Our members in the media!
*Charter Yacht Mustang Sallys article from Charter Guests in Caribbean World Magazine! May, 2008. PDF Format
*Promenade Sail Dive Charters to donate proceeds from March yacht charter to support the VIEC (VIrgin Islands Environmental Council) Court case on Beef Island*
Press release from Yacht Promenade
A long time Sail and Dive Charter yacht in the British Virgin Islands, Promenade, would like to give back to support the local environment that has given so much to us and our guests over the years.
Hans Creek, on Beef Island has always been a special place for Promenade , and the crew have always offered guided kayak and dinghy tours through the mangrove area, to see the baby sharks, upside down jellyfish, and see the pelicans.
As a business, we have watched in dismay as more and more areas of the British Virgin Islands have been paved over, or off limits and believe that unless responsible environmentalism is practiced, there will be nowhere left for us to cruise TO any more here except, from marina to marina.
Promenade has a cabin only sailing ( a cabin only sailing is where you can rent a "cabin only" instead of having to find a large group to rent the entire yacht. This allows 2 guests to enjoy the amenities that a much larger yacht offers) for 6 nights March 30th, Sunday and Saturday.
The regular cabin cost for a cabin only sailing is $3800.00, for two guests.
We will offer two cabins, each for two guests, at a special cost of $2500.00, with $2000.00 of the cabin fee being donated to the VIEC Beef Island Court case. This includes all activities, food and beverage.
Please help us in our efforts to protect the environment that has given so much to all of us on the water over the years. If you cannot come yourself, buy a cabin and donate it to a worthy individual.
We encourage everyone who has an interest in the environment and the British VIrgin Islands to donate to this worthy cause.
We have further donated as a member of the British Virgin Islands SCUBA Organization, which recently donated a substantial sum to help protect the waters that we all SCUBA dive.
For more information please contact Kerry Lynn Hucul ,Director, Promenade Sail Dive Charters, Box 2249 Roadtown, Tortola, British Virgin Islands ph # 284-499-2756 Email promcruz@surfbvi.com Website: yacht promenade
For more information on the VIEC, the court case, and donating yourself please see the British VIrgin Islands Heritage Conservation Group website or contact Dr. Quincy Lettsome, Director, Virgin Islands Environmental Council Tel: (284) 495 2250 Email: drqlettsome@hotmail.com
Yacht Viking Dream has been featured in the BVI Yacht Guide for February!
Feb 08 Article from the BVI Yacht Guide Written by Owen Waters.
The Viking Dream - A couple risks going it alone in the charter business - Sitting in the salon of Viking Dream, their
impeccably groomed Leopard 4700 catamaran, Mark and Sally Duncan are the very picture of contentment. Well, they
might be a little pressured by the deadlines of an upcoming charter, but they've been doing this work for so long now that
there's no doubt all will be in place by the time the guests arrive. Having only recently bought Viking Dream and having
supervised her refit, Mark and Sally are as happy as two kids at Christmas, purring over their new toy. "It was a
purchase of the heart," Sally says. "It felt really right when we bought her because of our previous history
with her. Besides, if we didn't try," she continued, "we'd always say 'Why didn't we?'. We're just so pleased
we've done it."
When Mark and Sally first considered the life of the sailing couple, they were on a year's leave from their corporate jobs
in the UK, trying to find some balance in their until-then crazy lives. Sally had been Training and HR manager with a
major British retail group, sorting out employees' problems, whilst Mark had been on the other side of retail, setting up
high-end malls in airports. He had 250 staff and 25 managers reporting to him and, when he wasn't traveling for
business, he was dealing with the inevitable headaches of management.
"One day in early 2001, Sally sent me a text," Mark told the BVIYG recently, "and asked me how my
day was going. I answered in four letters, and when I asked her the same question, she gave me the same answer. We
decided that evening to take a year out and within a week we'd resigned from our jobs and planned a world
tour! They bought round-the-world air tickets, rented out the house and took off for some rest and recreation. Six
years later, they're still traveling.
Their way to the BVI led them through a seven-month "Zero-to Hero" RYA Professional Skipper and Crew
course, although they both were already experienced sailors. With that in hand, Mark and Sally applied to the Moorings
crewed yacht division but nothing was immediately available, so they spent a season in Greece and Croatia running
flotillas. "It was the worst-paid job we've ever had," said Mark, "but the best fun. It was
awesome."
Eventually, in November 2003, the call came from Moorings in Tortola that there was a yacht awaiting them. "We
arrived in the Bahamas," Sally recalls, "and we had a week to get her ready and sail her down to
Canouan" After a couple of seasons, however, a family emergency forced them to take an unpaid leave and
return to the UK.
Upon their return, they were assigned Viking Dream in the BVI, which they ran until February 2006. After some months of
thinking about their future, Sally and Mark went to their financial advisor in the UK and asked some hard questions.
"Always, year after year, in the back of our minds," says Sally, "we'd been thinking, 'should we be
doing this for ourselves?'" They asked their advisor to let them know if they could manage to buy their own boat.
"I actually told him," says Mark,"to tell me how I couldn't do it. What I wanted him to say was 'Don't
be silly, there's no way you can do this'. But he came back and said, 'Actually, we can do this'."
On their way back to BVI for another season with Moorings, they checked the brokerage listings and saw, to their
surprise, that Viking Dream was up for sale. "There comes a point," Mark says, "when becoming
your own boss is the only answer to some of the questions you might have. With no disrespect to the Moorings or to the
private owners we'd met, we felt we could run a charter yacht better or more efficiently than we had seen them run. If you
don't do it, you'll always regret it."
The niche that Mark and Sally on Viking Dream occupy is a competitive one, so setting themselves apart from the pack
a big challenge. "We knew there were other (Leopard) 4700s going into the BVI fleet at the same time as
us," Mark says. "And there were several already in the fleet, so we felt we had to make ourselves look
significantly different from the rest. We spent a long time deciding on the colors we were going to use. We thought about
bright pink or electric purple to try and make ourselves stand out but we decided it just wasn't us, so we stayed with navy
canvas work and introduced the yellow on the Viking helmet and on the cushions."
The challenge was to create a brand. "We come from a retailing background," said Mark, "and that
is all about creating a strong brand image which we've tried to do with this boat. There's been a little bit of history with the
Viking helmets, so when we bought her we decided to build the helmets into the logo." "In fact,"
says Sally, "we didn't actually buy a boat, we bought the eight Viking helmets. The boat just came with
them."
"One thing we were trying to get across to the brokers at the Charter Yacht Society show," Mark says,
"was that Viking Dream isn't just another boat, she's a very smart looking charter yacht with a bit of
character."
The Leopard wasn't the only catamaran Mark and Sally were looking at. "We particularly like the look, and by all
reports the performance, of Catanas," said Mark, "but they were prohibitively expensive." Cost
wasn't the only consideration, according to Sally. "One of the business decisions we did make, and why we chose
the 4700, was that, starting a new business in a new country, we wanted to minimize all the news," she says.
"We would have to re-learn all the systems, source new parts, whereas this boat we know inside and out. Plus,
there's a whole warehouse full of Robertson and Caine parts here if we need something."
"Somebody did tell us," Sally says, "that it was really nice to meet some owner-operators who had
bought the boat as a business to charter, not who were chartering to cover the cost of the boat. We have bought this as a
business."
Having added electric toilets and installed a new generator, Mark and Sally are holding off on their next round of
improvements until the end of the season. The list is a long one, starting with a water maker and including new anchors,
a new RIB with beefed-up davits and a new DVD system.
Sitting in their salon with laptop humming as Mark answers e-mails and Sally prepares a provisioning order, life aboard
seems quiet and relaxed--a marked contrast to life on charter when the working day can be 16 to 18 hours long.
"Viking" means Sea Traveler in the Norse language says Mark. "We both love the
sea and we love to travel, so there's nowhere else we'd rather be."
"When I'm on charter, I never stop," Mark continues. I don't understand those crews who say they
get bored. There's always something to be done." And whether it's slicing fresh-baked bread, finessing a
marketing e-mail, or introducing guests to the joys of the Bubbly Pool, its all part of life aboard Viking Dream.
Viking Dream's own page on our site for more info.
Yacht Endless Summer is featured in the Standpoint Newspaper Nov 17th, 2007 Page 1 and Page 2
Crusing World Oct 07, article on Yacht Labe Yoseph
Read the entire article in PDF format here!
Promenade-Local Knowledge!
One of our members, S/V Promenade was the cover story on the August edition of The BVI Yacht Guide here in the BVI. Here is the article in PDF format
Local knowledge means sunset sails and quiet anchorages, waking to the sounds of birds (not to mention the smells of coffee and freshly baked bread), and walking on a beach where the only foot prints are your own. Local knowledge means drift diving with the currents along steep island drop-offs as you live-dive from the yacht or fish the deep northern margins. Local knowledge means the difference between just another anchorage and a night spent alone in a secluded bay gently kissed by the tropical breeze where the only lights are the stars above and the bioluminescence below.
Promenade’s Captain Rich Rome sums it up, “If people want it to happen, it’ll happen. It’s the Promenade Way.”
Begun by owner Kerry Lynn Hucul, the Promenade Way means that the crew engages with the guests to provide whatever they can to make an enjoyable and memorable vacation. It also means the boat has the diversity of activities to allow it all to happen. Think of it all like a giant toolkit for making fun! The concept must be working, judging by the number of guests that come back year after year for a week or more of this ideal environment.
On a recent charter, a group of eight guests with broad interests were kept constantly entertained with a variety of activities. While one was heavily into diving, three others spent hours snorkelling, and some enjoyed constant water sports where others were beachcombing, sunning, and lounging. At the end of the week, the group had managed to keep the crew busy using every toy on the boat. Laughing heartily, Rich said “I think that’s the first time that’s ever happened.”
Behind the scenes, Kerry and her partner “Bazza” Cooper are continually upgrading and improving the boat itself. As a small example, consider that Promenade has an onboard water maker ensuring enough water for showers and washing equipment down without ever having to visit a busy marina to take on water. Then there are items like the full-boat sound system and projection home theatre. All these add-ons assist with providing a seamless vacation for guests, whatever their favoured relaxation methods are.
But it is definitely Promenade’s three-person crew that keeps the action going. When chef/dive instructor Lisa Dixon says, “We’re having as much fun as the guests are!” she means it. Whether it’s Rich setting the spinnaker for a downhill rollick, Lisa guiding a dive group through Grand Central Station (her personal favourite), or Brad Griffiths towing another first-time slalom skier behind the 50hp tender, the guests love the energy and enthusiasm that the crew puts into it.
The crew, with extensive experience and local knowledge, spend a great deal of time tuning and tweaking each day’s activities to the guests’ desires. When you go geocaching, for example, you might be in for an easy walk on graded trails or you might need a machete (they’ll provide one) to scramble up the hills of one of the BVI’s uninhabited islands.
Similarly for the divers, you might have uncrowded, off-hours diving at the Rhone or a night dive on the Chikuzen. For the children, it’s “Survivor BVI,” and for everyone it’s fritters made from the conch you snorkel and pick yourself.
Ask Rich to describe a ‘typical’ charter and he smiles and says, “I don’t know. We try not plan more than 3 hours in advance.”
Many things make Promenade uniquely suited to BVI chartering, starting with the fact that she was built 27 years ago in Bristol, England, specifically for sailing in the British Virgin Islands. And she’s been here ever since, doing just that. Not many boats can make that claim; fewer still, have the distinction of having appeared on a BVI postage stamp.
The three hulls of Promenade’s trimaran design provide a stability that will suit all sailors, whether seasoned or novice. Where waves make catamarans continually rock and monohulls monotonously roll, Promenade is persistently unperturbed. Besides the obvious comfort, stability means many more anchorages to choose from – anchorages that most other boats can only sail past.
Then there are the practical pleasures. Things like three-times the deck and cockpit space of a similarly sized monohull, spacious cabins with queen- and king-sized berths, and a large air-conditioned saloon with ample bar and wine locker makes it great for group activities and at the same time simple for quiet solitude as well.
And now, let’s talk about the toys. Three kayaks, two dinghies, three sets of water skis, wake board, fishing gear, snorkelling gear, scuba gear (and onboard compressor!), Banana, Predator, and an 8-person Pal Lounge for afternoon blender sports on the water. Of course those are merely the water toys. One can’t forget the big-screen projection home theatre with hundreds of DVDs, an iPod station that feeds sounds anywhere on the boat, photography equipment, video games, board games, a Sky Scout, and even wireless Internet access.
Combine local knowledge with the crew’s unique skills (ask Brad about Formula 1 boat racing in South Africa) and broad experience (or ask Rich about sailing in Croatia), mixed with the BVI’s stunning variety of islands, sailing conditions, and anchorages, seasoned well with the yacht’s unique capabilities and diverse amenities and you begin to savour the alluring potential of the Promenade Way. This is what guests love and why they come back time after time after time.
Contacting Promenade
Promenade does term charters to a week or more. Her layout handles groups of twelve guests comfortably, whether family, friends, or corporate group. Breakfast, lunch, afternoon appetizers, ‘blender sports’, and dinner daily – all the highest quality served in family style – are all included, as are the extensive open bar, soft drinks, juices, etc. All activities and toys (except scuba diving – it’s extra) are included in the charter price.
For short-term visitors or island residents wanting to get away from Tortola for a bit, Promenade offers day charters from 9am to 5pm (including one-ways from Virgin Gorda to Road Town). Lunch, drinks, and all activities other than diving are included in a fixed price.
Per-cabin sailings are also available for singles or couples.
Promenade can be found on the web at www.yachtpromenade.com and the crew’s blog can be followed at www.saildivebvi.com/serendipity.
Check them out and find out why their slogan is “We have more fun!”
This PDF here is an article from Nov 2003 on Trish Bailey and her yacht Serendipity with the eco sails that they specialize in.
Green Seas. Trish Bailey wants the people who charter with her to leave the Caribbean with more than a healthy hangover. "When people think about the Caribbean, they think of lying in a hammock and sipping a cocktail" Ms. Bailey said during last week's boat show at Village Cay Marina. "That is what the industry promotes". But this captain has taken a different tack in promoting her charter business. Her guests can expect to get healthy doses of information about the health of coral reefs and the region's wildlife in addition to their painkillers and rum punches. Ms. Bailey promotes sailing vacations on the 50 foot Beneteau she captains as eco-sailing. A web site promoting her boat, Serendipity, mentions hiking, snorkelling and bird watching, along with the possibility of seeing humpback whales at certain times of the year.
Conspicuously placed on the boat are brochures from the Association of Reef Keepers, an environmental organisation of which the captain is the past president. She has been living and working on boats for more than 21 years. She has captained charter vessels in the BVI since 1988 and has been captain/manager of Serendipity since 1994. The boats owner supports the concept of eco-sailing. He participates in Reef Check, which is an annual study of the health of the territory's coral reefs. When she first came up with the idea, Ms Bailey said some brokers refused to promote the idea. But she added that that has changed in recent years. "Most come her to enjoy the water anyway" she said "The first thing they want to do is jump in the water and snorkel" The environmentalist has also noticed many other boats, if not actively pursuing an environmental agenda, have become more aware of protecting the natural resources. But Ms Bailey noted that it is sometimes hard to do eco-sailing in light of some of the projects that have had a negatice impact on the environment. "I am embarassed sometimes"the captain said. "I am not completely comfortable pulling the wool over their eyes about certain things". She said the lack of recycling facilities is particularily embarassing. I cannot do anything about it she says, adding that she reuses plastic water bottles to cut down on the amount of waste. The captain would like to see more done within the industry, including self regulation action toward the installation of holding tanks. "The industry has to take some responsibility toward keeping our waters clean" Ms. Bailey said. "It's getting to the point where clients don't want to swim in some anchorages"
