Cruising Life

Father, Son Cross English Channel on Fliteboards

By Peter Janssen on August 18, 2021 Cruising Life, Gear

A British father and son just rode their electric-powered hydrofoil Fliteboards across the English Channel in 1 hour and 44 minutes, setting a Guinness World Record for their performance. Rob Wylie, 51, and his son Morgan, 19, started in Cap Gris-Nez in northern France and rode, or foiled, for 23 miles until they landed in Folkstone, England. They both fell off their boards several times because of masses of seaweed in the water and fishing crates bobbing on the surface. Rob said that about half way across he didn’t think they would make it. The batteries were getting low “and…

New Beneteau Antares 11 Flybridge: An Outboard Flagship

By Peter Janssen on August 18, 2021 Boat Reviews, Cruising Life

The flagship of Beneteau’s outboard-powered Antares fleet, the new Antares 11 Flybridge is a family cruiser designed for comfort and easy times on the water. It follows the success of a coupe version of the Antares 11, and offers more space up top with the flybridge. The Antares 11 Flybridge is powered by twin 300-hp Mercury four-stroke outboards, which give it a 40-knot top speed. That’s certainly a more than respectable top end, but this boat isn’t meant to be a speedster. You also can order it with twin 250-hp outboards for family cruising. The flybridge blends into the boat’s…

Iguana Working on Fastest Amphib Yet

By Peter Janssen on August 17, 2021 Cruising Life

Iguana Yachts is working on its fastest amphibian yet, putting the finishing touches on a new 33-footer, powered by twin 450-hp outboards, that it hopes will hit 55 knots or so on the water. When it’s completed, the new boat will be “the fastest amphibious boat in the world,” Iguana says. World records about these kinds of things are a bit sketchy, but it seems that the world record for an amphibious craft is held by the WaterCar Panther that hit 52 knots in the water back in 2010. And that was a prototype; the production WaterCar Panther only went…

Cormorant Building Long-Range Cruisers in Poland

By Peter Janssen on August 16, 2021 Boat Reviews, Cruising Life

A new player on the extended voyaging scene, Cormorant Yachts in Gdansk, Poland, is working on two new cruisers, a 55 and a 69, designed for owners who want to spend weeks at sea while enjoying the comforts of home. The semi-displacement yachts are called the COR555/690, the numbers indicating the length. The Cormorant 69 is basically an elongated 55, although Cormorant emphasizes that it can heavily customize any of its boats. The Cormorant fleet goes up to 88 feet. Cormorant has its own yard with skilled craftsmen in the Port of Gdansk, so it can control a high quality…

U.S. Couple Buys New Boat, Sight Unseen, in Italy

By Peter Janssen on August 16, 2021 Cruising Life

A California couple, searching for a boat to use as a second home and workplace, bought a Princess F50 in San Remo, Italy, sight unseen, during the pandemic and are now shipping it back to the U.S. Cindy and Ariel Poler are lifelong sailors, and members of San Franciso’s St. Francis Yacht Club. They had lived in San Francisco, but when their youngest son went to college they sold their house there and moved to Stinson Beach, across the bay in Marin County. But they wanted to keep their ties to the city. According to a story in Britain’s Motor…

Maritimo Building New M60 Flybridge Blue-Water Cruiser

By Peter Janssen on August 16, 2021 Boat Reviews, Cruising Life

Maritimo, the highly regarded Australian builder, just announced that they’re planning an M60 Flybridge Motor Yacht that will be launched early next year. The luxurious new M60 Flybridge Motor Yacht is the latest iteration of the company’s first motor yacht, the Maritimo 60, launched in 2004. It was then selected as Cruiser of the Year and Australian Boat of the Year. “It has since gone on to earn a reputation as a standout blue-water cruiser with diehard following,” said Tom Barry-Cotter, Maritimo’s design director. The new M60 Flybridge Motor Yacht provides luxurious living on board with the company’s fabled blue-water…

Burger Launches New 50 Cruiser with IPS

By Peter Janssen on August 14, 2021 Boat Reviews, Cruising Life

Burger, the fabled custom and semi-custom builder, just launched its new 50 Cruiser, with an aluminum hull designed by Vripack and power from twin Volvo 600-hp IPS800 pod drives. The boat’s now for sale at Burger’s yard in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, on Lake Michigan. The Burger 50 comes with an interior by De Basto Designs in Miami. It has two staterooms, with en suite heads, below, and a large open salon and galley with unobstructed views all around. The boat was designed by Vripack naval architects in the Netherlands. It has Vripack’s patented Slide Hull, which reduces pounding and offers less…

New Strand Craft V8; PWC on Steroids

By Peter Janssen on August 11, 2021 Boat Reviews, Cruising Life

Kurt Strand, the Florida-based Norwegian yacht designer, is building the Strand Craft V8 Daytona GT, a jet ski beast that he calls “the ultimate personal watercraft.” Strand, who usually designs large yachts, says he’s been working on the V8 Daytona GT for the past five years. It’s 16’ 6” long and weighs 1,250 pounds and will be powered by a 6.7-liter supercharged aluminum V-8 engine with a high-performance water jet. We don’t have any details about speed or range yet; it will have a 22-gallon fuel tank. The hull will be either fiberglass or aluminum and the jet ski “marries…

New CMY 57 Powered by 3 Diesel Outboards

By Peter Janssen on August 11, 2021 Boat Reviews, Cruising Life

Compact Mega Yachts, a start-up from Finland, is building two new cruisers powered by three 300-hp OXE diesel outboards. The company says the boats will have a top speed of 27 knots, and when they’re driven by just one outboard in an “adaptable powering” mode they will have a range of about 3,000 nm. The two boats are the CMY161 at 53 feet LOA, and the CMY173 at 57 feet LOA (pictured above). The two are essentially the same, except the CMY173 has a third cabin in the accommodation deck below because of its extra length. The three outboards, developed…

Good Samaritans, NOAA, Save Stranded Orca

By Peter Janssen on August 10, 2021 Cruising Life

A group of Good Samaritans, with some help from NOAA, helped rescue a 20-foot-long orca that was stranded on the rocks on Prince of Wales Island, just above Ketchikan in Alaska. They poured water on the 13-year-old orca for about six hours until the tide turned, and the whale, known as TD146D, a member of the West Coast transient orca population, was able to swim out to sea and rejoin its pod. The Coast Guard received the first call about the stranded whale at 9 in the morning.The orca was at least four feet above the waterline then, and the…

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