Sailing Mystic Hearts

Last July, before we sold our house and took the leap living aboard, our realtor advised us to get a storage unit and begin moving items out of the house that were cluttering it. She said it would help show the home better so that it could sell faster. We trusted her judgment and began moving items out, not sure how long it’d take to sell the house.

When we finally narrowed down our list of desired boats, we made a plan to visit them. We had decided we wanted an owner’s version of the BENETEAU 473, so we went to look at one in Hampton and one in Deltaville. The boat in Deltaville had additional upgrades and features that made it more appealing, so it was at the top of our list. In August, we made the trek up to Deltaville to see the boat. It was on the hard out of the water, which was fine. Except we had to climb a house ladder to hop onboard and there was no AC (not plugged in to shore power) and we were in the middle of a Virginia summer. 🥵 However, when we finally got inside, we just KNEW Mystic Hearts was the one. 💕

By mid-August we had an accepted offer on Mystic Hearts and drove to Deltaville for our sea trial and inspection! The marina removed her from the hard and had her already in the water ready to go. We met our yacht broker and he took us out, showing us how the engine sounded and tricks on maneuvering such a large vessel. The inspector was very knowledgeable and overall said our boat was in great shape for it being 15 years old. It was a full day from start to finish, but well worth the time and money.

By late August we finally sold our house! I’m sure some family and friends thought we were crazy to give up our beautiful waterfront home that we had just finished renovating, but our dreams had changed, and this was our “now or never” moment. These were the final pictures we took as we said goodbye.

Once we purchased the boat, there was about a 2 week delay before we were able to take possession due to hull painting the prior owners were having done. During that time, we stayed in a nearby hotel with our 3 cats. 😬