When you work on a yacht as a captain, you get used to the yacht, but you don't feel your own at all. This has its pros and cons. When you're working as a captain on your yacht, the world turns completely upside down and things are different. Now you are not only responsible for the ship, but also all the expenses, and no one will ask you to wash the teak, polish the sides and repair what is loose. What your yacht looks like screams blatantly about who you are. It was with these thoughts in mind that I took the new Hanse 400 in 2011.

For the first time, I was allowed to name it myself, so I went through hundreds of options, but settled on the simplest one. It was built for my new life in Marmaris and I decided that “Marmaris” would be the most appropriate name. This is also so convenient for guests who come to us: to Marmaris to Marmaris.

If you remember, it was not me who paid for the purchase in full, and Nikita and I hosted the yacht in Slovenia. When I saw her standing on the water, I realized that this was the first time in my life that I had ever seen a completely new yacht and that I was the first person to sail on it. This was very exciting and increased my responsibility to investors.

Nikita did not come to receive the yacht empty-handed; he brought my future wife with him as a surprise. I was so puzzled by the idea of my future self-employment on a yacht that I couldn't even imagine anyone coexisting next to me. But now I can say with confidence that this surprise changed our future with her.

This is how Marmaris, my future family and my first business relationship, was born in Slovenia. We went to sea and set the sails, and I looked at her as if she were a complete stranger to me and understood that we had a long way to go together. And all these thoughts were about the yacht, not Ana. I saw our future with her the day I met, and the frightening accuracy of my intuition in this matter remains a major mystery to this day.

The adoption of Marmaris was a difficult process. I don't know if this is due to the fact that I ended my past relationship with the Dharma so abruptly and immediately got new ones with the yacht I saw only in the photo, or because Nikita chose it not me, or because it was much smaller after 50 feet. But something inside resisted how quickly things were changing for the better. Talking about this today, I think that my biggest concern was the level of responsibility from financial debt and the degree of freedom, because now everything depended only on me and no one else. You just had to think about work when you don't have one and work your best when you don't have one.

By prior arrangement, I was to start working with my teacher at his school, but on my own yacht. I tried to get to Marmaris in time to meet him from my trip around the world and start working right away. But when Jim came back, he talked about the difficulties that had happened to his school in his absence and said with great regret that he couldn't help me with my job and that I had to look for it myself.

So I found myself alone, out of work, with a debt the size of a yacht.

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