Photo - LONE STAR out of the water in Buenos Aires, Argentina November 2009

After months of waiting for an opening, we pulled LONE STAR out of the water for the first time in three years.

Our haul out started the day before with me requesting permission from Customs to haul the boat while providing a detailed list in Spanish of the work we planned to do. After three trips, and signatures and stamps covering the lower half of my letter, we were granted permission. I have no idea why Customs requires this, but understand we have to do the same procedure to go back in.

It was a busy morning moving the boat and preparing her for the Travelift (the mobile hoist) and I was fortunate to have my friend Juan Silva to help me. Yacht Club Argentino has two lifts and we used the larger model that is rated at 70 tons. We were by far not the heaviest yacht they have hauled, but the operator did comment "ella es muy pasado" - "she is very heavy" as he observed his load meters reach 32 metric tons.

LONE STAR looked very good underneath, showing the miles with some thin patches of bottom paint, along with a few scrapes on the keel from when we found the bottom a few times.

Our list of repairs include - repainting the waterline, repainting the bottom, varnishing the stern and repaint the gold trim, replacing the zincs, cleaning and polishing the hullsides. All in all not much considering the time and the miles we have covered in the past three years.

We should be back in the water mid to late next week. Once launched I will be preparing her for my absence, and heading back home to Houston on the 19th. I am looking forward to some time at home and will continue our planning for our trip north up the coast of Brazil.