Yachts, Sailing & Classic Boats
Three families of boat get chartered for holidays, and they produce genuinely different weeks: the sailing monohull that leans and talks back, the catamaran that stays level and lives like a house, and the beautiful old ones — gulets, restored ketches, traditional schooners — that people fall in love with in a photograph. Our charter guides start with the hull rather than the coastline, because the cruising ground can be changed on the morning of the day and the boat cannot be changed at all. They cover the parts nobody explains before you have paid: what a charter company asks before it hands you the keys, what the security deposit really exposes you to, where the boat sleeps each night and what that costs, how to provision a galley with two rings and a fridge the size of a suitcase, and how to split the whole thing between friends without a conversation on day five. We publish no charter rates anywhere in this section. They are set by the specific boat, the specific week and the specific contract, so we give you the questions to ask instead of numbers to trust.
Superyacht Charter in 2026: How to Choose, Book, and Enjoy
Chartering a superyacht is one of the most extraordinary holidays available. Here's everything from choosing the right vessel to understanding charter contracts.
8 min read · 4 April 2026
Sailing Yacht vs Motor Yacht: Which Is Right for You?
The choice between sail and power is as much philosophical as practical. We examine the lifestyle, cost, and experiential differences.
7 min read · 18 March 2026
Yacht Charter Guide 2026: Bareboat vs Crewed, Costs and Routes
Bareboat vs crewed, Mediterranean vs Caribbean, what it actually costs — the honest guide to chartering a yacht
11 min read · 4 April 2026
Chartering a Yacht in the Mediterranean
Crewed or bareboat, motor or sail — a practical first-timer's guide to chartering a yacht in the Mediterranean.
10 min read · 18 May 2026
Bespoke Superyacht & Catamaran Charters: Contracts, Hidden Fees, and Dream Itineraries
Master bespoke superyacht and luxury catamaran charters. Understand MYBA contracts, Advance Provisioning Allowance (APA), VAT rules, crew tipping, and routes.
18 min read · 25 March 2026
Sailing Yacht, Catamaran or Something Beautifully Old? Choose the Hull Before the Bay
Three families of boat get chartered for holidays: sailing monohulls, catamarans, and the restored wooden vessels people fall in love with online. They produce genuinely different weeks. Here is how to tell which one is yours before you have paid for the wrong one.
11 min read · 6 September 2026
Catamaran vs Monohull: The Charter Argument That Decides Your Entire Week
One hull leans and one stays flat, and almost everything people argue about — space, privacy, marina bills, anchorages, how it feels to sail — comes out of that single difference. A practical comparison for anyone about to commit a week to one of them.
11 min read · 6 September 2026
Gulet Charter: The Beautiful Wooden Boat Holiday Nobody Explains Properly
The gulet is the traditional broad-beamed wooden vessel of Turkey's south-west coast, and a gulet week is one of the best-value crewed holidays on the water. It is also widely mis-sold as sailing. What to expect, what to ask, and how to tell a good boat from a tired one.
11 min read · 6 September 2026
Chartering a Classic Yacht: Varnish, Romance, and the Questions the Photograph Cannot Answer
Restored ketches, schooners, pilot cutters and the assorted beautiful survivors of the last century are chartered by people who fell in love with a picture. They are worth it. But an old boat is an old boat, and there are seven questions worth asking before the deposit.
11 min read · 6 September 2026
Can You Actually Bareboat? What a Charter Company Asks Before It Hands You the Keys
The paperwork for taking a boat away without a skipper confuses almost everybody, because four different parties each have a say and none of them is the one you booked with. Here is who decides what, in what order, and exactly what to get in writing.
11 min read · 6 September 2026
Cabin Charter: Booking One Berth Instead of the Whole Boat
Most charter writing assumes you are taking the whole vessel. A large and growing part of the market sells single cabins on a shared boat instead. It is a genuinely different holiday with genuinely different risks, and it deserves a page of its own.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
Flotilla Sailing: Your Own Boat, Somebody Else's Worry
You sail your own yacht, but you do it in company, with a professional lead crew planning the route and available when something goes wrong. It is the bridge between a skippered week and a bareboat one — and it is quietly the best first sailing holiday there is.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
The Security Deposit Is the Number You Forgot to Budget For
Every bareboat charter takes a security deposit against damage to the boat. How it is held, what it covers, what waives it and what quietly voids the waiver are the least-read and most expensive paragraphs in the contract. Here is how the mechanism works.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
Provisioning a Bareboat: Feeding Eight People From a Fridge the Size of a Suitcase
Nobody warns you that the most consequential hour of a bareboat charter happens in a supermarket car park before you have even seen the boat. What to buy, what to check first, what breaks, and why the water tank matters more than the wine.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
Marina, Mooring Buoy or Anchor: Where the Boat Sleeps, and What Each Night Really Costs
Nobody books a charter thinking about where the boat will spend each night, and then it turns out to decide the budget, the showers, the dinner and how well anyone sleeps. A plain explanation of the three options and how to mix them.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
Chartering a Catamaran With Children: What Actually Works, and What Nobody Warns You About
A catamaran is the boat most families should charter, and the reasons are structural rather than marketing. But a good family week is built from a dozen small decisions about legs, shade, sleep and safety that no brochure covers.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
Seasickness Is a Planning Problem, Not a Character Flaw
One person feeling terrible can define a whole charter week, and it is far more preventable than most crews assume — through the boat, the route, the timing and the seat you choose. What actually helps, and the one thing we will not tell you.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
Splitting a Yacht Charter Between Friends: The Money Conversation Nobody Has Until Day Five
Chartering with friends is one of the great holidays and one of the great ways to damage a friendship. The problem is never the total; it is the cabins, the kitty, the deposit and the person who does not drink. A practical framework agreed in advance.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
What to Pack for a Sailing Charter, and the One Rule About Suitcases
Packing for a boat is not packing for a beach holiday with a boat attached. Stowage is tiny, salt gets into everything, and one wrong item — a wheeled suitcase — becomes a problem the whole crew has to live with for a week.
10 min read · 6 September 2026
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Curated by Thomas & Øyvind — NorwegianSpark · Last updated: April 2026
