Finding Kismet & Realizing Security
21 July 2005 | St. Martin
March 2005
We found our new boat totally by accident; did not even know we were looking for one.
We went to St. Martin to place a deposit on a dinghy and outboard. We owned a Beneteau Oceanis 461 that was scheduled to leave charter management during summer 2005. We planned to refit the Beneteau and move aboard for 5 years of cruising the Caribbean. When we arrived in St. Martin, we anchored just outside Simpson Lagoon. We took the dinghy in to Budget Marine and placed our order for a new dinghy and OB. When we returned to our boat, we noticed an Amel Super Maramu 2000 anchored right next to us. The next morning we just had to go over and tell them how much we liked their boat.
After visiting for a few hours, we left with a handshake agreement that they would contact us and give us a "right of first refusal" should they ever decide to sell their gorgeous boat. We had been wistfully looking at this model boat for 3 years at various boat shows.
To our surprise, we received an email a few weeks later offering to sell us the boat. The owner wanted to use the yacht for one more family short cruise in January 2006; after that we could close on the purchase of our dream boat. We would rename the yacht to be, what else, S/V Kismet.
Later, we came to feel that she called out for a different name. Final decision was to name our boat S/V Security. This related to our lives in many ways: we have twice owned private security businesses (one video surveilance/alarm and one private investigation), Bill is currently employed in security financing, and the yacht will truly be our security on the sea.