We have news, we are changing boats and coasts…

December 2024 I will cut right to the bottom line. We bought a new boat. There is a story, and I will tell it but I’ll jump to the spoiler. Please meet Moonstone. She is a 2009 Selene 55 located in Hampton, Virginia at the moment. We went to the Annapolis boat show in October, and while we did not find a boat we liked Phil decided we needed to see a Selene a few hours south. Long story short, we saw Finish Grade, loved her, and made an offer.

Meet Moonstone, previously Finish Grade

Let’s back up a little bit. We tucked St. Florian in for winter in October and jetted off to the Annapolis boat show. We spent a wonderful week with Phil and Annette Davies looking at boats, and boats, and boats. There was a boat ride in there. Then there were crabs, blue crabs on this coast. Then there was a big decision, and after 20,000 flight miles and 5,000 car miles we own a new boat on the east coast and are selling our west coast boat.

10/10/2024 After closing up St. Florian we flew to Annapolis where Phil and Annette Davis hosted us for a fabulous week of looking at boats.

We found Wayne Goldman at the Annapolis boat show. He was the broker for our sale of SEADUCTRESS but we never met him when Michelle Leonard sold her for us in 2022

We enjoyed blue crabs

Blue crabs are a mess but very delicious

Sorted blue crabs before they make it into the restaurant

We were treated to a boat ride on Phil’s Robalo

Beautiful in a different way…

We enjoyed the boat show, but did not see the perfect new boat. We did see a Selene at the boat show that we liked, but is wasn’t for sale, just for show. Phil took that cue and decided he knew of a similar boat nearby that we needed to see. Then he offered to drive us from Edgewater, MD to Norfolk, VA and back. We fell in love and discussed the obstacles and the opportunities involved in an east coast boat and decided to take the leap.

We fell in love with this Selene 55

So started the next stage of the adventure. We flew back to California for a quick moment.

My gardener has let things get a bit out of control at home

Our friend Dana had fun hiding messages in our house while we were gone

11/10/2024 We were home for a hot minute before flying back to Virginia for sea trials on the new boat.

Tidewater Marina in Norfolk, VA

Finish Grad at the haul-out

We added a shell to our truck

We added a shell to the truck to support the next act, emptying St. Florian and getting her put up for sale. Then we drove to Seattle, flew to Sidney, BC, drove St. Florian back to Washington, emptied her out, and put her up for sale. We filled the truck with things we want to take to the new boat, and gave away the rest.

And the packing begins…

In Sidney we did a quick haul-out, bottom scrub, and zinc change before heading back to Washington

It was a bit rough when we left Van Isle Marina

Luckily calmed down in the San Juans

This was completely full by the time we were done

Suzy took a lot of our overflow

Mabel was not happy with the situation in the back of Suzy’s car

12/10/2024 We closed escrow on Finish grade and moved her to her new home at the Bluewater Marina in Hampton, VA.

Our first voyage on Moonstone. There is a lot to learn on this new boat.

Moonstone Salon

Moonstone galley (crutches are propping open the refrigerator drawers

Pilothouse

Master stateroom

Guest cabin

12/17/2024 We were able to get the new boat name on the transom. We have some work to do with the renaming ceremony. There is a belief that a formal ceremony is needed to cleans the old boat name from the registers of Neptune. All old names must be purged from the boat so that Neptune is not confused. When we removed the pilothouse name boards we found a bit of a mess. Not only did we find the name before Finish Grade, but we found the name before that also! We must clean this up.

This just won’t do

Why Moonstone? Good question. After considering about a hundred potential names we landed on Moonstone.

Romans believed moonstone was frozen moonlight. Moonstone is considered the lovers stone, it is a stone that strengthens couples and the love that two people have for each other.

Meet Moonstone

Phil and Annette decided to buy a twin, meet Asante

We were in Virginia when Phil and Annette took possession of Asante. Glad we got to be part of their first voyage.

Annette enjoying the fly bridge on Asante

The year 2024 was amazing. We cruised to Alaska and back, spent 5 months on St. Florian, we bought a new boat (Moonstone), we are embracing an entire new coast. I will spend the winter cleaning up the blog and trying to reduce its size in preparation for a new site for 2025. Still playing with the name, but look out for Moonstone Meanderings or something like that in the new year…