane winding road that can get pretty congested due to everyone going to the boat show. We made good time up to Gothenburg and once we got through Gothenburg and on the North side, are stomachs started telling us it was time for some breakfast. Good old Mickey D's to the rescue. For some reason, it seems like Gothenburg has a McDonald's on every corner so we had no problem in finding one.

Since it had been ages since I had a proper McDonald's breakfast, I was jonesing for a bacon egg cheese biscuit. But since they do not have them here in Sweden, I got the next best thing, Sausage egg McMuffin. Breakfast of Champions.

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We arrived at the boat yard a little after 10:00 and to our surprise, there were not many people there. The weather was overcast, windy with a good chance of rain, so basically a typical Swedish summer day.

As we came in, they had one vendor that looked like it was having a going out of business sale. Clothes hanging on make shift rails and in piles on the tables they set up. In order to find something you had to fight your way in, dig through piles of clothes hoping to find something that would fit you. Since we would rather not have to fight to the death in order to find some clothes, we keep on walking by. We had more important things on our mind, the Najad boats.

Once you past some vendors, there it was, the Najad customer tent.

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We headed straight there since it was not that crowded. We meet up with Frida, the Najad PR rep and talked to her for a while. It is always good to see friends that you have not seen in a while. After talking with her we went onto the 410 and talked to some Najad salesmen regarding the 395cc. Since there was hardly anyone on the boat at that time, we could really look at the boat. Lift up the deck hatches, look into the bilge and engine room, look behind electrical panels, really give it the once over. The craftsmanship is impeccable. Just have a look at the wiring.

Wiring
Wiring

After spending a few hours talking with Najad and looking at the boats they had on show, we wandered around looking at the other boats. Even though we pretty much have decided on getting a Najad, we like to look at other boats just to see what they have and compare. Sometimes you see something that is on another boat and say to yourself, "That is really smart how they did this" or "That is really cool, and I want it".

Around early afternoon, the sun decided to show itself and Anna received a call from her big sister. Anna's sister and her husband were also at the boat show. We meet up with them and spent some time catching up. At the boat show, Hallberg Rassy allow you to take a tour of their workshop so you can see how some things are made. We all decided to go on this tour. It gave us a chance to hang out and look at some of the boats that were being built. Especially the 64' boat they build. It is a monster.

Once done with the tour, it was getting close to closing time for the day. So we headed over to the local pub to get some dinner. After eating a very expensive hamburger and fries,(not worth the price) we drove to our hotel. It was in a town about 10km away. The rooms are standard but they do have a nice courtyard.

Unfortunately, there was a family next door to us that had a kid that would not stop screaming. At least that is what Anna told me. I slept all night but Anna said the kid was crying all night and needless to say, Anna was a little tired come the morning.

We seen some older Najad boats online and have liked what we saw and most of them were up in Henån, just the next town over from Ellös. We thought it could be cool to go and have a look at them. Well to our surprise, they were at the boat show. We got to go on them, look them over real good and ask question about them. What a difference in seeing them in person vs seeing the pics on the net. One boat we were really interested in seeing was on the hard at the Najad office. We had an appointment at 09:00 to see the boat so we had to get up at 07:30. Besides the kid screaming all night, this was the other reason Anna was tired. The condition of the boat was great but there were some things we were not quite happy with. We will have to see if we come back to this one or not.

Once we were finished with looking at the boat, we drove back to the boat show. Since we seen the boats the day before, we went to all the venders booths. We took our time and talked with the venders and looked at what they had to offer. We had a really good talk with  UK sails, the ones that supply the sails for Najad. Got to talk about the type of sailing we are going to do and what type of sail setup would be good for us. It was very informative. Once we place our order for the boat, we plan on going on a tour of the sail loft to see how everything is done.

With Anna not getting much sleep the night before and us having a long drive home, we bailed out of there around 15:00. The drive home was pretty uneventful except the for the one or two crazy drivers that you always encounter out on the road.


Status update:

We have sold our car and are trying to sell our apartment now. Hopefully we can sell it in the next month or two. Once we get the apartment sold, we can start some serious negotiations with Najad and put an order in for our boat.

Najad Visit

On 17-05-05, we visited Najad in Henån Sweden to talk with them about the different options we can get on the boat. We arrived at 10:00 and it was a beautiful day. The sun was shining and at that time in the morning is was already 18º C. After about an hour of talking with them, going through an exciting excel sheet of options, we got to have some real fun. We got have a look around at the boats they were working on both in and out of the water. In the factory, we got to climbed aboard some of the boats under construction. Here are a few pics

After we had a look around the factory, we drove down to the marina where they had some nice boats in the water. By this time it was about 20º C and no wind.

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We went aboard a 570 CC to just have a look around.It was outrageous. Carbon fiber mast, refrigerator for wine, in boom furling and even a beer tap.

After that we decided to have an ice cream and discuss the options and what we saw. Can't wait until we get our boat!

Roller Coaster Ride

Just a about 6 weeks ago, we decided to start get serious about getting our boat. We got ourselves a relator and thought that we would have our apartment sold within a week or two. We were all excited and felt overwhelmed at the same time. Excited about selling the apartment but at the same time, overwhelmed about how much work we are going to have selling everything and down sizing. The first showing went ok but no one made an offer on the apartment. Then came the 2nd, 3rd and 4th showing with no results. By the 4th showing, Anna and I were both so blasé about the whole apartment selling process. Having to keep the apartment styled and staged in a certain way all the time is a pain in the ass. I don't want you to think that Anna and I live like hoarders or anything like that, but it is nice to be able come home a leave things where they are and take care of them later.

Since we were not getting the attention we wanted for our apartment, we have now took it off the market. It is still for sale but it has been taken off hemnet. (A Swedish site where houses and apartments are listed.) For some reason, everyone thinks if the apartment has been on hemnet for more than a week, there is something wrong with it and they tend to stay away. So for now, we are going to wait util the end of May and try listting the apartment again.

It may seem like a lot of emotion for just selling an apartment but it is more than just selling an apartment. Selling our apartment is like kick starting our dream. It marks the official start of us getting our boat. So until it is sold, it feels like we are just in libo and this in itself is a bit of stress. We want to get going now and since it is taking longer to sell the apartment, it is a bit frustrating. Wait for others to do something, like buying our apartment :),  is not one of our strong suits.

We have not even bought our boat or settled on the final details of the boat and our emotional state has been on a roller coaster. Real high at the start of each showing, real low when we did not get an offer, back to high for next showing and then low again. Then wanting to purchase our boat but having to wait due to the apartment. So our emotional state has been all over the spectrum these past weeks. I wonder what type of basket cases we are going to be once we sign the papers for the boat :)

 

 

Realtor Chosen

After a week of interviewing realtors, 5 of them to be exact, we finally decided on and signed the contract with our new realtor. Starting last Tuesday, 17-03-07, I had interviews lined up for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and the following Monday. The first two interviews were ok since most of the info they presented was new, but then it became old. All the realtors presented pretty much the same info as all the others. The only real thing that stood out was the pricing.

Basically they all stated their steps as

  • Evaluation of apartment
  • take pictures
  • post listing on hemnet (An apartment/house listing web site)
  • Have showings of the apartment

So when we got to the third realtor presenting the same info, we could pretty much walk them through the process :)

We told each realtor that we would be making our decision today 17-03-15 and they all said ok and would call back to see what our decision was and if they could answer any questions we might have. The second realtor that we interviewed, her name is Silva, contacted us on Friday 17-03-10 and then again on Monday 17-03-13. Two other realtors called me back today as the other two have not tried to get in touch with me. Since Silva, contacted us twice, she seemed to be hungry for our business. This drive was one of the reasons why we chose her. Plus she instilled confidence in us that she could do a good job in selling apartment.

Silva has already set up an appointment for a stylist to come to our apartment to tell us what we need to change to make the pictures look good. So it will be interesting to see what they say. Everyone thinks they have good taste so we will see how bad ours is :)

 

Boat 2017 Jan 21-22

We awoke at 08:00 to a cold overcast morning here in Sweden but the forecast for Dusseldorf Germany was for a few degrees colder but sunny. The train ride to Kastrup was uneventful and the same with out flight. Since our flight was the 12:15 flight, the plane was less than half full. So we had plenty of room. Even if we did not have much room, the flight was only an hour, but it is always nice to have that extra sit next to you empty :) Once we landed, we headed straight for the taxis. Since we were only staying one night, we had only a carryon. This makes traveling so much easier. One can get in and out really quick. We grabbed a cab to our hotel. Lindner Hotel Airport. It was still before 15:00 and our room was not ready, so we dropped off our carry on and hopped in a cab to Messe Dusseldorf where Boat 2017 was being held.

Upon arriving we checked in our jackets and proceeded to go into the exhibition area. We knew that it was big but once we entered, then the enormity of the exhibition hit us. They had 17 halls setup with sailboats, motorboats, equipment and products for all boats. They had a shuttle bus that took you from exhibition hall to exhibition hall. It was that big

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We were a little hungry so we stopped at one of the restaurants and had som schnitzel. Then we were off to were they had the sailboats. We found were Najad exhibit was and signed up for the last time they had, 17:30. With a few hours to kill, we went around to look at all the other sailboats.

We looked at Hanse, Jeanneau, Beneteau, Hallberg Rassy and many others. But none of them grabbed us like a Najad does. We like the price of some of the others, but it is Najad that we have fell for. You can see some video of some of the boats here Boat_2017 video

17:30 came and we meet up with Jörgen, CEO of Najad, and he showed us the Najad 450 CC that was on display. We got to talk with him more about the boat that we have our eye on. The Najad 395 CC. We got to see some more renderings and talk more about the progress of the 395 CC. They are building the first ones now and they should be ready by the end of the year. Anna and I are excited to see on up close.

We spent over an hour with Jörgen and since the exhibition closed at 18:00, we hurried to get our jackets. Grabbed a cab back to the hotel, checked in, ate dinner at the hotel restaurant and then crashed. We both were so tired from all the walking we did.

The next day we decided to look at more of the products and the other fun stuff they had there. In the trendsport hall, they had a wave pool where they were having a surf/paddle board competition. The announcer was screaming something in German so we did not understand what he was saying but it was still fun to watch them carve up the water.

After seeing what we wanted to see, it was getting close to leaving. So we decided to end the visit with some cocktails before we left to fly back home. We got Anna her Piña Colada and I had sex on the beach. (Oh Yea!) :P

It was a really good trip and we are looking forward to going back next year.

Boat 2017

Tomorrow 17-01-21, Anna and I will be flying down to Dusseldorf Germany to attend Boot 2017. We got information from Jörgen (CEO of Najad) that Najad will have their new design bureau – FARR Yacht Design – along with their Interior styling team – Ken Freivokh there at Boot 2017. Plus they will have the Najad 450 CC on display. Even though this boat is a little bigger than what we are looking for, it is always nice to what they put into the boats. It gives us a good idea of how our boat will look like :)

After hearing about what Najad is bringing to Boot 2017, plus reading up on everything else that is going to be there, we decided that this was defiantly worth going to.

We will land in Dusseldorf around 12:15, then straight to the hotel to check in and then to Boot2017. So we will have about 5 hrs on Sat and then about 6 hrs on Sun before we need to fly back home. Hopefully it will be enough time to see everything we want to see.

We have a gopro now so we will try to make a video worth watching once we get back.

Update 17-01-15

It has been a long time since we update this blog but there has not been any real reason why we have not updated except for there has not been a lot going on.

Boat Course

We have finished our sail course "FÖRARINTYG" so no Anna and I can both take out a boat that is under 12m x 4m. So if the boat is 12m or longer and 4m or wider, according to Swedish law, we could not take the boat out.

Berthing

We have paid for another year to stand in the queue for a berth in Helsingborg. They still can not give us a time frame as to when we might get one. It is very frustrating that everything is hanging on when we get a berth. Not much else we can do except wait. :(