During our preparations and during the actual cruise we met some nice People:
Anja, Andre and Robin on "Step by Step 2": http://systepbystep2.com
Martin on "Anima IV": http://www.anima4.net/
Our French Friends on "Sea You": https://seayou.org/
Elisabeth and Toni on "Regina": http://bx4.ch/
Elke, Markus, Oskar and Nestor on "Diana": http://234grad.de/
Frauke and Christian on "Svea": http://wirsindmalraus.ch/
Marianne and Bernhard on "Jolene": https://baerfussroute.com/
Christa and Hartmut: http://luftundliebeunterwegs.blogspot.de
We found the following commercial dealers to be extremely helpful when planning and equipping for our cruise. We have no personal affiliation to any of these companies and recommend them only because we are happy customers.
RJS Marine - The top of the list, outstanding support and service!
Finding a distributor for Balmar equipment in Europe proved not to be easy, but luckily we found RJS Marine. We sent an inquiry for a quotation on a Saturday noon, and two hours later we had a quotation with only a few days delivery time on a product that was seemingly unavailable in the rest of Europe. Not only that, Richard from RJS Marine was also extremely helpful when we faced some problems during installation of Balmar components.
The first alternator did not fit physically - no problem, Richard came to the rescue and provided excellent support. Highly recommended!
Hermanos Guasch Embarcaciones Deportivas, L'Hospitalet de l'Infant, Tarragona, Spain - Very nice, competent and supportive team. For more than one year we have been working together with Hnos Guasch on getting Entropy fit for her long voyage, providing us with excellent service, quality work and, very important, professional advice.
Special thanks to Jordi (no longer with the company), Joan, Eloi and the rest of the team.
Best Boat Yard, Sint Maarten - Fully featured boat yard with haul-out, travel lift and work shop. Very nice and competent staff. We received professional service and top quality work here for hull maintenance (sand blasting and antifouling painting), gel coat repairs, engine maintenance and installation of a new fuel filter as well as fuel flow sensors.
FKG Rigging, Sint Maarten - Getting there was difficult (got stuck in mud twice) but once at their dock FKG did a very good job installing our 3rd Reef rigging and replacing the worn out rope clutch CAM module. Very competent and friendly staff.
Turbulence Sails, Grenada - Excellent canvas and rigging work. We got our lazy jacks and sail cover replaced here, the work was done quickly and very professionally.
Tactix Yachting Solutions - our dealer for Beilken Sails, boating equipment and yachting consulting
We ordered our new Beilken jib (Genoa III) and the storm jib at Tactix. Lars Lensing-Hebben not only advised us thoroughly on recommended material and sizing, he even visited us on the boat 1500 km away for measuring the rigging, performing a thorough rigg check and providing extremely useful consulting to us.
We also bought quite a lot of lines and blocks from him. All thumbs up for this great service!
ISTEC AG - producer of the famous Parasailor which we are using for light wind situations. Special thanks to Gerold Bergen and his wife for great consulting and a nice day trip on the Chiemsee on their boat.
yachtbatterie.de - extremely well stocked online shop for marine electrics and installation material, providing the full Philippi product range. Very nice and competent communication with Hr. Winkel who has a lot of experience with his products and shares experience and insight.
litrade.de - the shop where we bought our LiFePO4 batteries. Quick delivery and good support.
jamboanker.com - the best anchor we ever used was designed by an austrian engineer. Herr Waltl is proud of his anchor, and rightfully so. We drop this anchor. Done deal.
Angerer Bootsmotoren - our supplier for engine spare parts and associated equipment. Hr Angerer was very helpful and supplied useful advice and consulting to us marine engine dyslexics.
Finally, the following are fine examples for excellent custom-built service from German Mittelstand (small and medium sized business):
Gerhard Hesselmann oHG - produced our braided and tinned copper ground straps and even sent them to Spain for us.
H&S Kunstofftechnik - produced our acrylic battery bank cover
Maschinenbau Feld GmbH - produced the slotted steel brackets for fixing the battery bank.