Over the years, I’ve heard marketing folks offer some pretty ambitious descriptions of a given vessel’s aims and capabilities. A couple of years ago, a sales rep said that I could take his company’s new 40-something-footer and “do a Bermuda Race on it, or live aboard, or sail around the world.” Except the deck layout was horrible for racing, the galley and storage were too tight for long-term ­habitation, and there wasn’t nearly enough tankage for crossing oceans. In reality, it was a pretty fair coastal cruiser. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t win any prizes.

In sharp contrast to that experience, it was refreshing to step aboard the Voyage 590. The marketing was actually the straightforward skinny: This 59-foot cat, built in South Africa, is a high-end charter boat with a half-dozen equally sumptuous staterooms. Not a long-range cruiser. Not for living aboard. 

What’s more, it has one and only one chartering venue: the British Virgin Islands, from a base at Tortola’s Soper’s Hole. Not the Mediterranean or South Pacific—just the BVI. Simple, no? What wasn’t said is that the 590 is an engineering marvel that addresses its design writ superbly. But I was about to discover all that on my own. 

Voyage founders Robin and Jo-Ann Downing set out from South Africa to the Caribbean aboard their own boat—a custom monohull design that Robin was not only sailing, but also selling—nearly 40 years ago. They then returned home and switched allegiances to cruising catamarans. The first two Voyage cats launched in 1995. By 2017, Voyage ran some 30 charter boats in the BVI and offered dedicated cruising boats beyond those sold into their ­charter-management program. 

Then Hurricane Irma happened, decimating their fleet. With help from their three kids (and their spouses), the Downings regrouped and carried forth with their family-run BVI charter business. It is now replenishing its charter-boat numbers, at this time exclusively with the 590. Going forward, the company has completed preliminary designs for “owner’s layouts” with fewer staterooms, as well as different amenities for long-range cruising and living aboard. The first is expected to launch in early 2024.

Phil Southwell is the ­company’s current naval ­architect of record, but the 590’s concept, layout and objective are all Robin Downing’s. And he is clear about what he was after. 

“It’s a six-cabin layout with slightly different configurations but all of equal size,” he said. “It fills a niche in the market.” 

Of course, not everyone wants to vacation with a dozen companions, but if you do, here you go. Bareboats are available to super-qualified sailors—we’re basically talking longtime, repeat customers—but many charter parties go all-inclusive with a captain and chef, or at least a captain. Which makes sense. The 590 is a lot of boat, my friends. As such, it was named Best Charter Boat in CW’s 2022 Boat of the Year competition. 

The comfort of vacationers was on Downing’s mind when it came to propulsion and charging systems. The 590 is available in a dedicated all-electric version, or a hybrid setup with a diesel engine for propulsion augmented by a set of Bellmarine electric generators (and accompanying solar panels). In all instances, there’s a bank of lithium-ion batteries. Voyage wants its guests to enjoy full nights of air-conditioned comfort without the noise and bother of a diesel generator. Anyone who has picked up a mooring in a crowded BVI anchorage will also appreciate this silence.

“It’s a techy boat, and they’re doing a lot of cool things with lithium tech and 24-volt systems,” BOTY judge and systems expert Ed Sherman said. “In terms of the systems integration, they’re using very high-end inverters with variable-speed air-conditioning systems that step down as it gets cooler at night. That’s pretty cool stuff. They’ve selected the MG lithium battery banks, which were originally created and designed by Victron Energy in Europe. And there are a lot of refrigeration units on board. They want to make sure the beer is chilled, and they went to great lengths to ensure that it is.”

Nothing is simple about the 590’s construction, including the hand-laid, three-piece hull mold. There’s another vast mold for the deck. All of it, including the structural grid, is foam-cored and vacuum-­bagged in a laminate that incorporates a vinylester skin. It’s all extremely solid and well-executed. 

How to describe the rest of the boat? My notes had two related entries: “laid out for gracious living” and “party palace.” Both were meant to be high compliments.

Stashed in the hulls, those aforementioned six staterooms—four with athwartships bunks, and another pair with fore-and-aft berths—are indeed of equal size and appointments, though with different color schemes and accoutrements for a bit of variety. Topside and aft, swim platforms in each hull step up to a wide boarding platform that accesses the cockpit, with sliding doors that lead to the saloon. With those doors open, the layout makes for a sweeping, integrated space. There’s an outdoor grill, naturally, and a couple of members of the related fridge family. The dining table is long and wide enough for the entire New England Patriots offensive unit. 

The galley is forward with a window for ventilation and easy entree to a forward cockpit, in the event one wishes to throw separate parties at the same time. Five steps lead up to the flybridge, which hosts all the sailing controls and running rigging, ably tamed by a trio of electric stainless-­steel Andersen winches and a series of Spinlock clutches managing color-coded lines. A single wheel is to starboard, with engine controls for the twin Yanmars and a suite of B&G instrumentation. There’s a hard Bimini overhead with windows to the mainsail, in addition to the windshield. Sun pads for lounging are here, there and everywhere. 

The gargantuan mainsail is of course raised by an electric winch, and I was surprised to see what I thought was a black carbon laminate, but it turned out to be Dacron painted black (it still looked cool as could be). The next surprise under sail was the steering, which I thought would be hydraulic on such a beast of a boat. It turned out to be a standard wire Lewmar arrangement that wasn’t exactly sensitive, but it was more than adequate. In 8 to 10 knots of breeze upwind, we made better than 6 knots and sped up to better than 7 on a reach. The fact that these boats are delivered on their own bottom to the Caribbean is a testament to their seaworthiness. 

I asked Robin about top-end boatspeed, and with a look of mock horror, he said: “You don’t want to ever do more than 12 on this boat. It’s 26 tons.” He then listed the many things you’d need to compromise to go faster: slender hulls (which would erase the spaciousness of the accommodations), a higher bridge deck (ditto) and so on. Besides, on the 590, haste is definitely not the point of the exercise. 

BOTY judge Gerry Douglas said that the 590 reminded him of “a boutique hotel.” His words ring true to me, and I personally would be more than happy to check in anytime. 

Voyage 590 Specifications

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Are they really all-around cruising sailboats, or are they luxurious and large party platforms that are best-suited for crewed charter vacations in tropical settings? That was once a fair, probing question to ask of the builders knocking off long, tall, beamy vessels balanced on a pair of cabin-filled hulls. But no longer. Despite their respective girths and displacements, not to mention a wide variety of windspeeds and sea states, this quartet of full-size cats performed admirably across the board in this year’s BOTY sea trials. Yes, they now truck along like good, honest sailboats. All that room is icing on the cake. At the end of the day, however, it’s how that space is utilized that separates the king and the contenders. 

Destined almost exclusively for the charter trade, the judges believed the Voyage 590 would truly excel in that role, so much so that they ultimately recognized it with a special award as the year’s Best Charter Boat. But that didn’t mean they did not consider it an innovative, exciting vessel on its total merits. “It’s a ‘techie’ boat, and they’re doing a lot of cool things with lithium batteries and 24-volt systems,” judge Ed Sherman said. “In terms of systems integration, they’re using high-end inverters to help out with things like variable-speed air-conditioning systems so they won’t have to run generators for extended periods of times. It’s pretty cool stuff. And under power, it’s one of the quietest boats we tested. High marks all around!”

Lagoon Catamarans, as most multihull sailors know, was one of the era’s true pioneers in the evolving world of cruising cats. Their new Lagoon Sixty 5 is another vessel that, not unlike the Voyage 590, will find plenty of duty in the serious business of having fun: in other words, the charter business. And it would be hard to find a better vessel for doing precisely that. The focal point of the boat, on multiple levels, is the epic flybridge, a feature that Lagoon first explored on a big cat with the firm’s 620 but which they have fully realized on this massive 67-footer. It utilizes a pair of steering stations, which are handy indeed given the beam of the yacht. The overhead Bimini sports a glass window for trimming the mainsail, a welcome and innovative addition. Sofas, wet bar, grill, fridge: all combined, they ask an important question, one that strikes to the heart of the boat’s clear purpose. Why would you ever go below?

In many respects, Fountaine Pajot was unquestionably another pioneer in the realm of production cruising cats, and it’s been fascinating to watch the company evolve. Tim Murphy has had a ringside seat for much of that decades-long evolution. “It’s been interesting to watch their trajectory over the years,” he said. “They started out as a very performance-oriented manufacturer. So, a lot of their thinking is about keeping weight out of their boats and creating cats that are going to perform well. Now they’re more in a market that’s moved in the direction of accommodation, and we’ve watched them transition in that direction. But speed and elegance remain important, as shown here.” A key selling point in the Samana 59 is the versatility offered in the several optional interior layouts. A pair of Maestro versions incorporate a roomy, stellar owner’s suite. But for full-on chartering, who could resist the six (!) double cabins with, of course, a half-dozen accompanying heads.

When all was said and done, though, the judges couldn’t help but honor the efforts behind the Xquisite X5 Plus; it must be noted that, unlike its competitors in the class, chartering wasn’t part of the design brief. This is a dedicated cruising cat, through and through. And there’s much to like about this 53-foot South African-built product. For judge Tim Murphy, the important details weren’t necessarily the ones you could easily see, but rather the ones you couldn’t. “What I was most struck by on our tour of the boat was actually the service side of the whole equation,” he said. “There are 40,000 man-hours invested in this boat. And you can see it—those are solid hours of labor. One thing that was pointed out were two different marks on the heads of bolts showing they were torqued. And part of the Xquisite program is they spend two weeks with each owner, training them up with systems. All told, this is really one strong product.” 

Judge Ed Sherman agreed: “The business model here is exemplary. What they’re really doing is emulating the high-end automotive market. I think they looked at the automotive sector for high-end cars like BMW and Mercedes and said, ‘OK, this sounds good, it looks good, and we’re going to do it, too.’ And they are. So, I think that that aspect of his business plan where they’re training the owners and then doing things like loading the boat up with spare parts as part of the original purchase, I mean, hats off to them. It’s a great way to go. How can you argue against it?”

“I couldn’t find anything that was done halfway,” said Gerry Douglas. “It was done better than you’d expect it to be, just because they wanted the boat to be perfect.  And the quality of construction is excellent. It’s an infused hull but with a hand-laminated deck because there’s so many very tight corners and cavities. They didn’t think they could infuse that without adding a whole lot of weight. And I get that. So, they would hand laminate it, which makes sense when you have some of the very sharp corners that exist on that boat. It was all just perfectly done.”

Sometimes coming to a decision is hard. Sometimes it’s obvious. And when the votes were tallied, it was the Xquisite X5 Plus that was the obvious choice as Best Cruising Catamaran (Over 50’) for 2022.

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Over the course of the competition, in concept, innovation and execution, one boat never seemed far from the judging team’s collective mind. The Kinetic Catamaran KC54 is a new player in the class of what might be called Super Cats, the progenitors of which are notable brands like Gunboat and HH Catamarans. These light, fast craft put a high premium in flat-out performance, but also have the cool, comfortable, contemporary features and amenities of a stylish, forward-thinking cruising boat. They are, in the realm of performance cruisers, at the very cutting edge. 

Judges’ Special Recognition

“This was the Tesla of sailboats,” Gerry Douglas said. “This boat was built without compromise. They wanted the best in every aspect. Superb.” Douglas’ colleagues agreed and together, they gave the KC54 their Judges’ Special Recognition award.

The other standout boat to win a special prize from the judging panel was the Voyage 590, named Best Charter Boat. For 2022, perhaps more than in recent years, builders across the board stated that a significant percentage of their new models were destined for charter fleets. But perhaps nobody targets that segment of the sailing market with the same verve and intensity as the business known as Voyage Yachts, the South African builder that supplies multihull yachts exclusively to its partner and family-run company, Voyage Charters.

Best Charter Boat

“We’ve seen this company for a while,” judge Tim Murphy said. “For 30 years, they’ve been building boats and exclusively operating them in the charter business in the British Virgin Islands. They sail them up from South Africa, so they’re very seaworthy. And they have everything you’d want for a great vacation.”

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As I stepped aboard the new Voyage 480 catamaran last fall, I thought, “My, it would be easy to keep this baby looking good.” The boat had just sailed across the Atlantic to make its North American debut at the U.S. Sailboat Show in Annapolis, Maryland, and to be honest, she didn’t look a bit worse for wear.

A little pre-show washdown had left the exterior gelcoat and stainless-steel hardware gleaming. Inside, composite paneling, acrylic counters, a rugged vinyl sole, and a distinct lack of woodwork to ding up blended into a Spartan but pleasant look that would be a breeze to keep spiffy.

That’s no coincidence, as it turns out. The same ­company that builds Voyage catamarans in Cape Town, South Africa, manages them for owners and services them for charterers in Soper’s Hole, Tortola, in the British Virgin Islands. By design, Voyage’s cats — four models ranging from the 480 to a 60-footer — feature practical layouts and easily handled sail plans. They come packed with creature comforts and gear that make them luxurious to vacation upon — but with as little downtime as possible, so they can earn their keep.

Voyage Yachts is a family-owned company that’s been building boats since 1994 to supply Voyage Charters, which opened two years later. About 40 percent of its boats are put to work carrying vacationers, and the remainder have been sold to private owners.

Boat of the Year judge Tim Murphy began his discussion of the 480 with a few of the things he liked, including the fact that the builders “did some nice things to keep weight out of the boat,” like using cored furniture and doors.

Murphy also praised the textured gelcoat panels used in the saloon and guest cabins, as well as the mainsheet handling system, which we’ll get to in a moment.

With catamarans, there’s a direct link between weight and performance. By using foam coring in the hulls, deck and cockpit bimini, and vacuum-­bag construction to control the flow of resin, the builder managed to produce one of the lightest boats we looked at — a displacement/length ratio of 116, the lowest of any of the cats, and less even than the performance cruisers we test-sailed. And they did it ­without eliminating amenities like built-in dive-tank ­storage; a front-opening fridge and top-opening freezer, stove, oven, microwave, and ice maker in the galley; indoor and cockpit tables; and a hardtop bimini over the cockpit that incorporates a composite ­traveler arch.

On that arch are ­attachment points on both sides to anchor two bridles that control the mainsail. By toying with the sheets, you can dial in sail shape no matter the conditions, as well as control the boom when jibing.

The 480’s helm station is built into the starboard side of the aft bulkhead and includes a two-person helm seat. Overhead, a sliding hatch in the bimini lets you stand and see over it or view the mainsail when seated; depending on your height, you may have to try a few alternatives for a clean sightline forward. That and the camber of the side decks would take some getting used to, I think.

What would feel quite like home are the comfortable indoor living spaces. King-size berths are featured in the four-cabin, four-head-and-shower layout (a three-cabin ­owner’s version is also offered). Aft ­cabins have in-line bunks; athwartship beds are located just forward of the mast, and there’s a single bunk perfectly sized for kids in each forepeak.

All up, the charter version of the 480 is $770,000, while the base price for a private owner’s boat is $572,000; the difference in cost is attributable to the long list of options available. Bottom line, if you’re looking to either own a cat of your own or put one in charter to pay the bills, the builder can work with you to make sure you have the right Voyage for your voyage.

Mark Pillsbury is CW’s editor.

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Specs:

LOA: 58 ft 0 in
LWL: 54.8
Beam: 30.6′
Max Draft: 5.5′
Displacement: 39600 lbs
Fresh Water Tanks: (436 Gallons)
Fuel Tanks: (210 Gallons)
Holding Tanks: (40 Gallons)
Total Power: 2 x 75hp
Designer: Alex Simonis
Builder: VOYAGE YACHTS

The post Specs Only – Voyage 580 appeared first on Cruising World.

Among the 29 boats in the contest, eight were catamarans, making them the single largest category this year. The number of new models at the Annapolis shows has been rising, too; their numbers on the show docks have met or broken records for each of the last three years: from 38 multis two years ago to 42 this year and last.

The boats we sailed ranged from 34 to 57 feet. The lone cat in the mid-30s size range was the Esprit 3400, built by Creeksea Ltd. in Durban, South Africa, and designed by Prout. At the other end of the size scale was the luxurious French-built Lagoon 570.

Between 42 and 47 feet we saw six cats. Two, the Moorings 4200 and 4700, were designed by Alex Simonis and built by Robertson & Caine to Moorings charter specs, which are impressive; the boats are also sold for private use under the name Leopard 42 and 47. The EndeavourCat 44, built in Clearwater, Florida, was the most commodious of all the cats. The French-built Outremer 45, the only cat in the contest with daggerboards, was the one most stripped down and powered up for speed.
In the opinion of the judges, the one boat that best blended performance, safety, and comfort into two hulls was the Voyage 440.

Of the structure, a judge said, “Every multihull takes enough time getting through the wind that you’ve got torsional loads going through the skins, and, man, this one was a tight as a good guitar body.” Of the sailplan, one judge said, “They really had their bases covered for a variety of wind ranges in a very safe way. Of the deck layout, another judge said, “Wherever you walked, you had a feeling that it was the most appropriate pathway to where you were going.” Of the systems, a judge said, “The electrical panel was absolutely 4.0, and the fuel tank forward was as fine an execution as I have ever seen.” For these reasons and others, the judges called her the Best Cruising Multihull for 2002.

But that’s not all. Said one judge, “She’s the first multihull I’ve seen that I really consider a prime yacht and a functional cruiser.” Said another, “Everything about this boat indicates that it’s seriously made for going to sea. Without any hesitation, you could hang the word ’passagemaker’ on it and your conscience would be at ease.” It’s the first time in the contest’s nine year history that the overall boat of the year award goes to a multihull. Congratulations to the folks at Voyage Yachts in Cape Town, South Africa.

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LOA: 43’8″ (13.36 m)

LWL: 41’2″ (12.57 m)

Beam: 24’9″ (7.60 m)

Draft: 3’2″ (.97 m)

Ballast: 6,800 lb.

Displacement: 16,200 lb. (7300 kg.)

Sail Area: 1174 sq.ft. (120%)

Disp/L: 110

SA/Disp: 29

Ballast/Disp: .41

Company: Voyage Yachts

Phone: 410-956-1880

Email: http://www.voyageyachts.com

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