|
Sometimes boat tests start problematically. Take my wring-out of Riviera's 45 Open Flybridge. The morning I was to fly down to Stuart, Florida, to jump aboard her at Riviera Yachts' facility, Brett Noble of Riviera called with bad news. "Bill, the weather's awful here, mate," he said in Aussie Speak. "There's no way the boat's goin' to make it from St. Augustine in time for the test. Can we reschedule?"
I dialed my travel agent. No dice, she said. No seats available until the following week, well beyond the time the test report on the 45 was due. So I called Noble back: "Your part of the country's way popular these days, Brett. Flights are booked solid."
Serious machinations followed, and I do mean serious. The air went blue with phone calls. Then finally, just moments before I absolutely had to leave for the airport, Noble called yet again. He'd convinced an owner who'd taken delivery of a new 45 just a week before to donate his vessel to the cause. The vessel was at Soverel Harbour Marina in North Palm Beach and, as luck would have it, needed a quick trip up the coast to Stuart for custom modifications, most notably the addition of a Steelhead crane (with Zodiac RIB) to the foredeck and replacement of some interior carpet with faux teak-and-holly Amtico flooring. The owner's name was Preston, and he wanted to join us for the ride north. "Cool!" I said.
a d v e r t i s e m e n t
|
Preston was waving from the cockpit when Noble and I pulled up. He wore a big, easygoing smile that comingled joy, anticipation, and pride of ownership. As he helped heft test gear into the cockpit, I rapidly inventoried likable details nearby. Preston's vessel was a beaut, all right. Although her LOA is 51'3", she seemed a good deal larger. The highly arched and stylized brow and side panels of the flying bridge were super-ample and plenty thick, and the hardtop was stabilized via an array of tubular stainless steel supports that were both elegant and brawny; one glance aloft told me the top was unlikely to shimmy during the trip to Stuart. And the access door to the saloon—hinged instead of a slider—looked gutsy enough to withstand a bank robbery!
As we hit a set of teak-paved steps to the flying bridge, Preston explained that he prefers steps to ladders on boats: His wife and daughter feel safer using them and find them easier to negotiate. The point made eminent sense considering the excellent ergonomics of the stairwell: wide enough to nicely accommodate my 5'11", 180-pound frame as well as Preston's slightly bulkier one. The opening in the deck above was ample enough to obviate having to duck, and the treads on the steps themselves, flanked by a sturdy handrail, ascended at an angle that was not too steep.
"How do you get her out of this slip—stick the bow in that hole across the fairway?" I asked once we'd reached the steering console. The fairway beyond the bow looked way too narrow to rotate the 45 once her swim platform was clear of the pilings. "No," replied Preston. "Believe it or not, I go straight out—there's just enough room to turn. I promise. You do it, Bill. See how she handles."
I seldom dock or undock an owner's boat, especially with the owner onboard. But in addition to an even-tempered manner, Preston seemed to have some genuine salt water in his veins. He'd worked as a deckhand on his uncle's boat in South Florida and the Bahamas as a kid and never forgot how much he'd loved the ocean during the many boatless years of med school and subsequent practice. He'd often sworn that someday he'd take his very own boat to the islands. A dreamer? Yeah, but a knowledgeable one who understood exactly what it means to hand off your helm to a stranger.
I fired up our twin 715-mhp Caterpillar C12 ACERTs and let 'em warm for a considerable period (temperatures were in the low 30s in Palm Beach at the time) while Noble, Preston, and I stowed the shore-power cord using the Glendinning Cablemaster. Then we singled up our lines, and Preston and I went back topside.
Coming out of the slip was nerve-jangling, primarily because the 45's bow pulpit wound up overhanging another across the fairway while her swim platform cleared a big ol' crusty piling astern by inches. But thanks to the 45's Twin Disc QuickShift engine control and the responsiveness it engendered in our big Veem propellers, I was able to rapidly tweak forward and reverse progress while pivoting the vessel. "Go ahead, you're too far back," advised Preston at one point—he kept tabs on the swim platform for me while I kept close tabs on the bow. "Okay, fine," he advised after just a second or two.
The trip to Stuart was uneventful and smooth. We stuck to the ICW all the way, taking a pass on the open Atlantic at Jupiter Inlet—conditions simply looked too rough out there for a brand-new 45-footer, at least one that was so obviously close to her owner's heart. On the wheel until just south of St. Lucie Inlet, I came away with two impressions: First, thanks to a set of significant prop pockets and a long, modest keel, the 45 virtually steers herself, no matter what the rpm. And second, nothing beats a tight, Strataglass top hamper on a frigid day—with the sun popping occasionally, we were warm enough on the bridge to unzip our jackets.
|
PAGES:
|
1
|
|
 |
|