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How
would you like to sit on the deck of a charter yacht and sip coffee iced
with chips from Perito Moreno Glacier, one of the most awesome sights
in all of Patagonia?
Perhaps
you would prefer to splash off your kayak for a little snorkeling in the
warm waters of Bora Bora’s Coral Garden underwater park, then paddle
back to the yacht for a cool shower in your stateroom’s marble head.
Or
maybe you dream of cruising Costa Rica’s Pacific beaches, hiking
amid white-faced capuchin monkeys and three-toed sloths before returning
to the boat for a gourmet dinner of freshly caught fish steamed in just-picked
banana leaves.
These
are all fantasy adventures, to be sure, for charter guests and brokers
alike. While crewed motoryacht charters offer a variety of fantastic experiences
aboard an array of different-style boats, most of those yachts tend to
ply Caribbean, Mediterranean, and New England waters, where the yachting
infrastructure is established. Sure, a few head off each season for Alaska,
Australia, and other points afar, but for the most part, charter yachts
tend to cruise near perfectly pleasant hubs equipped with marinas, day
labor, and provisioning houses, places like Newport, Sint Maarten, and
Antibes.
That’s
what makes the handful of expedition yachts that are now entering the
charter market—and the myriad possibilities these vessels represent—so
exciting.
It’s
easy at first glance to mistake these behemoths for the work boats they
resemble. They are built not to turn heads amid the sleek, white speedsters
in St. Tropez, but to have the kind of fuel and water capacity, ballast,
equipment and systems design, and heavy-duty construction that make them
self-sustaining as they circumnavigate the globe. But look beyond the
exterior. The trend is refitting commercial craft or building new yachts
that look like them for elegant expeditions, keeping the characteristics
that allow for true worldwide adventure while providing all, if not more,
of the comfort, decor, and toys found aboard more traditional charter
yachts. That means the best of all worlds for charter guests who want
five-star accommodations in wild, undeveloped lands.
The
calls for such travel started coming around the mid-1990’s, says
Jan Henry, a charter broker with Fraser Yachts Worldwide in Fort Lauderdale.
Younger clients—generally late 30s to early 50s—had chartered
in the well-traveled destinations and wanted to venture somewhere new.
She and her associates were frequently frustrated with the lack of options
available. “Quite frankly, I don’t know of any expedition
yachts that were out there even five years ago,” she says.
Then,
one by one during the past few years, a handful of expedition yachts became
available for charter. Brokers immediately saw the potential. The boats
are typically more fuel efficient than traditional motoryachts, which
means money saved for the charter guest. They tend to be beamier, which
usually means larger living spaces. Their interiors are just as luxurious
as today’s newest deliveries from Holland and Italy. They often
have more deck space, which translates into more toys. They can go places
where no shore-based infrastructure exists to support them, which means
more adventurous itineraries.
And
yet, the boats initially were a tough sell. “Especially [for] the
women,” Henry says. “The women have to be convinced. They
know the Feadship look.”
Next page >
Part 2: “They’re wanting to go far away and do something different.” > Page 1, 2,
3
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