A Beautiful Classic Wooden Sailing Vessel

Castalia has magic in her.  She has beautiful sleek lines and you can imagine her cutting gracefully through the water. I was to take this yacht from Athens to Singapore, but I left Athens via Swiss Air and I am not certain if Castalia has yet to leave Athens.

Her owners were lovely.  They had immediately fallen in love with Castalia and bought her, with the hope of having her delivered to Singapore, where they would do a refit on her, and then live aboard her in Singapore.  Castalia had too many issues to be resolved in the narrow weather window we had to get her ready for sea and across the Indian Ocean and onto to Singapore. 

I have added Castalia into this list, because even though I was only on her while she was berthed in Athens, she had so many lessons to share with a steep learning curve and she was my first wooden boat.  Lots of things I had only read about in textbooks came to light.  I found the dry rot much earlier than I ever expressed concern over it, because I had no idea what kind of menace dry rot was. 

With severe structural issues, huge electrical problems, difficult mechanical issues, Castalia needed time, more time than we had.  Yet she stole a piece of my heart.  She was a yesteryears yacht, but with no doubt, with love, hard work, and heaps of tenderness, she would reclaim the pride of the sea. 
 Some of the photos in the slide presentation are of the issues that needed to be resolved on Castalia.  Some reveal her intrinsic beauty.  A year has passed, I have not heard from her owners since March of this 2008.  I truly hope that Castalia has made her journey across the Indian Ocean and that they are enjoying her in Singapore.  I hope to meet her, fully sailed on the high seas – what a sight to behold!