If only Amazon Prime would deliver sails

May 24, 2017 131 0 0

Fano, Italy

We decided to begin our cruising season a bit later than usual this year, for several reasons: 1) Berkeley East was in Fano Italy, which is fairly far north in the Adriatic Sea, and we knew the weather would be cooler and wetter, so we set a May 15th departure. 2) We really enjoy spending time in our little Italian town of Fano and did not want to rush away. 3) Another Hylas yacht wintered in Fano as well, so we planned to rendezvous with our friends on Amante. 4) We wanted to do some touring in the surrounding regions of Emilia-Romagna, La Marche and Umbria. 5) BE was expecting some deliveries: a serviced mast motor from the UK, a new tender from Spain, and new sails from Turkey.

Arriving on April 25th, we discovered that our weather prediction was accurate. It was very cold and very wet. Apparently, Fano was having an unusually harsh spring. We dealt with the elements as best we could and got Berkeley East back in the water as quickly as possible, while soaking up the local culture in Fano.

Following our usual pre-cruise routine, BE was nearly ready to move in the typical 10 days. We caught up with Italian, and American, friends. We had a Hylas rendezvous. We did some exploring, went car shopping, and learned how to make cheese.

We took a day trip to Grotte di Frasassi one of Europe’s largest cave networks. The largest cave ceiling extends to a height of 787 feet and was used for sensory deprivation experiments and the social consequences of leaving a group of people alone in its depths for long periods.

The new tender was trucked in from Spain. The mast motor returned from the UK. The sails even eventually arrived in Italy from Turkey. We were a bit off our schedule, but everything went as planned, well almost. While the sails were in Italy, they were 250 miles from Berkeley East being held hostage by Italian customs. No one could tell us why, no one could tell us what to do to get the sails delivered to Berkeley East. After a winter of two-day Amazon Prime shipments in the US, we were really out of our element.

One thing we love about the Italians is their vivacious, confident personalities. While they may not be able to tell you why they are doing something, they do it with self -assurance and flair. First we were told that the shipper’s paperwork wasn’t completed properly, but they would not say what was missing. Then we were told we needed a broker to facilitate the process and the local broker said it was “impossible.” The saga continued for eight days and involved hundreds of phone calls, dozens of people, hours of listening to officials argue in Italian. One broker finally drove from Venice to Bergamo, fetched the sails and brought them to Fano (a round trip of 10 hours). After some enthusiastic discussion at the local customs office (“impossible” being the only word we understood) papers were signed and stamped multiple times, and “perfecto” it was done. We still don’t know what the original issue was.

The next day, we happily unwrapped and installed our new sails, and were very relieved that they actually fit. With a plan to finally leave the marina the very next day, 30 days since our return to Italy, we proceeded to roll up the sails, only to discover that the mast motor we had sent to Sweden, and then the UK, for preventative maintenance (simply because it was 10 years old) was broken.