A to B to Sea: Meet Aquabat

Many people have been waiting very patiently for photos of Aquabat and others not so patiently! I must've been waiting for the magical day when all jobs were done, everything was put away and the boat was "perfect" before I introduced her to the world. I now realise that that is an illusion and that you will all love her just the way she is. So without further ado, meet Aquabat.

Aquabat is a 40 ft Aluminium Adams Naut sailboat and will be the vessel that will carry us around the world (we hope). She has already done one circumnavigation so we hope she remembers the way! We heard from someone that more Adams Naut 40's have circumnavigated than any other type of boat. We don't know if it is true but we like the sound of it! We bought Aquabat from the man who built her from scratch 23 years ago. He named her and since we didn't have another name that we wanted to change it to, we decided to keep it as it's a part of her story.

We have all of the old documents and receipts from when the boat was built and it is quite fun to go through them and see everything onboard itemised and how much cheaper it was 23 years ago! These are some of the notes from the designer about the boat:

"The Naut 40 has a finished deck which gives a clear deck to work on and lots of room to lie about in the sun. The hull of the Naut 40 is of moderate displacement. This allows it to carry with ease the luxurious accomodation plus gear and stores. The keel is a long fin, carrying ballast inside... The rudder is hung on a skeg for strength."

The plans were originally drawn up with fibreglass construction in mind but as I mentioned above Aquabat is actually built from Aluminium.

Vital Stats:
While she is technically 40 ft long, she is actually 43 ft if you include the swim platform & bow sprit. She weighs 11 tons unloaded and a bit under 12 tons loaded.The Keel is 4.5 tons of lead. She is a cutter rig and we carry 7 sails on board. The mast is 55ft above deck and her draft is 1.9m below the waterline. The hull is aluminium and is 6mm thick below water line and 5mm thick above it. There is a 10mm thick reinforcement running along the bottom of the hull from stem to stern. We have the ability to hold 600 L fresh water, 200L of diesel in our primary fuel tanks plus another 200L in the reserve tank, and 180L of waste in our holding tank. She also has a 40 horsepower Yanmar diesel engine and hydraulic steering.