Commissioning
The day had come for us to walk on board REGINA for the very first time as her proud owners. The feeling to commission a brand new boat, both design-wise and production-wise, is difficult to explain. For years, we have been following every development closely and planning equipment thoroughly . And now – finally the day had come! She was ready!

As with all Hallberg-Rassy boats ever built, she was delivered on time, not a day too late. This is not always the case, as I understand, and many anxious owners of other brands had to see their boat launch postponed by days, weeks or in one case I know of even by two full years!

Also impressive is that it all is there: all equipment as it should, nothing forgotten and all tested by the yard before delivery.

It took one full day at the Hallberg-Rassy yard to go through the bits and pieces of the boat. Professional Hallberg-Rassy staff explained everything to us in detail, from service of engine and watermaker to flushing the toilet. Five files, full with documentation ranging from the owners’ manuals from all the equipment manufacturers to Hallberg-Rassy’s own tips and suggestions including a full wiring diagram of all the electric’s was handed to us. The night reading was thus secured for several weeks to come!
Take a look at this electronic installation behind the easily accessible instrument panel at the nav station: Everything neatly wired with signs and labels logically put together and easily expandable with ample spare wiring and fuses for additional equipment to come. All corresponds to the wiring diagrams provided with each yacht. I can't think of a more professional installation on any yacht.
At far left: diods for split of battery; From top left: Sailor Iridium, Sailor VHF, Comrod MAS1 combo antenna split box; Under grey cable canal: Thrane&Thrane MiniC, Raymarine GPS splitting box; Bottom line: Incoming 12V Service, Bow Thruster control, common Negative Point, Common Earth Plate, NMEA distribution; At front: Reverse side of the opened instrument panel with wiring to fuses, tank instruments, heater control, inverter control and battery supervision.
One of my biggest moments was when the actual boat keys were handed over to us and I hang them onto my other keys for the car and the house. My bunch of keys was now complete.

The next step was to fill our new home with our stuff. But where should we put all our things?! There were so many cupboards and drawers available! Jonathan even discovered a “wine cellar” down under the flooring, where he suddenly had vanished and soon after started to store Dad’s beer into plastic baskets under the flooring.
When inspecting the HR 40 on boat shows, the cupboards had looked so “similar sized” to the ones on our previous HR31. Also comparing with the previous model HR 39, the HR40 had less cupboards in number. However, the boat's new hull shape with a much more "vertical" hull, allowed for the actual volume to become far bigger than they initially looked. Our previously used plastic boxes which fitted so neatly into various cupboards in our HR31 almost looked ridiculous on the HR40.
So we had to go shopping for plastic boxes, bigger in size and larger in number. We used several evenings puzzling around with "borrowed" boxed from various shops to find the most suitable for each location. They all had various advantages and disadvantages, some were labeled "made in Poland", some "made in China" and some even "made in Sweden". Without any political aspect, we put them onto each other, side by side, with and without lids, transparent or coloured. In the end, we found out that all boxes could fit into all places, depending on how the were stowed..... Confused, we went to bed, instead, dreaming about boxes and cupboards.
Here are the smallest boxes we found fitting into the drawers....
The first night on board, celebrating with Champagne, not forgetting to give the God of Wind, Rasmus, his part of the bottle. We were explicitly reminded of Rasmus by Magnus Rassy's wife Mellie. She spoke about giving him "Schnapps", but we thought that the Queen of the Seas, S/Y REGINA, being an elegant Hallberg-Rassy, Champagne would be more suitable. Don't you think?! And no, we did not crash the bottle against the hull! First of all, we don't want to hurt the boat and second of all, we wanted some of the champagne as well!
On the following day, there was hardly any wind, and it was time for the first sea trials. The first challenge was to get out of the berthing! She was huge, Regina, but luckily, with a centre cockpit, the distance is not so great from the helm to the front of the boat giving a good overview of the bow. But beware, there is "more boat" behind you, and the distance is far from the helmsman to the flagpole and the bitter end of the boat.

We chose a day of very little wind to slowly build up our self confidence, especially since we always have our children taking part on the manoeuvers. Fenders, holding mooring lines with eventually making the final knots are on their responsibility. We also practiced mooring alongside over and over again in the harbour and the children loved trying to through the lines ashore trying to "catch" the pole. It became a game trying to make the best possible mooring. Later on, practicing without the bow thruster gave an additional dimension in the "professional's league". "Look no hands" became synonymous of not using the thruster. But we have to admit, the bow thruster is a fantastic additional invisible crew member, pushing the bow to one side or the other should we fail to do it right from the beginning.
Despite the little wind, we decided to, at least, hoist (oh, excuse me: I meant roll out!) the sails for the very first time on the open bay. There was hardly any reason for sailing, since the wind was only around 6 - 8 kts and the 10 tonnes of the HR40 would hardly move in this breath of wind.
How wrong we were! In the light breeze, Regina quickly picked up speed and came up over 7 kts. With the autopilot, we even picked 7.36 kts (shame on us that the autopilot did a better job then we did, but there must have been a local wind breeze right there and then!). The sailing performance in light winds were extraordinary and the "feeling of sailing" were far beyond our expectations. We had thought that the "feeling", we had to leave with our HR31, instead steering a vessel in the future. But no, we still have this fantastic light wind sailing performance despite her heavy hull. Congratulations, Germán Frers!
Everyone wanted to try the helm, of course, and the children did an impressive job, despite the fact that they, in the beginning, felt that tiller had been easier than the wheel.
After all this excitement, it was time for Karolina to take a nap. What better place was there than lying on the wonderful aft deck, listening to the sea. Close by, always at hands and still some "privacy", without having to go up front on fore deck. Just gentle movements, stretching out... We started to really appreciate the mid cockpit concept!
After an exciting day, we unpacked our elegant and fancy HR china (a special birthday present to Karolina from me, who else....!). We opened a bottle of Amarone wine and poured it into our new wine glasses (I think these are actually small cognac balloon glasses, but perfect to stow and use on board).

We are, indeed, a lucky and happy family!