Sitting at the flybridge helm station aboard the new Leopard 40 power cat, taking in the view of Biscayne Bay and the Miami skyline, was an excellent way to spend a sunny February morning. It was the day after the 2023 Miami International Boat Show, where the latest model from South African builder Robertson and Caine had made its world debut. I was thoroughly enjoying my allotted time at the helm.

Did I mention that I was a thousand or so miles from the snow and ice back home in New England? Or that the three-person helm seat was far comfier than a similar-size chairlift on any ski hill? Or that the table, surrounded by an L-shaped couch directly behind me—never mind the adjacent chaise abutting a counter with grill, sink and fridge—promised nothing but fun times for both skipper and crew?

With another nine hulls already in the works, and more to come by year’s end when production is fully ramped up, the boat will soon be available for charter vacations with The Moorings. At first, it will be in the British Virgin Islands, the Bahamas, Croatia and Greece, and eventually, it will join the company’s bases worldwide.

Off the Florida coast, we monitored miles per gallon at 500 rpm increments. In slow motion (1,000 rpm), the twin 370 hp Yanmar diesels sipped fuel at an estimated rate of 4.8 miles to the gallon. The boat’s sweet spot—3,000 rpm, where we cranked along at 17 knots—came at a cost of 0.8 miles per gallon. Any more or less, and efficiency dropped, according to onboard gauges. Top speed was a little better than 22 knots.

At cruising speed, the boat’s hydraulic steering felt nimble and responsive as I cranked the wheel into a turn. Conditions were fairly calm, but crossing our own wake, the 40 PC plowed on through the chop without missing a beat.

At low speed, the 40 PC turned easily when I adjusted the twin fly-by-wire throttles and shifted between forward and reverse. The sailor in me wondered if the builder really needed to include a bow thruster in the port bow, though the feature had made getting out of the tight slip at the marina a simple enough maneuver. For extra-tight quarters with a shorthanded crew, cameras can ­monitor the stern and bow, and deliver the imagery to either of the twin Raymarine displays at the ­upstairs helm station.

The 40 PC joins a lineup that includes the Leopard 46 PC (also sold as the Moorings 464) and Robertson and Caine’s flagship on the power side, the Leopard 53 PC. 

A word of explanation here: Robertson and Caine enjoys a somewhat unusual relationship with Travelopia, which owns The Moorings and Sunsail, and oversees the Leopard sales team. All of Robertson and Caine’s sailing catamarans go into the charter companies’ fleets or are sold to private owners as Leopard Catamarans. Robertson and Caine’s power models are branded as Leopards or Moorings models, depending on how an owner plans to use the boat. All of Robertson and Caine’s current models—power and sail—are developed by the in-house design team, along with Alex Simonis of naval architecture firm Simonis and Voogd, and Franck Bauguil, vice president of yacht ownership and product development at Travelopia. Bauguil also manages sales of all three brands.

At present, he says, approximately half of Robertson and Caine’s sailboats are sold for charter, and half are for private use. The same is expected to be true for the 40 PC. Robertson and Caine plans to build 20 of the boats this year and increase the number to 31 next year. A well-equipped model, delivered from South Africa to the United States ready to go, comes in at under $1.2 million. 

The three current power models comprise the fourth generation of power vessels from Robertson and Caine in terms of design. Previous generations shared some furniture modules with boats from the sail side, but Bauguil says that this new line started with a blank sheet of paper. The result is increased volume for interior accommodations without disturbing performance.

The boat in Miami was powered by optional twin 370 hp Yanmar diesels. Charter models are fitted out with 350 hp Yanmars, and 250 hp Yanmars are also available. Tankage is cruiser-friendly, with 370 gallons of fuel and 170 gallons of water.

Aboard the 40 PC, the owner’s stateroom occupies the starboard hull. It has a queen berth aft and a head ­compartment forward with a shower in the forepeak. Amidships are a desk and ­television, hanging lockers, and a fair amount of stowage.

The port hull includes guest staterooms fore and aft, each with a queen berth, and a shared head between them.

It’s bright and airy in the salon, thanks to windows that offer a near 360-degree view, a sliding door that opens to the cockpit, and another door forward that leads to the foredeck, where a couple of cushioned sun beds await. The cockpit is shaded by the flybridge, with a cushioned seat across the transom, and a dining table.

The salon itself is well-laid-­out, with an indoor helm station tucked into the forward starboard corner. To port, an L-shaped couch surrounds a coffee table (a dining table is optional); opposite is an upholstered chair. The galley is adjacent to the cockpit, with a full-size, home-style fridge to starboard and an L-shaped counter to port that includes an induction stove top, a convection microwave oven, a sink, and a dishwasher.

On deck, a solid stainless-­steel rail around the boat provides secure handholds for moving about underway.

Inside and out, the lines of the 40 PC are sharp and stylish. Bauguil says early orders indicate that the boat is appealing not only to multihull sailors who want to make a jump into power, but also to powerboaters looking for the efficiency gained by two hulls. As for charterers, I can state it pure and simple: Put me on a 40 PC somewhere warm and sunny for a week, and I’ll guarantee a good time.  

Leopard 40 Power Cat Specifications

The post Boat Review: Leopard 40 Power Cat appeared first on Cruising World.

For some reason, flotilla charters seem to have a stigma attached to them, especially among experienced bareboat charter skippers.

“I don’t want to be led through the islands like a string of rubber duckies,” one sailor says. Another says: “I want the freedom to run my own boat, sleep late when I want, and stop for a snorkel.” Yet another: “Flotilla charters are just for beginners, and I don’t want to be slowed down.”

Those are three common misunderstandings that have kept flotilla charters from being as popular with North American charterers as they are with Europeans, who embrace flotillas as a great vacation choice.

The very word, flotilla, seems vaguely military and suggests a group of boats being herded along by a mothership. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, many companies now label flotillas as “social charters” because it’s a more accurate description.

Social chartering in Europe is just as popular with experienced charterers as it is with first-timers. In fact, many charterers with years of bareboating return from their first social charter asking, “Why didn’t we do this earlier?”

Here’s how a social charter works: A charter company puts together a package for a particular destination, such as the British Virgin Islands, for a dozen or so boats. An itinerary is laid out to include the most interesting stops, where special events are planned.

 All well and good, but it’s here that experienced sailors start getting antsy, because cruising along with most flotillas is a team (on their own boat) from the charter company, including a captain, engineer and host/hostess. Often called the “lead crew,” this threesome is one of the elements that makes social chartering so special.

The captain is a local who provides a briefing for the skippers every morning, going over the charts and discussing a general plan for the day. The engineer or service tech is there to make sure that everything works perfectly. And the host/hostess? They are there to take care of special events and help with individual plans.

The captain’s briefing each morning sets out the general plan for the day, but one of the best parts is the discussion of all the attractions along the way: a great lunch cove, a reef for snorkeling, or perhaps a perfect beach. The itinerary is flexible and you’re free to move as you please, but with the reassurance of having the lead crew nearby.

Do you have to sail along with the other boats? Of course not. Each skipper plans the adventures for the day, depending on the crew’s preferences.

When you arrive at the day’s destination, the lead crew will lend a hand with your anchoring (at your request) but, once settled, you’re on your own. Barbecue on board, visit a local restaurant (with reservations made by the host/hostess) or simply enjoy sundowners in your own cockpit.

It’s called social chartering for a reason. You’ll meet and mingle with other crews who all share one thing: They love bareboating. Friendships have been made during social charters that last for years, and that have led to future social charters together. I know of one marriage that resulted from college kids who met during their parents’ social charter.

Part of the fun of social chartering is meeting up with everyone at your destination for dinners, beach picnics, or a progressive party with ­munchies on one boat and ­everything from salad to dessert on others.  

But, you ask, won’t we miss out on some destinations with a social charter? Not likely. In fact, because the lead crew is intimately familiar with this area, you’ll probably get more out of a social charter than if you were doing it on your own without their local knowledge.

Some flotilla charters are more choreographed but to your advantage. The Moorings, for example, offers several Italian Cuisine Flotillas to explore the food and wine of the Amalfi Coast. Kicked off with a pizza party, the fleet ­harbor-hops with dinners—from apéritif to tiramisu—ashore in the evenings. The flotilla also provides transfers to ­restaurants and wineries, and a cook aboard one day to teach boaters how to prep an Italian meal.

Social charters are ­perfect for kids too. They meet other youngsters to share their explorations. Some charter companies, such as Sunsail, often include a kids’ activity coordinator on social charters during school holidays. This youth leader takes the youngsters off on adventures so that the parents can have some time for themselves. Whether it’s hunting pirate treasure on an island to staging a kids-only barbecue onshore, this service is a part of a social charter.

For first-time charterers, social charters are a great way to hone basic boating skills. The lead crew is always available to help with anchoring and departures, as well as to provide support and local knowledge along the way. Freshwater pump acting up? It’s fixed in a jiffy from the spare parts and tools the lead crew has.  

For experienced skippers dipping their toes into a new charter destination, a social charter provides the benefit of local knowledge. No matter how much you’ve planned or how many cruising guides you’ve studied, nothing gives you more confidence than going over a chart with someone discussing their home waters.   

Social charters really are the perfect recipe for fun: a blend of independent bareboating with an unobtrusive support team. You enjoy the privacy of your own boat but benefit from a wealth of local knowledge provided by the lead crew.

Social chartering: It’s the best of bareboating. 

Chris Caswell is the editor of CharterSavvy, the free online magazine devoted to bareboat chartering.

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A rain-disrupted two-day safari in the usually arid plains and mountains north of Cape Town, cruising across windy Table Bay to view Robben Island from a power cat, and wild World Cup soccer fans filling
the streets nightly each provided entertaining sideshows to the main event on a recent trip to South Africa: a media tour of the Robertson and Caine boatbuilding shops, where Leopard catamarans are built. It was an adventure that the builder arranged to coincide with the launch of its newly designed 40-foot power cat, to be marketed as the Leopard 40PC and the Moorings 403PC. 

R&C operates six manufacturing ­facilities in Cape Town, where it builds models that include 42-, 45- and 50-foot sailing catamarans, and 40-, 46- and 53-foot power cats. All models are available to private owners under the Leopard brand, and for charter through Sunsail and The Moorings. The 403PC will be available for on-water vacations this year.

All the R&C facilities that our small troupe of writers visited were bustling, though they were winding down the 2022 production year in anticipation of the plant’s closing to give employees their annual holiday break. The company built 182 boats in 2022 and plans to produce 213 this year, according to Donovan Thomas, R&C’s technical director. 

The three-stateroom 40 PC is being constructed on a new production line, in a building previously used for research and development. Hull No. 1 had just launched, and we saw four more in various stages of build. Construction of the first few boats includes hands-on workforce training; full-on production commenced early this year.

The busiest shop we found was the Bolt facility, where the Leopard 45 sailing cats—the company’s most popular model—are built. There, assembly-line manager Rotenda Randima walked us through the various workstations, from bare hull to finished boat. At each ­station, a swarm of technicians added to the overall sensation that there was, ­indeed, a lot going on. From the plant, she said, a new boat is trucked every four-and-a-half days to the harbor, where it undergoes sea trials before being loaded onto a ship for delivery.

On the 45’s production line, large fans kept the air moving, even on a hot South African morning. Hulls sat in cradles fitted out with wheels that roll along rails in the floor. At each workstation, lists of tasks were posted, along with progress notes and reports on things such as the number of injuries incurred, if any. At the station where the 45’s deck and cabin top are bonded to the hull, workers had gone 204 days without a mishap, I noted as I strolled by.

Throughout its plants, the R&C workforce includes experienced boatbuilders and trainees, the latter easily identifiable, dressed as they are in orange overalls. The company trains 100 to 150 people a year in skills that include carpentry, lamination and mechanical systems, among others. The overall number of employees runs right around 2,000.

R&C is somewhat uncommon in the world of boatbuilding because it has just one customer: Travelopia, the parent company of Leopard Catamarans, The Moorings and Sunsail. 

Franck Bauguil, vice president of yacht ownership and product development, says that besides the Leopard 42 sailing cat, which won CW’s 2022 Boat of the Year award for Best Cruising Catamaran Under 50 Feet, R&C has introduced three new power cats in the past three years. The company plans to refocus on sail in the coming months, with a couple of new designs in early stages of development. 

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One summer evening many years back, a friend invited me to sail on a new Leopard 47 off Newport, Rhode Island. Although daylight was slowly fading, there was still a tug of a breeze when we met on the dock. After 11 years of cruising on my 60-year-old, gaff-rigged double-ender Tosca, just the ease of boarding the Leopard with a simple, normal step onto a stable platform—with no life-threatening leaps, stern-boarding cardio or ultra-­athletic bowsprit avoidance—impressed me.

But as we slid out of the marina and hoisted the main, bluewater-voyaging PTSD washed over me, and I fought the need to madly stow charcuterie boards and wineglasses, my bags, their bags, pillows, plates, everything. When the captain suggested we set the jib, I braced myself in the cockpit, a reaction from years spent sailing with tight sheets on a steep heel. I still remember the sensation as we caught the first gust on the fast cat: We lifted over the water and took off, flying across the bay. Nothing on the tables slid. Nothing down below moved. No one was sprayed or flung across the cockpit. It was so quiet. The moon rose, the stars came out. More bottles of wine appeared. I was all-in.

That sunset sail decades ago brought me up to speed on what I’d been missing about cruising multihulls. My slow-but-much-beloved ketch provided full-contact sailing. I knew very little about multihulls, and the little I knew wasn’t helpful. I’d been cruising with friends on a wet Wharram cat in western Fiji and daysailing on a worn-down trimaran in Tonga. I’d seen the French cruisers zip by on their multihulls in Tahiti, but none of my Pacific friends in 1990s had anything close to the Leopard 47 I sailed that night.

None of my cruising friends had a million dollars either, so when asking if a multihull is right for you, let’s get right to it: Multihulls are expensive. The five new multihulls in CW’s 2023 Boat of the Year range in price from just under $1 million to just over $2 million. CW’s 2023 Best Cruising Multihull, the Fountaine Pajot Tanna 47, is listed at $825,000. And the pre-owned market is pretty competitive. The 23-year-old Leopard 47 model I sailed that night, after two decades of use, is listed for $350,000.

If there’s a silver lining here, it’s that multihulls hold their value. But the first step in determining whether a multihull is right for you is to talk to a builder or broker about your budget.

People, Plans and the South Pacific

If you’ve made peace with the buy-in and you’ve budgeted for the boat of your dreams, there are a lot of people with you. The 2022 State of the Sailing Industry Report numbers show that despite the cost, plenty of people are choosing the multihull path.

The most recent statistics show that 980 of the 4,937 new sailboats sold in the United States in 2021 were ­multihulls. That’s just shy of 20 percent. The ­multihulls break out as 654 domestic ­p­roduction and 326 imports. And ­multihulls make up 45 percent of the sailing charter fleet. 

“The multihull movement started in earnest in the early 1990s, when The Moorings put catamarans such as Lagoon in the charter fleets, and Fountaine Pajot brought out the Venezia 42,” says Phil Berman, founder and president of Balance Catamarans. Berman founded The Multihull Company in 1999 and watched the steady growth of the multihull segment over the next several decades. The market struggled in 2008-10 with the financial crisis, but it exploded after that. 

“Over the past 10 to 15 years, the market itself has matured quite a bit, with the retirement of the baby boomers,” he says. “The multihull market was growing steadily, but it really exploded during the pandemic. Balance Catamarans has grown from building two or three boats a year to 24 boats a year.”

And while The Moorings was the biggest player to popularize catamarans in the charter industry, Berman says, Hobie Alter did more than anyone for the catamaran industry as whole. Alter brought Hobie Cats to the public in the 1970s, and introduced fun, ­competitive sailing to young people outside of yacht clubs or any formal sail training. Many of those early Hobie Cat racers are owners in today’s cruising- and ­performance-multihull fleets.

What the Owners Say

“I grew up around monohulls and powerboats,” says circumnavigator Amy Alton. “My dad bought a Hobie Cat, and then a Maine Cat 30, where I had my first cruising experiences, and later, the one that my husband first sailed on.”

The boat she has today is a Fountaine Pajot Helia 44: “When we picked out our cruising boat, we were looking for good performance for downwind sailing and comfortable living space. Starry Horizons has been our home for eight years and is the boat we circumnavigated on.” 

Performance, comfort and stability are the top reasons many cruisers choose multihulls. Faster offshore passages with downwind speed and overall higher cruising speeds are priorities. Mile for mile, multihulls are simply faster. Decades earlier, cruisers worried about how a multihull sailor might manage extreme weather conditions at sea. Advances in weather technologies such as Predict Wind have eliminated surprises during shorter passages, and the technological advancements in communication and route planning allow cruisers to track and avoid extreme weather during longer crossings.

This matters if you’re eyeing the Coconut Milk Run westward across the Pacific. There’s a lot of downwind miles, and a multihull will eat them up faster. In a blow, multihulls might be able to cover more miles faster, toward safety.

What about going to windward? Realistically, cruising multihulls can struggle; they typically sail close-hauled at 55 to 60 degree true wind angle. Performance catamarans can cut those angles a lot closer, sailing 45 to 50 TWA.

“Starry Horizons doesn’t point very well to the wind, but you know what? Neither do I,” Alton says. “We rarely rush our weather windows, so uncomfortable passages are few and far between.”

For cruisers looking to spend a season or two in the Bahamas or Caribbean, a multihull’s shallow draft and open, airy living quarters are a popular choice. With flights to the United States a short hop away, onboard space for guests is also ideal. 

If you’re considering a multihull, where do you intend to spend most of your time? While the Caribbean trade winds and downwind sailing through the South Pacific make sense, the Roaring 40s might not. The French Riviera and the Italian Riviera simply might not have the space, and other destinations such as Spain and Scandinavia require research if you hope to secure a marina berth or schedule a haulout. In many places, end caps or slips with wide enough space for a cat’s beam might be close to twice the price, if you can find one open. Know before you go.

There’s also the need to adjust to handling such a beamy boat. I remember the joy of flying down Florida’s Caloosahatchee River in a 50-foot power cat over a Thanksgiving weekend, heading for a reserved spot at Sanibel Marina. But when we arrived at the dock with the light fading and the current and wind against us, I was relieved to see the dockmaster standing ready with a line. “It’s like ­parking a tennis court,” he said.

Dave Newman, a cruiser who sails the Balance 442 performance cat Umoya, says that the trade-offs he and his wife have made for the multihull life are worth it. He acknowledges that slips cost more and are harder to come by, but he usually anchors out. “More living, less camping,” Newman says. “Our boat’s comfortable on long passages and is a relatively flat sailing platform. The salon provides lots of light, great views, and headroom for taller people. We have redundant power with two engines, more coachroof space for solar panels, and a galley that is very pleasant to cook in.”

Although they need to manage weight sensitivity and clean two hulls instead of one, he’s happy with the design and sailing performance of his cat and, after a couple of years of cruising the Caribbean, hopes to head to the South Pacific.

 “Don’t wait too long to buy a boat,” he says. “Buy what you can afford and just go. Multihull or monohull, whichever sparks your desire to sail.”

“Catamarans have been in my DNA since 1970, when I was racing Hobie Cats in Southern California,” says Kevin Hutton, who recently joined Newman, Berman and others at a Balance Owners Rendezvous in St. Maarten. “However, in those days, cats were still unique, and our family sailed monohulls, specifically Catalina yachts. Our last boat was a Catalina 440, but to be honest, I never gave up my Hobie Cats and have a few of them stashed in the Bahamas and Baja that I still sail.”

He and his wife, Sandy, chartered catamarans a few times, but they missed the performance of Hobie Cats, so they decided on a new Balance 482. Sandy loved the idea of being part of the development of a new performance cat, and liked the ability to stow everything a second home requires. Stability, ease of anchoring, and ease of sail-handling became more important over time too.

They both love the integration of the cockpit and salon, which allows a greater area to socialize. And they both felt more comfortable with the boat’s systems and performance after some training. “The days of singlehanding a monohull doesn’t prepare you for singlehanding a ­performance cat,” Hutton says. “Any sailor who has not had modern performance cat experience needs to be humble enough to seek experienced training, especially if your crew is new to sailing.”

Over time, you learn that your boat will need repairs and things will get broken, he says, but you will also enjoy fixing things, eventually. All boats have frustrations; attitude is everything. 

“My wife and I have embraced the education and training, and I am glad that I took the ASA Course and hired professional captains to help us learn together. It’s made us a better team, and that extends well past sailing. We’re looking forward to expanding our experiences and capabilities. And we’re hoping to add our dog, Roca, to the crew next year.” 

Theresa Nicholson is senior editor of Cruising World. She cruised the Caribbean, South America, South Pacific, Micronesia and Southeast Asia for 11 years on her gaff-rigged Atkin ketch, Tosca.

Monohull Sailors Go Multi

It all started as many sailing stories do: I raced monohulls as a kid in San Francisco with my dad. After Lennie and I married, we stepped away from sailing to raise a family, but we chartered in the Caribbean. After a few trips, Lennie suggested that a catamaran would be a good choice for our three kids. I was horrified and didn’t want any part of it. Eventually I succumbed, and we realized just how great catamarans were for a crowd like us. But whenever Lennie and I charted without the kids, we sailed strictly on monohulls.

When our youngest went to college in 2012, we decided that it was time to buy our own boat. Neither of us even considered a cat. We bought a Hunter 49, which we could sail to weather, with a generator, air conditioner, a washer-­dryer and a ­watermaker—and the added bonus of headroom for me (I’m 6-foot-4). We sailed the Caribbean for three years and loved every minute of it. 

A few years into it, several couples who owned large monohulls started telling me they were switching to cats, for the creature comforts and the ease of sailing flat. “Sailing flat?” I asked. “What does that have to do with anything? To sail, you have to bury your rail!” 

Eventually, curiosity overtook us, and we did our research and visited Leopard Catamarans in Florida and really liked the forward cockpit. The designer, Simonis Voogd, said that they designed boats to sail and live on comfortably—not the other way around. 

We ordered a Leopard 48 and outfitted it in Fort Lauderdale with Just Catamarans. By the time we took delivery, half of the new Leopards were going to private owners instead of into the charter fleets. We sailed that boat 18,000 nautical miles. The leg from the Caribbean to the Panama Canal would have been a rocking-­and-rolling mess on our monohull. On our cat? A calm, luxurious trip. We averaged around 7.5 knots under sail and had some thrills at 12 to 14 knots.

After three years, we pulled the trigger on a new Leopard 50. Its design and construction made the boat stiffer between the hull and bridge deck. We took delivery in 2019 and were set to sail to the South Pacific with a rally in 2020, until the pandemic canceled those plans. Instead, we sailed to New England and then throughout the Caribbean again. We had a great time. Our five years of experience sailing catamarans gave us time to consider upgrading to a performance cat.

Today, we have ordered a Kinetic 54, which we think of as the ultimate cat. It’s solid carbon fiber and still full of luxury, another Simonis Voogd creation. When we sail this boat, it feels as comfortable as a typical cruising cat but performs like a speed machine. And tacking into the wind achieves 50 degrees easy, so we can leave the motor off and sail more. Our Kinetic 54 will be delivered in May. We plan to spend a month in Cape Town, South Africa, shaking her down. After that, who knows? We’ve seen every island in the Caribbean thrice, so it’s time to go beyond. -Randy Smith

Randy and Lennie Smith are serial entrepreneurs and commuter cruisers who live and work in South Florida. They’ve been ­married 25 years and spend the majority of their free time cruising.

The post Is a Multihull Right for You? appeared first on Cruising World.

Overall Winner and Best Full-Size Cruiser: Hylas H57

Peggy Huang and David Crafa accepted the award for Hylas Yachts for the Overall Winner of the 2022 Cruising World Boat of the Year. The Hylas H57 won the Best Full-Size Cruiser category, placing it in the running against all category winners for the major prize: the overall Boat of the Year. The Hylas H57 distinguished itself above and beyond the others and was named Best Overall.

Boat of the Year judge Tim Murphy had this to say about the Hylas H57: “This Bill Dixon design is a departure from previous Germán Frers-designed Hylas yachts. It signals a new trend: new look, new layout, new thinking. This is a 57-foot twin-rudder boat that displaces 57,000 pounds. They’re doing something that we’ve seen in a lot of new boats lately, a trend where there’s a separation between the social cockpit and the working cockpit, and well aft, a walkway down between the twin helms to the transom. It’s a good solution. It works.

“When you come alongside, it actually looks and feels a little like a catamaran.

It’s got a hard dodger built in, a very successful one, which I think is quite useful when you’re in the cockpit. Everyone wants to have shade and shelter from rain and the elements, and this is an excellent answer for that. By and large, this is just a very nice, functional cruising boat. The berths are big and luxurious, but they’re also set up for lee cloths. This is a boat meant to go places. And it’s lovely to be aboard. It’s just a very strong boat in many, many ways.”

Judge Ed Sherman noted: “The boat we sailed seemed like a test bed for systems the company is considering for future models. The owners have broad experience in offshore sailing and considered very carefully what they wanted in a large boat that can be easily sailed by a cruising couple. From the custom enclosure for the helm and cockpit area to the powered winches and video-camera repeaters at the helm station to confirm sail trim, I think they hit a home run. 

“Like other boats we tested in this size range, the builder employed a 24-volt DC electrical system, which dramatically reduces overall weight on a boat as systems-rich as this was. Additionally, the electrical-system design helped ensure that onboard systems would function regardless of global location: 120-volt/60 Hz or 230-volt/50 Hz, it didn’t matter; accommodation was made to cover all bases.

“On top of all that, it sailed well. I thought they did a great job in designing the sailhandling controls. It’s all right there near the helm, and it worked well. I liked that. It got my vote.”

Judge Gerry Douglas noted: “The performance of the boat was terrific. It tacked through about 50 degrees, which was outstanding for a boat that big. It was always sailing at about 60 percent of the windspeed, which for a big, heavy boat like that was impressive. Regarding the boat’s ergonomics, every place to sit was comfortable. You had good seatback support and nothing awkward to step over. All the companionway steps were of equal size and worked well. It was just a really easy boat to get around. All the seat dimensions in the interior were correct. We’ve seen so many boats where that’s not the case. It was really comfortable to sit in. And you can imagine sitting there reading a book for hours and not feeling like you’re sitting on a park bench. 

“I voted for the Hylas because I think it was probably the most different from any other previous boat that the company has produced. It’s the first one that appealed to me personally. There’s a lot of content there and the price point—in retrospect, in view of all the prices of the boats in this year’s contest—is pretty reasonable. I never thought I’d say that a boat worth 2 million bucks was reasonable, but it is.”

2022 Boat of the Year: The Contest and Winner

Beneteau First 27: Best Pocket Cruiser/Daysailer

The Beneteau team, including Tomo Novak, Head of Sales, Seascape; Eric LeVine, Sales Manager, Beneteau; Andraz Mihelin, Founder, Seascape; Aurore Bordage, Marketing Manager, Beneteau, accepted their award for the Best Pocket Cruiser/Daysailer for the winning Beneteau First 27. The First 27, a sporty racer/cruiser, boasts all the amenities necessary for weekend and coastal voyaging: a serviceable head, galley and berths, and a Yanmar diesel. In other words, a couple could easily liveaboard, rather than camp, for short periods of time, but they could also expect to be serious podium contenders should those outings involve a regatta. In the end, when deciding the winner of the Best Pocket Cruiser, it was the little things that swayed the judges. “The fit-and-finish for the price point is at a different level,” judge Gerry Douglas said. “The equipment level was higher.”

2022 Boat of the Year: Best Pocket Cruiser/Daysailer

Leopard Catamarans Leopard 42: Best Cruising Catamaran (Under 50 Feet)

The Leopard Catamaran team, including Michael Robertson, Designer, Robertson and Caine; Theo Loock, CEO, Robertson and Caine; Franck Bauguil, VP Yacht Ownership and Product Development; Alex Simonis, Naval Architect, Simonis-Voogd Design; Peter Robertson, VP Sales, Robertson and Caine; and Josie Tucci, VP Charter Sales and Marketing; accepted their award for the Best Cruising Catamaran (Under 50 Feet) for the Leopard 42. 

From the proven partnership and collaboration between South African builder Robertson and Caine and the Moorings, the judges felt the Leopard 42 is an ideal platform for private ownership and/or bareboat chartering. The judges found much to like about this latest Leopard, including the offset steering station to starboard and the lounge space forward accessed via a front door in the saloon. But the Leopard sealed its victory with an awesome sea trial in which it overhauled and passed a popular new monohull. What put the boat over the top wasn’t just the sailing performance, which was obviously terrific, but also the tools with which to sail the boat, and its overall deck layout, all of which optimized the experience. Judge Tim Murphy said, “With the Leopard, you have visual eye contact from the raised helm station to starboard down into the cockpit, you’ve got a visual line of sight into the saloon, and you’ve got a pretty good visibility over the top of the cabin top everywhere. You had access to your main sheet right there where you needed it. This was one of the boats that had no traveler, but instead had a windward and leeward block on the mainsheet. I think that’s a fine system, I like the control you have. Jibing works fine and is easily controlled.”

2022 Boat of the Year: Best Cruising Catamaran (Under 50’)

Balance 482: Best Performance Catamaran

Mark Delany, Balance Managing Director; and Phil Berman, Balance Catamaran President received the award for the Best Performance Catamaran, for Balance Catamaran’s Balance 482. Quick, fast and fun, the South African-built Balance 482 is a cat that will get up and go, but offers plenty of comfort once the hook is down.

“The sailing performance was excellent,” said judge Gerry Douglas. “The boat felt really good. The steering was terrific. The structure of the boat throughout was exemplary. Storage is really good. Visibility was good. Ventilation was great. There was even a rain collection system on the cabin top, which is the only one of the boats we looked at had that. It was very well concealed because the gutters formed a handhold going forward. The solar panel installation was also well done. The panels were encapsulated into a fiberglass tray that elevated the deck so the panels wouldn’t overheat. Very clever.”

The driving force behind Balance cats is Phil Berman, a world champ at racing beach cats who brought that passion to developing and marketing fully found cruisers. Judge Murphy knows him well: “Phil comes from a very strong view of wanting to see boats that have solid sailing performance. He’s also a strong proponent of daggerboard boats, which tends to be quick shorthand for the dividing line between cats that are more about payload versus cats that are about performance, but not so much where you’re going to fly a hull or break a rudder. There’s a balance within a boat that really performs that you can still live aboard.”

2022 Boat of the Year: Best Performance Catamaran

Xquisite X5 Plus: Best Cruising Catamaran (Over 50 Feet)

The Xquisite crew of Tamas Hamor, CEO; Stephen Joyce, Global Service Manager; and Sara Hajdu, Xquisite Charter, were on hand to accept the award for the Best Cruising Catamaran (Over 50 Feet) for the Xquisite X5 Plus. A unique cruising cat with cool features galore and an impressive commitment to customer service, the Xquisite X5 Plus won the judges over. 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.”

2022 Boat of the Year: Best Cruising Catamaran (Over 50’)

Kinetic KC54: All-around excellence took the judges breath away

Kinetic CEO Bob Hayward and Collin Marshall, Boat & Sailing Systems Engineer,

were on hand to accept the award for the Kinetic KC54. The Kinetic KC54 received a Special Recognition award. The Kinetic KC54 is a fresh entry in the cat universe and 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. Judge Tim Murphy got right to the point: “This is a fairly new company that was started within the past couple of years. My breath was absolutely taken away by this boat; it was spectacular. I think it was the best-built boat in the entire fleet. It’s an all-carbon boat, with a foam core, epoxy resin, all infused–fantastic. The whole boat felt integrated. You didn’t feel like there was a conflict between the forces in terms of accommodation versus performance.” With a price tag approaching $3 million, it perhaps should not be astonishing. That was a major factor in evaluating the boat, and while it did not win its class, the experts panel did present it with a Judges’ Special Recognition prize to honor the boat’s overall excellence.

“It was my personal favorite in this year’s contest,” said judge Ed Sherman. The materials that were used are absolutely the highest quality available in our industry at this point, and it’s a very high-tech boat in terms of systems.” Judge Gerry Douglas was also duly impressed: “This was the Tesla of sailboats. I think that that was their model. In terms of design and execution and technology, it hit all three of those marks. This boat is built without compromise, and what it cost was not an issue, they just wanted to do the best they could in every aspect of the boat. The construction was impeccable, the fit and finish was amazing. There are some very clever design things in the boat, but it all really worked seamlessly.”  

2022 Boat of the Year: Special Judges’ Awards

The 2022 BOTY Contest

The 27 entries—the largest BOTY entry list in many years—were ultimately broken down into eight categories, with the 16 monohulls distributed over five divisions ranging from 24 feet to 67 feet in size, and with prices ranging from $50,000 to $4 million. Meanwhile, the 11 nominated catamarans were grouped in three classes: two based on size and a third focused on performance. And talk about an international gathering! Builders from no fewer than nine nations were represented: the US, France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Slovenia, South Africa, Sweden and Taiwan. 

Boats tests were divided into two parts: onboard inspections that took place on the docks at the US Sailboat Show in Annapolis, MD., in October; and at-sea sail trials conducted in the days immediately following the boat show.

Judges chose winners in eight separate size- and/or purpose-related categories. Just for good measure—because they were suitably impressed by their excellence—they also presented a pair of separate awards to boats that deserved special recognition. 

The post Cruising World 2022 Boat of the Year Winners Celebrate Their Awards at the Miami International Boat Show appeared first on Cruising World.

The sweet spot for cruising catamarans, for most multihull sailors, is right there between 40 and 50 feet: manageable by a couple, not so large that finding a place to park or dock is prohibitive, and with lots more room to spread out and bring the toys and kids than a monohull of similar length. This year’s set of nominees features industry stalwarts Leopard and Fountaine Pajot—both of which have enjoyed plenty of success in previous Boat of the Year competitions—and a pair of relative upstarts from Bali, the cruising offshoot from French builder Catana. The former are all-around cats with plenty of versatility; the latter aim to cater more toward the cruising/liveaboard part of the equation. Choices, choices! It proved to be a challenging quartet of cats for the judging panel to evaluate and sort out. 

The larger sibling of the two Bali cats entered for BOTY 2022—all the Bali offerings feature an innovative “garage door” separating the saloon and cockpit, which when raised creates a seamless indoor/outdoor living space that has proven to be highly popular—was the 46-plus-foot 4.6. It’s yet another one of this year’s catamarans with the ever-popular flybridge that has become a design staple for many cat builders. Judge Tim Murphy found it a pleasure to sail. “On some of the other cats, you felt you were fighting the sail controls,” he said. “Not here. It’s laid out nicely. It has a double-ended mainsheet system with no traveler but control at both ends, so you’ve got a port and a starboard sheet, and I think that’s a fine way to control the mainsail. It’s arguably easier to jibe with that system than a standard traveler; you have good athwartships control throughout the maneuver. Bali cats are known for comfort, but this one sails well too.”

At 40 feet, the Bali Catspace—the second of two boats from the brand entered in the 2022 BOTY contest—is the smallest offering in the Bali line, but judge Murphy found the open floor plan particularly alluring: “The living experience of being able to open up the back end of these cats so you create an indoor/outdoor platform is terrific. I didn’t give it much thought until I chartered a Bali, and it was totally delightful. The sailing performance was actually fine, but it was that back porch that made the trip.”

Dream Yacht Charters has added more and more Bali cats to their fleets, and it’s easy to see why. With their vast interior space; plenty of amenities including air conditioning and multiple fridges, including ones that would not be out of place in any well-equipped household kitchen ashore; and surprisingly effective sailing prowess given their systems and accommodations, these boats are almost synonymous with the word “vacation.” Take the interior layout of the Catspace: It has four staterooms with private heads, the forward pair with berths aligned athwartships and the aft set laid out in a fore-and-aft configuration. It’s hard to imagine a better use of space for four couples or a family in 40 feet of waterline.

Yes, a 40-foot catamaran is a design challenge; it’s fairly easy to accommodate loads of features in a 50-foot multihull, but it’s quite another to include all the creature comforts and niceties in considerably less real estate. But Murphy felt that the Isla 40—another 40-footer like the Catspace, but this one from longtime cat leader Fountaine Pajot—pulled it off well. The Isla also had a tall order to fill in that it replaced a previous cat of the same size in the builder’s lineup, the highly successful Lucia 40. “The mission for this boat was described in thirds,” Murphy said. “Bareboat charter, crewed charter and private ownership. I think they’ve created a boat that accomplishes all those missions. The boat sailed well, but it was also laid out well. In fact, the owner’s cabin to starboard was superb, one of the nicest places on any boat we inspected. We toured a lot of much bigger boats that didn’t have that sort of space.”

But when all was said and done, the Bali Cats and the Isla ran into a juggernaut with the Leopard 42, which proved to be a powerhouse BOTY entrant. It’s pretty clear by now that the relationship between South African builder Robertson and Caine; their lone client, the Moorings; and naval architects Simonis and Voogd, who bring the Leopard brand to life, is strong and fruitful. And they have a wall full of BOTY award-winning plaques to prove it. It’s time to make room for another. The judges found much to like about the latest Leopard, including the offset steering station to starboard and the lounge space forward accessed via a front door in the saloon. But the Leopard sealed its victory with an awesome sea trial in which it overhauled and passed a popular new monohull that shall remain nameless. Cats can’t point? Wrong!

What put the boat over the top wasn’t just the sailing performance, which was obviously terrific, but also the tools with which to sail the boat, and its overall deck layout, all of which optimized the experience. Murphy said, “With the Leopard, you have visual eye contact from the raised helm station to starboard down into the cockpit, you’ve got a visual line of sight into the saloon, and you’ve got a pretty good visibility over the top of the cabin top everywhere. You had access to your main sheet right there where you needed it. This was one of the boats that had no traveler, but instead had a windward and leeward block on the mainsheet. I think that’s a fine system, I like the control you have. Jibing works fine and is easily controlled.”

It was one little thing in a series of them, all of which added up to a boat—the Leopard 42—that was the unanimous winner in the 2022 category of Best Cruising Catamarans (Under 50’).

The post 2022 Boat of the Year: Best Cruising Catamaran (Under 50’) appeared first on Cruising World.

Mark Pillsbury, Editor in Chief of Cruising World, recently sat down for a virtual Q&A with Franck Bauguil, VP of Sales & Product Development for Travelopia Holdings Limited, Alex Simonis, Naval Architect for Simonis-Voogd Yacht Design, and Michael Robertson, Chief Designer for Robertson and Caine, in order to discuss the much-anticipated Leopard 42. This new catamaran is the perfect combination of performance, comfort and styling and will be added to the charter fleet for The Moorings and Sunsail in the coming seasons.

The post Virtual Q&A: Leopard 42 appeared first on Cruising World.

There was certainly no lack of fine catamarans launched in 2019 that will soon be introduced to charter fleets around the globe and, in the years ahead, will shepherd many a happy crew on countless memorable vacations. French builders have seemingly made a cottage industry of placing roomy, well-appointed, comfortable cats into the charter trade, and this year they upped their usual ante with a host of new offerings from Bali, Lagoon and Fountaine Pajot. But when our judges were asked to decide which cat they’d choose among them all if they were off on a charter trip, their pick as the year’s Best Charter Boat was the Leopard 50, aka the Moorings 5000.

The renowned South African builder Robertson and Caine has been supplying cats exclusively to The Moorings and Sunsail fleets for many years now, and between longtime naval architect Alex Simonis and The Moorings’ own marketing maven Franck Bauguil, it’s a collaboration that has the process down to a science. Put another way, this team knows how to manufacture fun. Their new 50-footer will deliver it in spades.

“It’s already been ­determined that over the next five years there’s going to be 200 of these built, so there’s no question about the commercial viability,” said Tim Murphy. “They have a 15-year track record of following through with their plans; they know exactly what goes into the boats. It’s probably going to be built with 5,000 or 6,000 man hours. Robertson and Caine know precisely what they’re doing, and they do great work.

RELATED: Leopard 50 Catamaran Review

“Everyone involved did a really good job of following through on the design criteria set out for charter catamarans,” he continued. “The visibility and traffic all the way through the boats; the communication from the helm station down and back to the social spaces; the safety and comfort of the cockpit, saloon and staterooms — all these things are addressed and implemented very, very well.

“One of the themes we have are the different kinds of social spaces you can create on a cat, specifically one of this size. There’s the outdoor aft cockpit; inside the bridge deck, or in the saloon; forward of the coachroof; and up on the hardtop. Four spaces. The goal, specifically for chartering — when you have different couples, or groups of people like families — is having different spaces to have social interactions. And then, of course, there’s the component of sailing and running the boat. So the test is how all these different spaces interact. Of all the nominees, I felt the Leopard/Moorings was the most successful at developing each of these social spaces, and integrating them. There’s a flow in this boat through the living spaces that’s independent of the sailing functions. So the social spaces are really unified in that way. Not only that, but going up to the sun deck you have a dedicated stairway up to that area. It’s completely separate from the sheets and halyards, and the helm. Once you’re up there you’re surrounded by seating and rails, so you’re centered in that space the same way you would be in the cockpit.”

What more is there to say? Well, other than “pack your bags.”

See All Winners:
2019 Boats of the Year

Other Winners:

• Domestic Boat of the Year
• Import Boat of the Year
• Best Midsize Cruiser Under 38 Feet
• Best Midsize Cruiser Over 38 Feet
• Best Full-Size Cruiser Under 48 Feet
• Best Full-Size Cruiser
• Best Cruising Catamaran Under 50 Feet
• Best Cruising Multihull Over 50 Feet
• Best Value

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Learn more about Leopard Catamaran at leopardcatamarans.com.

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