It doesn’t take long before whatever boat we own becomes a member of the family. As such, we are not very comfortable leaving her on her own. However, as we want to see some new parts of the world and cruising full time doesn’t make sense for us right now, we are learning to cope with separation anxiety.

Our preference is to leave Beowulf in the care of someone we know and trust. When she stayed behind in St. Lucia last spring when we returned to Arizona, our friends Dave and Diane Wyman came down to baby-sit. This way Beowulf had company and could go for a sail now and then so she didn’t become frustrated by inactivity. And Dave was able to keep us up to date on her condition with periodic e-mails.

Late last spring we left her at the Fairhaven Shipyard in Fairhaven, Mass. The yard was clean, and we tied her carefully, in case of a late Northeaster. We discussed her care with the yard manager, and asked that someone check her electrical connections once a week (the freezer was nearly full). As we were only to be gone six weeks, and she seemed in professional hands, we concentrated on work projects back in Arizona.

When we returned six weeks later, late at night, we were in for a bit of a shock. At first we couldn’t find her. Boy, was that a shot of adrenaline! The we found her several docks away. She had been moved away from the floating dock where we’d left her, to a commerical pier in the yard. We made our way aboard and turned on the lights, and nothing happened. The batteries were dead flat!

Going back on deck we found the shore power cord hanging over the port side of the boat, where it had been left when the boat had been moved (we later found out she had been in this condition for five weeks).

Everything in the freezer was ruined, and at first, the Fairhaven people were very helpful. We didn’t know if the batteries could be saved – after sitting flat for at least four weeks – and they said they would replace them if required. We fired up the genset (on its own battery) and proceeded with four complete equalizing cycles. In the meantime, we inventoried the mess in the freezer, and gave them the list. They compensated us for the freezer, and as we were not sure if the batteries were recoverable, we decided to wait on this part of the deal.

When I asked Ron Fortier, the yard manager, how this could have happened hs was apologetic. It seemed the dockmaster had not been doing his job and had been fired as a result. But how the other staff of this busy yard could have failed to see the power cord hanging over the port side was a bit of a mystery to us.

A couple of months later it was obvious the batteries had less than half their capacity, and might fail catastrophically at any time, so we arranged to replace them, and advised Fairhaven. You can imagine our surprise when we recieved a letter frm Roger Judge, the president of Fairhaven telling us that his employees denied that the boat was left unplugged – and that they would take no responsabilities for the resulting problems.

We relate this story for two reasons – first, because we now know we should have asked for a weekly report on the boat’s condition, including confirmation that shore-power was attached and functioning. Second, so that other cruisers understand how Fairhaven deals with its clients.

When we left Beowulf in Norfolk at the end of summer, we made arrangements to have her checked weekly, and for an e-mail to be sent to us. The folks at Atlantic Basin Marina in Chesapeake City could not have been nicer, and Beowulf came through her period of loneliness with only a few spiders added to her crew.

We are now trying a new system. Beowulf is sitting on the hard, hauled out at the Virgin Gorda Yacht Harbor. We have a local trades person checking on her weekly (mainly making sure the dehumidifier and ozone generator are working, and that the battery charger is connected – although there are no electrical loads). We don’t have to worry about dock lines, corrosion, or being run into by other boats. And the cost is less than half what it would be in the water. This may be the ultimate system.