The next day we walked over to the boat yard and prepared ourselves mentally for the damage below the waterline. "Diversified Luxury Yacht Repair" is the name of the place. You've got to be kidding me - we just unwillingly brought our 25 year old sailboat to a luxury yacht repair facility...awesome. As we walked into the impressive 3 story office, complete with marble floors in the lobby, we looked at each other and just laughed. Problem is, we're a little under insured and this one is coming straight out of pocket. Oh well, hard to shop a boat around without a rudder, so here goes nothing.
We met up with the yard manager, and scheduled the haul out for later in the day. His name is "Bob", and after a nice chat we are relieved to find out that the rates are competitive with other facilities in the area. He also mentions that in all of his years repairing boats, he has only had to replace 2 rudders. Most times they can be reshaped or salvaged in some capacity. Cool.
So we spent the next 2 hours cleaning coconut, literally.
As the boat came of the water, we were surprised to see the rudder intact. It was all bent up and pushed into the hull, but not actually broken off. Good news!
After some assessment from the staff, they found no damage other than a bent rudder post. It's supposed to be straight up and down, and ours is bent like a banana. They are planning to bend back the post, reseal and reshape the top of the rudder and put it all back together. Everyone at the facility is super knowledgable, friendly and helpful, and once again we are counting ourselves lucky.
We are literally in awe at the fact that the boat took such a beating and didn't crumble underneath us. She's a tank and although she's missing several layers of paint all over the hull, that's nothing that a bottom job can't fix. But that's for another season.
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