"Why Don't We Just Build Our Sail Boat?"

The sail boat salvage agreement that Art signed from the towing company was suppose to save Mariner. The salvor's towing contract had in small print something called binding Arbitration.

The Arbitration board sent us their findings after 4.5 years and thousand of dollars later. The arbitrators decision was final. Final Award: The panel determined the towing company was liable for the loss of the vessel's mast and no other liability whatsoever to Art.

The America's Cup boat was gone.

Devastation means: lay waste, destroy utterly.

It was hard watching my friend of 23 years walking into a valley with no way out. Sitting on the couch across from Art, I stared into his eyes and said "Why don't we just build a sail boat"? This is the true story about 1 man and 1 womans journey to start over.

Without a dream or vision people parish. Art and I both needed a fresh start. Designing and building this yacht was just the challenge that brought spark back into lives.

When we started this project Art and I owned a house in New Smyrna Beach, Fl. The garage was our work shop. We ordered our first sheets of 5086 marine grade aluminum from a company in Fort Lauderdale, Fl. We drove down south to pick up our first load of Al. sheets.

It didn't take long for us to out grow our double car garage. Our neighbors were retired they would stop by the garage and check our progress. They always offered a smile with an encouraging word. I think they were waiting for us to assemble the whole boat down the side street.

The amount of cut aluminum sections it took to form just one rib was 6-9 cut pcs. Pretty soon all those pieces looked like a bunch of dinosaur bones standing up in the corner. We needed to rent a warehouse space soon.

We found a warehouse that we could rent behind the New Smyrna Beach airport. We needed a space that we could grow into. Also we had to give the ceiling height consideration. Boat building was new to us so we were careful with finding a place that we could get the hull out of, once we were finished.

This is where it all began...building our sail boat for the next several years. The good thing was it took us only 5 minutes to drive from our house to where we were building the boat. It would be too easy to talk ourselves out of working on it if we had to drive a long distance.

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