May 2022
At long last, hours every day online boat shopping paid off for Garry. A boat was found only slightly out of our price range …. £50,000.00 over. So a secret mission to mortgage the bungalow commenced and trip to the south of France was booked.
Port Navy Services ( aka Mosquito City ) the largest dry dock in France was were the boat sat out of water. I had never been to France so i was pleased i get to explore a new country.
2010 Batopoupa was launched so 12 years old and looking really good too, it turns out the boat had been stationary many times in its life.
When we found her in May 2022 she had been there since November 2021 and the previous owns had only just collected her from Morocco. Batopoupa was wintered in November 2019 in Morocco the owners were unable to return to claim her because of Covid for 2 years.
This was not the 1st time this Yacht had sat on the hard, the Batopoupa owner’s found the boat in Turkey where a chap had purchased it off the charter company and then not done anything with her for a few years.
To cut a long story short the survey was fine she has low engine hours, interior looking great no wear and tear to speak off. 2016 she had a Copper bottom painted along with a lot of new equipment installed, including a raymarine, auto pilot, all sails and matching hood and bimini.
An offer was submitted on our return to the UK after the sea trial to purchase the yacht which was accepted. When we received the call from Martin @ Go Earth informing us the good news we took one looked at each other and said holy sh*t this is really happening.