We loved the idea, but we thought that the houses would not work at the Paraná, but what about a big boat, like a floating lodge, to which Dario replied, that that’s exactly what he thought was needed for the Paraná, as those floating houses would not work on the Paraná for many reasons.
So we got our minds working, brainstorming about it, and excitement grew rapidly. We shared the idea with my father which he loved totally, and as he shared with our partners at Estancia Laguna Verde, everybody was on a new journey.
We started looking for the right boat. We looked at many different ones. We also looked into building one, there were so many different ideas.
We finally found a really nice catamaran named the Parana Gipsy, which had worked in the past as an “eco tourism” cruiser. It was built by one of the earliest outfitters in the fishing and hunting business in Argentina, David Denies.
The catamaran was well built and had many classy details, with a good structure, but was not well maintained. Once David Denies sold it, it was basically used as a floating house at the Classy Tigre, near Buenos Aires.
After some negotiating, we were able to get the deal finalized. We thought we were now entering the easier part of putting the Paraná Gipsy back in shape and adapting it to the needs of a fishing boat, staff, professional kitchen, etc.
Two of our partners and close friends, the Segura brothers, are architects and the younger of the two, Eduardo, is a very experienced sailor with vast knowledge on the field and a close friend of a great naval engineer, as well as multiple people in this business.