Mini 6.5

USA 680, IT”S HERE!!!

Well, I’m not sure where to even start. After 14 days of 40 degrees and gray skies, the sun finally came out here in the Northeast, which makes it difficult to sit inside right now and type up a little report on the boat. That’s right- it’s here, right now, along with three other Mini’s, an Open 50, and soon to be a Volvo70. 

The Newport Shipyard is looking more and more like a French yard this week, and glancing at the schedule ahead, it seems the trend is here to stay for the summer. Grab your  ‘safety orange’ quart of paint, people, and get ready for an exciting season of offshore sailing right out of Newport.

Fresh out of the shed with a glamour red paint job, an Open 50 looks like it’s give birth to a set of Spanish twins, Zero hulls #30 and #31. I’m falling out of my chair laughing, just thinking about the process of how we got them there on an otherwise depressingly dreary Wednesday in Rhode Island.

The much anticipated phone call came from Katie at about 0930 on the 17th of April (over two weeks past our original delivery date), which announced APL Boston had “a containeh with sevehnteeen caatens of sailboats” in it, ready to dispatch to an undisclosed yard on the north end of the island. (That’s Boston, for 17 cartons- like, milk cartons- of sailboats, in a container).

“What? Seventeen boats!” I exclaimed. “In one container!! Ha!”

I arrived at the yard, and was pleasantly surprised by a very narrow 45’ blue APL container, sitting right at the entrance- my heart skipped a beat right then I think. There it was, this thing that had been packed and sealed by boat builders and yard workers in another country, in another language, made it across an ocean, miles and miles of railroad track, onto a truck, and driven through a quaint neighborhood, into this tiny yard, and was now in front of me.

With a spring in my step, and an unsettled tone of voice, I walked over and introduced myself to the driver, who was in quite a friendly mood despite the steady 20 knots of breeze, and now hailstorm we were standing outside in. He promptly pulled out a large pair of bolt cutters from the cab, walked to the container doors, and snipped off the plastic seal those Spainyards had attached over the pond.

“Oh man, this is it, huh? I get to see them......now?”

It was just I and he, and my trusty little camera, in the very anticipated moment the door swung open to reveal the bow pulpit of Hull #31. I switched on the video, and I think I said something corny like “Katie, I wish you were here for this right now,” and leaped inside the container to get a better look.

The driver pulled back the other door and said, “Whoa lady, I don’t know how you guys got 17 of these things in heah, look at ‘em.” This became the theme of the day- where the hell was the memo that said 17 cartons of sailboats were in this container was unknown to us, but that’s what everyone thought. Yes, we were sailing Mini’s, but they’re not that small. I’m pretty sure Euro containers are a bit narrower than the ones here in the States, but man- those things were packed into that container. Talk about a ‘box rule’- I feel like Marc Lombard (our designer) was given this ‘box’ and a set of instructions saying “Design and build a hull in it, and we’ll call it a Mini and ship it all over the world.” Forget measuring anything, if you can fit your mini into this box, you’re official- just make sure you can get it out. (See photos for how tight it really was).

With weather conditions worsening, and a yard crew who was apparently unaware of our “cartons of sailboats” arriving for immediate offloading, we knew the process wasn’t going to be easy. All I’m going to say for this part of the story is; this wasn’t my first time in a boatyard, so I respected the yard crew and gave them their space and time to work and figure out the best approach in pulling the boats, keels, and palettes out. Granted, hail is now blowing sideways, and a little girl patiently waiting in the background to climb around on her new boat wasn’t helping. I had photos of how the boats were loaded in Spain, and a few shots and some instructions (“pull it”) of how they were extracted once before, but being men they didn’t take much interest in proper planning.

Time goes by, and holy mackerel, we’ve got the bow of one boat sticking out of the container, “Woo whoo!” I exclaim as I’m recording video. By this time Katie makes it to the yard and standing aside, we’re quietly chatting about the obvious approach and machinery necessary (and Katie’s operator license for such) to extract the little buggers without damaging them.

“That’s like puttin’ ten pounds a shit in a five pound bag, ladies. Jus’ don’t know how they did it....” the yard manager says as he walks by. “Nice one,” I think to myself, laughing.

Suddenly, the man who appears to be in charge of the operation, shakes his head and throws his hands in the air, “We’re not set up for this,” he says.

“Right,” I look at Katie, and we instantly spring into action on our mobile phones, load everything back into the container, and ask our friendly driver if he knows how to get to Newport, “I think we’re done here.” It was something out of a staged reality TV show- Katie and I giggling in the front seat, pulled up next to the truck driver, signaled him to follow us; and with our flashers on all the way to downtown Newport, we lead those two Spanish Minis to their home at the Newport Shipyard. I looked back in the rear view mirror a few times and smiled to see that skinny blue APL container closely behind. I couldn’t believe that after six months of planning and preparation, we were finally bringing this boat to the yard.

I can’t explain the relief and excitement I felt when I walked around the main building at the Shipyard. After seven months of being away, I looked over to see Jimmy and the boys for the first time, he cracked a little smile, stood there and simply said, “We’ll take care of it”. That was all that needed to be said right then, because I knew he would. They always do, and I think I wrote this in a web update somewhere, but those people, and that yard, really are the only thing that remains consistent in the very unpredictable sport of sailing.

The rest is history in the making. Hulls #30 and #31 (and all that goes with them) were happily extracted from the Spanish container in less than three hours on the morning of Wednesday, the 18th of April.

“Thanks you guys,” I said, knowing this wouldn’t be the first time everyone would pull together and make the project happen in a collected and organized fashion. Josh gave a salute as he pulled up the stabilizing legs on the crane, and drove off around the yard. Jimmy gave the same salute as he tossed the last bits of wood onto the forklift, and took off in the other direction. And just like that, they were on to their next project; leaving me alone, standing between two Spanish Minis, canted in their shipping cradles on the ground.

There were a few people in the yard who came out of the shed, or their respective boats or containers, to see the two very small offshore sailboats that had somehow come out of the truck sitting a hundred feet away. I stepped up onto Hull #30, took a look around the cockpit, opened the hatch and climbed in. From where I was sitting, I could see the water outside the port “skylight” window. With a huge grin, I did a quick inspection of the interior (quite spacious for a mini) and thought, “I could get use to this...”.

I popped my head out of the hatch, climbed back into the cockpit, looked around and laughed (to myself), “Right. So has anyone seen the manual for this thing?”