Dr. Antonio Collarino is a leading Italian vascular surgeon, and an early pioneer in laser surgery there. He’s a scientist. He’s precise. He knows when things work and when they don’t. Dr. Collarino also is a veteran cruiser, having spent more than 30 years sailing and boating around the Mediterranean. He and his wife just bought a new Turkish-built Sirena 58, which they heavily customized, and they couldn’t be happier. “My boat is called Avalon,” he said, “because it is above all a place where I can find myself. I used to like to sail quickly. But now I want to travel.”
Dr. Collarino and his wife Isolina handle the boat themselves. With three cabins and three heads, it’s large enough for their family or visiting friends, but they like to do everything themselves. They keep the boat at the Marina di Pisa, not far from their home in Tuscany, and they use it most weekends, all year round. Then they cruise the month of August.
For his part, Dr. Collarino uses the boat to connect to something outside his everyday life. “When I’m on a boat I listen to myself,” he says. “Boats are somewhere we can get to know who we really are, deep down. My previous boat was called Parsifal because it represented traveling through the sea of life.”
Powered by twin 650-hp CAT diesels, the Collarinos’ Sirena 58 tops out at just over 25 knots, but they prefer to dial back to enjoy the cruise. At 10 knots the boat has a range of 850 nm. They like the way the Sirena, designed by German Frers, handles at sea.
They previously owned an Azimut 53 Magellano, an Atlantis 50, an Atlantis 39 and many sailboats. They both say they enjoyed working with Sirena on getting the 58 just the way they wanted. An interior designer, Mrs. Collarino asked for pale wooden tables and mother-of-pearl fabrics on the sofas in the dinette. They also ordered larger sofas in the salon, a foldaway table, a marble galley countertop “and bright fabrics, which I chose in Turkey,” she says.
“When you work with a young shipyard, you can talk to them and share a lot of ideas,” Dr. Collarino says. “They followed our requests every step of the way. Our boat is made to measure; it’s the epitome of tailor-made.”
Specs.: LOA: 60’9”; Beam: 17’7”; Draft: 4’1”; Disp.: 76,279 lbs.; Fuel: 950 gals.; Water: 210 gals.; Power: 2×650-hp CAT C8.7 diesels. For more:
