Yachting March 2021

WHEN I STARTED OUT AS A NEWSPAPER REPORTER, I wrote my stories on an Apple II computer—about the size of a real apple—complete with an eye-unfriendly black-and-green screen and a memory capacity as limited as mine. It was the day’s best technology, though, and we marveled at it. It was a far cry from the Brot her word processor that got me through college. ¶ Today, it seems that there is more computing power in my smartphone than NASA had in its entire arsenal when it sent men to the moon. How far we’ve come. Similar leaps and bounds have been made in the world of marine electronics—more specifically, in fish-finding gear, a technology I’m always interested in on personal and professional levels. ¶ The best-in-class marine technology I used…

THIS JUST IN Wally Yachts has announced the Wally WHY200, an 88-foot-9-inch widebody design. One of the yacht’s trademark features is the master stateroom in the bow with ocean views through 200 degrees of glass. Wally says the WHY200 has more than 2,153 square feet of indoor space, including a 1,076-square-foot main deck. Belowdecks, owners can choose three or four double-berth guest staterooms, and there are three cabins for five crew. Power will be a hybrid propulsion system. The WHY200 is expected to debut in September. CORRECTION In our January issue, our review of the Azimut Magellano 25 Metri had the incorrect fuel burn numbers at 2,000 rpm and the incorrect maximum beam. The average fuel burn at a 2,000 rpm cruise is 101.4 gph. The yacht’s maximum beam is…

180'5" LENGTH OVERALL 31'6" MAXIMUM BEAM LOOKING AHEAD TO THE NEXT boating season is everyone’s favorite hobby at this time of year, with the last gasps of winter starting to fade and the warm summer sun just a few months away. Boatbuilders around the globe are encouraging this daydreaming in a major way, with some bold new designs that add style and spice to the imagination. ¶ In the following pages, we off er a look at new builds and concepts from mega-yachts to catamarans, with everything from traditional propulsion to solar power, as well as design elements that run the gamut from classic to modern. Some of these yachts are already under construction, while others are concepts awaiting owners to bring them to life. ¶ No matter how you…

38'3" LENGTH OVERALL 12'6" MAXIMUM BEAM ANYONE WHO ACQUIRES a Huckins Yacht automatically becomes a curator of a slice of American yachting tradition, a status that carries with it certain duties and expectations. Huckins owners soon get used to people on the dock saying, “Isn’t that a Huckins?” ¶ Such an incident occurred while Cindy Purcell, current Huckins Yacht president and granddaughter of company founder Frank Huckins, and I were standing on the Huckins dock in Jacksonville, Florida. ¶ Purcell was telling me about the new Sportsman 38, which is a distillation of 100 years of yachting history with all the 21st-century advances we’ll expect in future yachts. A gentleman, Tim Colbert, approached us hesitantly. A longtime yachtsman who keeps his yacht in the Thousand Islands on the USCanada border,…

17'9" LENGTH OVERALL 8' MAXIMUM BEAM MARCO BARDI, the Italian freediving spearfishing champion, helped design the Lomac 540 IN Spearfishing center-console. The rigid-bottom inflatable measures 17 feet, 9 inches length overall with an 8-foot beam. Lomac sells the boats without engines to dealers, allowing owners to customize their outboard selection; however, Lomac recommends a 60 hp engine for the 540 IN Spearfishing RIB. • Whom It’s For: This RIB is built for anglers who also like to spend time afloat with friends and family. • Picture This: It’s early May, and grouper and mahimahi season has started off the Florida Keys. You and your buddies jump aboard the Lomac 540 IN Spearfishing RIB and cruise out of Key West to the wrecks. The boat’s deck spaces keep all your gear…

VIRGIN GORDA BRITISH VIRGIN ISLANDS THIRTY-SIX HOURS AFTER HURRICANE IRMA smashed into the BVI in late 2019, Lauren Hokin was standing on the property that used to be instantly recognizable as the Bitter End Yacht Club on Virgin Gorda. She was with her father, both of them part of the family that had owned and built up the property for about 50 years. ¶ “The place was just decimated,” she says. “We were used to storms, but this was orders of magnitude worse.” ¶ It took a full year just to clean up what used to be about 70 buildings on 65 acres, with all the debris needing to be burned or sent off by barge. Then, it was time to think about how to rebuild—which was going to take…