Maximus, the 100ft supermaxi was supposed to have arrived in Antigua on a ship from New Zealand (with Nick Lykiardopulo’s Kerr 55 – Aera) on 22 April giving the crew just enough time to prepare her for 38th Antigua Sailing Week. But just a couple of days before the start of the regatta that the onion ship carrying the two boats broke down which meant the yachts wouldn’t make it to the regatta on time.

A week on, co-owners Charles St Clair Brown and Bill Buckley are still seething about the situation and still can’t quite believe they’ve spent a whole week at Antigua Sailing Week with their entire crew ‘twiddling their thumbs’ while their multi-million pound yacht was floating somewhere in the mid Pacific on an old onion ship.

St Clair Brown commented: “We raced Maximus to Tauranga, spent the weekend packing her up, getting her ready and putting heron the ship, and she was scheduled to arrive here on the 22 April. It was always going to be fairly tight but we had it planned out and we were going to be ready. So it was very disappointing and expensive for us since we had 24 crew and all the hangers on, girlfriends, boyfriends, wives coming along, so we are most disappointed.”

“One of the worst things about the situation,” added St Clair Brown, ” was the fact the shipping company were not very good about giving us the lats and longs. So we didn’t really know where she was.”

According to St Clair Brown the Dutch onion ship was the only one they could get out of New Zealand, “?we managed to persuade the shipping company to de-tour via Antigua. Apparently the main engine failed which is a bit unusual.”

The ship is now underway again and should arrive in St John’s harbour, on the north-west of Antigua, on Saturday or Sunday. “We’re going to do a 24-hour shift, get the rig and sail her round the island for fun on Monday. Maybe we could get Titan who set record of five hours today for the Yachting World Trophy, to come and join us,” concluded St Clair Brown.

Bearing in mind Maximus has been stuck on an onion ship for the past few weeks I can’t imagine Titan going anywhere near her!