20-year front garden boat renovation finally completed
Some locals in New Zealand have been complaining, according to the New Zealand Herald, as a local landmark – an 11m catamaran – has finally been renovated and been moved to a marina. Now locals will have to find a new landmark to use when offering directions. The catamaran’s been in the process of renovation for two decades, so it comes as a shock that it’s finally finished and gone.
Beach Haven resident Malcolm Steedman has been working on the family boat for about 23 years as it sat on the front lawn, upgrading it from a ‘handyman sailboat’ worth about $30,000NZ to a modern cruiser worth around $300,000.
He built the boat and sailed for more than a decade before it needed some attention. Rainwater had seeped through screw holes and rotted the windows.
He decided to give the almost 11-metre boat an extreme makeover, using a marine architect and spending around $180,000 over the years.
“It’s taken so long to do because I didn’t want it to look like a handyman had built it. I wanted to make it look like it had been done professionally,” Steedman told the New Zealand Herald.
“I looked around at other boats and thought I wish I could afford something like that but that was impossible. You’d see photos of other boats and think that [part] would fit here so you work it around that.”
He says it’s a relief to have the job done.
“At some stage, I thought, it’s not going to get there. You get frustrated with some parts and it just doesn’t work the way you want it to. You get sick of spending months and months sanding. All that’s behind now. It’s the easy part [now], everything is in other people’s hands, not mine.”
The catamaran was winched by crane off Steedman’s front lawn and onto the back of a truck. It was then transported to Hobsonville Marina where the motors will be mounted.
It will stay there for around four days before it’s put into the water. Steedman plans to advertise the boat for sale “and see what happens” once he’s got it running – but not before taking a few family and friends onto the water to watch the America’s Cup.
