28 February 2009 12:02.42N 61:44.48W
The Boat
Milano Blanco is an F&C 44, a centreboard ketch designed
by German Frers and built by Frers & Cibils in Buenos Aires in 1981. Some 57 of these yachts
were built, a small number were either fixed keel or sloops. I’m biased,
but they are seaworthy, fast, well ballasted, beautiful and will hopefully get
you off a lee shore in bad weather – something you can’t say about
a lot of comfy recent yachts. The previous owner had kept her in the Caribbean
for 13 years, most recently at St Georges, Grenada. I went to see her there in
February 2009 and we struck a deal. This was a dream come true for me as
although I had sailed whenever invited for a weekend or so, my main sailing
recently had been racing Dog Woof, an Albacore dinghy, with my eldest son
Robbie.