Harry Dames, Pretoria, ZAF asks:
Hi Scott & Mary,
This is just to wish you Godspeed on your amazing adventure! I hope to own an Nordhavn one day and will do the same God willing! I'll follow your journey with great interest. The stateroom in Egret is that Midship or in the bow? Many thanks

Harry

Scott Flanders from Egret responds:
Harry, good question. We'll pass along the entire story how staterooms work on Egret. We have a midship master. There is less motion mid ship than up forward, true in any boat. The normal downside to a midship stateroom is at anchor there is less ventilation. Most boats, including Egret, spend more time on anchor than under way so you would think a forward stateroom would be more practical overall. There is a twist that lets us enjoy the best of both worlds. Egret's stateroom is covered by the flybridge bimini, flybridge and pilothouse. A small portion of the midship stateroom is below the walkway behind the Portuguese bridge but that portion is shaded by the pilothouse overhang, Portuguese bridge and raised sides. Heat in the tropics has never been an issue because of the shading and excellent ventilation. On the hottest, stickiest days we take a quickie shower before going to bed and turn the low draw fans. The very worst days we run the air conditioner for an hour to cool tings off. Before long we are under the sheets and very comfortable.

On those hot days it would be easy to move into Egret's forward stateroom but it is not necessary. We have three hatches up forward, two in the forward head and a large one in the middle for the forward stateroom. The foredeck is nearly two inches (5cm) thick between the coring and fiberglass. Additionally we have cut two pieces of close cell opaque foam (that doesn't absorb water) (9/16" or 14mm total) to insulate the hatches with a white sumbrella cover to keep the foam in place. This works well for heat AND cold and still lets in some light. During our stay in the Deep South when other boat's interiors were dripping water not only from the hatches but from the poorly insulated overheads we had zero condensation or mildew.

Bottom line is we find the midship stateroom cooler or warmer, depending on what we want, than the forward stateroom. The fans duplicate the natural breeze thru the hatch with no bug problems.

You have a credible goal for the future. If you truly want it to happen, it will happen. Good luck.