The Long and Winding Road

by Rick Hartley
(Twin Falls, Id.)

Hello everybody;
My name is Rick and my wife is Valerie, and we just became classic wood yacht owners.

To be more exact, we recently traded a 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix,(in near perfect condition for a 1949 Ed Monk Sr. 43 foot yacht,..in need of some serious work.

The one thing that makes this yarn worth reading?

Neither me or my wife have ever worked on a boat before,..and this one has to be ready for our retirement in five years.

The "Orphan Jewel" is dry docked in Sandpoint, Idaho, and after she's finished we'll be staying in that area.

Before you ask,..NO, we don't have any choice but to go this route.

We don't have the money to get a down payment for a house, and we are most sincerely NOT rich people.

As a matter of fact we live in a hotel room for the time being, and to make matters worse, we are five hundred miles from the yacht until we move to Spokane area in about three months.

Yeah, I know.

No money, no way of getting to the project every day, no knowledge of how to fix anything on the Orphan Jewel,.....this is just failure waiting to happen!

Did I mention that we don't have any choice is out of the question, because after 2008, the banks are out of the question.

So the only other choice we have, if we wish to own a place of our own,..is sitting in Sandpoint.

Please don't think that all of this adds up to our not caring about classic yachts,..the truth is we love them.

Their grace and beauty goes far beyond anything that anyone can call a possession, and quite frankly, we never thought in a million years we would get this lucky, but the whole job does seem very daunting.

Look forward to meeting a few of you,..and I'll be happy to keep everybody updated on how this goes,...until I return, have a safe and beautiful day on the water,..we'll be there before you know it.

Questions on the restoration of "Orphan Jewel" >>>>>>>

Trouble

by Rick Hartley
(Twin Falls, Id.)

I recently received a message from another wood boat builder, but unfortunately I experiencing bigger problems then refitting a 43 foot wood yacht,...it's called the local internet services.

Yeah I know,..I'll have more luck with the yacht.

In any case, please allow me a chance to put my service provider in a strangle hold, long enough to work through this.

I really need the help that I was starting to receive before all this started.

Thank you
Rick