Pull your anchor and join us on our Mystic Venture around the Great Loop.
Where are we off to now?
Follow our journey in 2025 on Mystic as we venture the Great Loop! (This will be live mid June 2025)
About The Mystic Venture
About Lisa & Delton
We are two 50 somethings (OK, late 50 somethings) that decided to pull our anchor while we still could and go on an adventure. Join us as we take you along from the boat buying experience, to buying in another country, disassembly, hauling, re-assembly and finally, the Great Loop.
We started talking about this idea many years ago, let's do an adventure, find a way to disconnect and do something very few people do. I said why not circumnavigate the globe... Well, we needed to pull back as that was a little too big of an adventure. :)
We did both agree that this adventure should be on a boat. We have owned many cabin cruisers over the years and always loved our vacations where we would not touch land for a week or so.
So now, we needed to define the when. Lisa had retired a few years back and I was still working full time and traveling around the world for work. I was definitely tired and did not have the same passion towards my job that I once had. Covid really did not help, and coming out of it we decided 2024 was the year to make it happen. So I retired, and we went on a search for the right boat for us.
We started searching while in Florida winter of 2023. We were at Fishermans Village in Punta Gorda and there was a boat for sale there. It was a Hatteras 50 Sport Deck called Capital Gains. Now I need to clarify that going into this I was pretty sure we would land on a Sea Ray. I love the brand and have worked on them for years and we had owned many sport cruisers over the years. However, once we walked through the Hatteras and instantly fell in love with the layout and the lines. This is a boat, built for living aboard and handling any water you can throw at it.
Back to Capital Gains though, it was nice had lots of cool features but the closer we looked it was not in the condition we were looking for. But about that time we found the boat we have now. But, it was in Ontario and was land locked... so, I called the broker to see what the story was. Turns out the broker was a real piece of work, more to come on that later.
So after that we gave up on our current boat for a bit and kept looking.
We looked at Sea Rays, Carvers, Ocean Alexanders, Navigators and a few others. We even put an offer on a Jefferson, but the winners went well over asking and I just could not see us doing that. We liked the carver 530 and 570 Voyageurs, but on all of them the exterior finish was chalky and many had headliners coming down. The Navigator was awesome, but water leaking around the salon windows scared us off.
To be continued... Check the video out on our Youtube channel @TheMysticVenture videos will start loading in June / July
About Mystic
Mystic is a 1998 Hatteras 52 Sport Deck. She is 60' overall length with a 16' beam. She is powered by twin Caterpillar 3406E 800 HP diesel engines. She has three staterooms each with its own full head including separate showers. We have done many upgrades since we made the purchase, getting her ready for our Mystic Venture.
The 1998 Hatteras 52 Sport Deck Motor Yacht checked all the boxes for us. Thats why went through all the work of disassembly and reassembly as we moved it from Lake of the Woods in Ontario to Superior Wisconsin. We will have videos on our Youtube channel taking you along from the buying experience to upgrades as well as launching and doing the Great Loop.
A few more specs on the 52 Sport Deck, Fuel capacity across 4 tanks is 1000 gallons, Fresh water capacity is 187 gallons and the holding tanks are 100 Gallons. The displacement (weight) of here is just shy of 70,000 lbs.
The three staterooms is a big part of why we went with this boat, wether the bow stateroom or the aft, you have an on-suite head, plenty of closet and draw space as well of enough area to get dressed with out having to do boat yoga. The third state room is just forward on the starboard side of the aft cabin, its head is across the haul and is very large, making up for the space in the third stateroom. Again, lots of closet and drawer space and it has two bunks.
The other huge selling feature was the aft sundeck, fully covered and closed in with canvas, it is a very large area for entertaining. It has its own beverage fridge with ice maker, a sink as well as TV. This is our primary hanging point when not underway. Plus, it has AC and heat so we can be there regardless of the weather.
For me, the electronics were a big part of what I was looking for, something new enough I could still add on to the system. The boat had a new Simrad system installed in 2020, so only 4 years old, and it is compatible with the latest version. The boat has auto pilot, which was working great so no update there. The Simrad MFD (Multi Function Display) was an NSS EVO 3, and what was great about that was the new ones were on sale so we saved a bunch on that. It also has a Simrad Halo Pulse Radar 48" Open Aray and 60 Nautical Mile range. We added AIS to the system so we can see the boats coming and see their speed, course and specs. We also added a Simrad IS42 which is a smaller display, often referred to as a tri-data. We did add the wind sensor to that one as well. We also added a stern camera as seeing the swim deck from the helm is not possible.
What was also really nice was the work Barkers did to clean up the wiring. For some reason when electronics get upgraded in boats, the boxes, wiring and even the displays get left in. Ours was no different, but Derek at Barkers cleaned it up and it looks like a new boat under the dash.
Shots of Mystic and the work being done
Mystic was found on Lake of The Woods near Kenora, Ontario. It is a beautiful lake that is in the US and Canada.
After the survey and the test runs, we pulled the boat to its normal spot for wintering and started the disassembly process.
The disassembly process was about 4 weeks, although total with weather and people delays, it was about 6 weeks.
Here you see the upper bridge hard top removed, the aft sun deck roof and walls are down.
It had been a lot of years since I last did a major job like this and those were on Sea Rays. The good news is Hatteras built this boat with the intentions of it having to come apart and all in all it went well.
I do have to mention, the prior owner who disassembled it and moved it from the Potomac River to Lake of the Woods did a great job documenting with photos his work from nearly 11 years ago
Mystic made the 7 hour journey from Kenora to Knife River Marina on Lake Superior without a hick-up.
US Boat Haulers did an amazing job. Be sure to watch that episode on the youtube channel as there was some crazy drama with the roads and customs last minute.
Oh, and it took two loads, this is the second load with the tops and flybridge wrapped and loaded.
Here is a shot of the aft deck roof going back on.
Here is the fly bridge roof going back on. It was a bit nerve racking as the crane operator was brand new, in the end he did an awesome job!
The major reassembly went quick, about two weeks. We launched and had a 2.5 hour trip over to Barkers Island Marina. All those who helped with the re-assembly wanted to ride on the boat, so we had close to 10 to 12 people on board for the trip.
I am skipping about a month, but once at Barkers we had planned a two week turn around and then to take off and head to Tennessee.
The more and more Lisa and I discussed, plus seeing the capabilities of Barkers we ended up making a decision in late September to leave the boat there and get some upgrades and maintenance done.
We added a second Simrad Multifunction display, a tri-data with weather, a second VHF, AIS and Neabo.
The one part of a boat of this era, 1998, is they did not worry much about inverters. It has a generator, so just run that was the idea.
Our thought was let's get some lithium and an inverter so at least our Starlink and fridge can run without having the generator running all the time while under way or on anchor. So, 540 amp hours at 24 volts, 3000 watt inverter charge plus multiple DC to DC char
I love this picture, not as sharp as I wanted but this is one of the last nights on the boat last fall before it went in the shop for the winter.