Discovery 55, TICKETEEBOO

Broker’s Comments

Discovery 55, TICKETEEBOO is still in her original ownership and has proved to be a very successful platform for 2 handed sailing as well as a great destination for family to join along the way. She has been carefully maintained through life and has been used in the Mediterranean and has also sailed the north Atlantic circuit to the Caribs. As with her sisters she is a benchmark blue water cruising yacht with furling Solent rig and easy handling.

She has an anodised spar which is easy to look after and the signature Discovery dark blue hull livery. Her interior woodwork is executed in cherrywood and she has a very full specification for Mediterranean cruising.

Sales Video

Owner’s Comments

TICKETEEBOO was built and handed-over to us in August 2009. It was certainly a wonderful occasion. Within a week or so we set-off towards the Eastern Mediterranean and based her there until deciding we fancied a little trip to the Caribbean and back in 2014. Whilst in the Med, we’ve mostly sailed her eight weeks during Spring and eight weeks Autumn. We’re not midsummer sailors! Towards the end of 2013 we brought her out of the Mediterranean and enjoyed visiting Porto Santo, Maderia and the Canary Islands before ‘parking’ her up over Chrstmas ahead of embarking towards the Caribbean on New Year’s Day. We achieved landfall, Barbados, within 19 days and then on towards Grenada before working our way northwards, visiting many islands, finishing at Jolly Harbour, Antigua where we berthed her for a month whilst we were at home in the UK. On the return passage we visited some beautiful bays at Barbuda and the BVIs, then Bermuda, followed by most of the Azores islands, which we found equal to the very best. From there we sailed to northwest Spain (because we wanted to visit and spend some time in the Rias before making our way towards Gibraltar, where we had a berth booked at Queensway – another favourite place). All told, 2014 was the year we sailed TICKETEEBOO the most. Just wonderful and probably our most outstanding year on board. Sadly, also the year CHEEKY RAFAKI was lost – we were searching no further than a mile away when the upturned ‘keel-less’ hull was located by the US Navy.

During the last several years, we based TICKETEEBOO at a fine shipyard www.bsg.com.gr. This meant her being in a steel cradle (on the hard) when we were not sailing her. We certainly enjoyed having access to Aegean waters and visited almost all the Greek islands at one time or another. However, we had one more country to visit, two if including Montenegro. Early 2022 we finally managed to claim an annual berth at https://aci-marinas.com/marina/aci-veljko-barbieri-slano, which is our base for now and we are intending to renew our contract for an additional year soon. A Slano is a super base.

TICKETEEBOO is a fine ocean-going yacht, which is also ideally suited to sailing the Mediterranean or Caribbean, in the way we like to. For example, our preference is to swing on the hook in quiet bays. We provision extensively when we first go to her, making full use of the large freezer and refrigerator we have on board. When our watermaker membrane filters needed replacing we upgraded from 106 litres per hour to approx 140 litres per hour. This simply means we run our generator less often! We’ve always made our own fresh water and have plenty so have never needed to use seawater to flush toilets. No smells & no pipes blocking-up.

When choosing owner-options during build time, we were told solar panels were not needed because we could charge batteries in quick-time when running the generator. Whilst true, we set-about adding solar panels whilst berthed Gibraltar 2014. We added a couple of 20W semi-flexible panels to keep our engine and generator 12V batteries fully charged. We also added a combined total of 300W semi-flexible panels to help support our house batteries, as well keep them fully charged. These worked well to keep all batteries fully charged whilst we have been absent from the yacht. However, their contribution whilst sailing has been limited. We subsequently decided to design a framework to add 600W solar panels and use the frame to conveniently secure our Radome, antennas, as well our passerelle (when berthed stern-to). Also to provide convenient lifting of our outboard. This project has proven very successful. It’ll never achieve a pay-back, although typically takes care of our entire electrical load during daylight hours. Hence, we now seldom need to run the generator to charge batteries (although we always top-up before turning-in each night). Since coming to Slano, however, we’re finding we’re enjoying the marina ambience – maybe we should have expected this! Our watermaker has remained ‘pickled’ this year and our diesel fuel consumption is much lower than before. We have shore power readily available so our solar panels are doing very little. How times can change!

We believe we have improved TICKETEEBOO over the years. An occasional ‘knocking’ noise when sailing in heavy following seas always bugged us. Eventually we pinned down the cause. It was the rudder shaft, slight movement, when the pressure on the rudder changed sides in a following sea. Certainly noticeable when trying to sleep in the aft cabin on our Atlantic crossings! Whilst at Gibraltar, I approached the nearby engineers in Spain, agreed the scope of supply, and had additional needle roller upper-bearing fitted. I also had a troublesome Tides Marine propshaft seal replaced. The result – 8 years without the rudder ‘knocking’ in all conditions and a perfect trouble-free propshaft seal arrangement.

Owning and sailing a Discovery 55 can be a challenge at times. During our early years of ownership we regularly discovered parts we wish could have been done differently during manufacture. When Discovery Yachts were still in business and we were visiting Southampton, Sue was asked if we were considering purchasing a new model. Her answer came from the heart when Sue said “We’ve spent several years improving TICKETEEBOO. Why would we want to start all-over again?” Despite these comments, we’ve never regretted or doubted our decision to buy this yacht and we’ve never seen a another sailing yacht we would want to own and sail and we absolutely love TICKETEEBOO. So, why are we selling her? Well, we’ve been sailing since 9/11, 2001 (a very easy to remember date). We took delivery of our first (42ft/new) yacht in 2004 and sailed her from Scotland to the Mediterranean the following year. In 2006 we went on board an Oyster and liked what we saw. We sold our yacht and bought a new 50′. We thought we liked her until we were introduced to the Discovery 55 (there’s marketing for you!). At the London Boat Show we liked the Oyster 56. However, within an hour or so when we sampled the Discovery 55, this was always going to be our next yacht. As it has worked out, we have owned our adorable sailing yacht for the last 14 years. We will certainly be sad to see her move into new ownership, although we have many happy memories sailing her and visiting bays that most people will never have the same opportunity to enjoy.