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There is a Vripack-designed steel trawler currently lying with De Valk in their covered marina in Sneek called ‘Aegir’, and she is the boat in my latest video tour. Her broker, Henk de Vries, lists her (link below) at €489,000 with VAT paid. This is the companion article, covering what the video did not: her ocean rating, the 2023-2025 refit work, and what she would cost to keep and to move over the next 5 years.

Let us start with her sleek lines, because they give you an idea of what she is before the spec sheet does. Her bow is fine and flared, with high freeboard and a sheer rising towards a substantial stem and anchor arrangement. The topsides run long and fairly straight, a dark blue steel hull under a white steel superstructure with a stainless rubbing strake the full length of her.

Aft, she finishes in a near-vertical transom with a bathing platform and a decent-sized cockpit. The pilothouse carries big windows above a long band of side glazing, and the flybridge is compact and practical. Side decks, high rails and opening gates all point the same way: she was drawn for moving about safely at sea.

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The design comes from Vripack in Sneek, and if you have read my pieces on the €695,000 Vripack Trawler 1960 or the Vripack 69, you’ll know why that name matters.

Dick Boon opened the studio in 1961 and built its identity on practical long-range boats. The Doggersbank series helped earn Boon the description “Father of the Expedition Yacht”; the 1985 Doggersbank Offshore became the studio’s international breakthrough, and their research vessel Turmoil, now Pioneer, became the first yacht to run the Northwest Passage in 2001, then the first to do it twice in 2010.

Today the studio numbers around 40+ designers, engineers and naval architects. The broker record lists Searocco Yachts of the Netherlands as her builder; I could not find a fuller history of that yard, so if you know more about Searocco Yachts, then please feel free to leave a comment below.

Her spec carries a CE Category A rating, and it’s worth pointing out what that covers.

Category A is the EU design category for craft designed for winds that may exceed force 8 and significant wave heights of 4 metres and above, excluding abnormal conditions such as hurricanes. In simple terms, her design envelope is offshore gale conditions. It is a design threshold rather than a condition report, though, so on a 2003 boat I would still want the relevant survey, which is standard practice.

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De Valk says a huge amount was invested in her between 2023 and 2025, and the spec sheet backs that up with dates. 2023 brought a Kabola KB40 central-heating system and new Simrad depth and log instruments. 2024 added a 1,500W Lofrans windlass, 100m of stainless anchor chain and a washer/dryer.

2025 was the big year: a full 12V/24V/220V electrical overhaul, new Redtop batteries across the start, generator and bow-thruster banks, twin Simrad NSS9 Evo 3S radar/GPS displays, new stainless propeller shafts with water-lubricated bearings, fresh antifouling and a serviced Onan 7kW generator. That is a serious systems renewal programme and not just a lick of paint with some minor touching up here and there.

Two practical numbers are worth highlighting as well. Her air draft is 5.50m, dropping to 3.60m with the hydraulically lowering mast, which opens up much of the European bridge and canal network; I personally would still measure her in the lowered configuration before committing to a low bridge. Headroom is a generous 2.00m in the saloon.

She is round-bilged with a box keel, and that combination is the heart of her impressive seakeeping story. A round-bilge hull turns smoothly from bottom to topsides rather than meeting at a hard chine, and at displacement speeds that generally means efficient flow and a gentler, more progressive motion in choppy conditions.

The trade is that round-bilge boats can roll more freely, which is exactly why she carries hydraulic fin stabilisers to damp that roll underway. A box keel like hers can provide a deep spine of protected structure low down and contribute to straight tracking; exactly how hers is arranged is one for the surveyor to confirm.

The rest of the file: 14.97m overall, 4.94m beam, a shallow 1.30m draft, 32 tonnes displacement and 5mm steel hull plating. Twin Volvo Penta TAMD41H diesels of 145hp each deliver an 8-knot cruise and 10-knot top speed, fed by 3,200 litres (845 US gallons) of fuel, with 850 litres (225 US gallons) of fresh water. Below, she sleeps 4 in 2 cabins, each with a 2.0m French bed and its own en-suite shower and toilet.

You might be wondering why the fuel capacity for a CE Cat A boat is not larger, but it all comes down to what the owner wanted from the boat, and her range reflects that. Many owners never intend to cross the Atlantic or the Pacific. Instead, they are content knowing they can get from Northern Europe to the Med without stopping every other day for fuel.

And a CE Cat A vessel is exactly what you need if you have your sights on the Bay of Biscay, which can turn very gnarly in a short period of time.

My overall impression is that she has been very well maintained and looked after by an owner who clearly spent a lot of time and effort on what must have been their pride and joy. She is ready to go cruising, and being steel in both her superstructure and hull, she will take on some serious conditions, which is exactly what you would expect with an explorer yacht.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”. Thanks to my paying subscribers, I can travel around Europe and film boats like Aegir. So, if you are a premium subscriber or indeed you become one, then I would like to say a massive thank you!

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In the premium section below, I cover:

- Steel hull maintenance at 23 years old: what she needs and a realistic 5-year budget

- Stabilisers and engines: service cycles and 5-year cost ranges for the hydraulic fins and the twin TAMD41Hs

- Shipping her to the United States: a working estimate for getting her across the pond.

- My honest assessment of the Atlantic question: whether she can cross on her own hull, and her price against her Dutch steel cohort

What a 23-year-old steel hull asks of you

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There is a 60ft custom steel expedition trawler currently lying at Gold Coast City Marina in Queensland called ‘Reel Steel’. Launched back in 2000, she completed an internal refit in June 2026, according to her broker.

Her listing (link below) quotes ‘just’ 18 litres of diesel an hour at an 8-knot cruise, and a range beyond 3,000 nautical miles from a 7,000-litre (1,850 US gallon) fuel tank. Not bad for a trawler yacht of this size and displacement.

At the time of writing this blog, the broker lists her at AU$950,000, but if you want to make an offer, you will need to confirm the current asking price, as another source lists it as ‘POA’. For the budgets below, I use rounded equivalents of US$675,000, €590,000 and £505,000 (17th Sept 2026).

The builder behind her

The listing credits J. Reynolds of Auckland as builder and Hakker as the designer. I could not find a fuller yard history or reliably connect other builds to that name for this one. If you know anything about J. Reynolds of Auckland, then feel free to leave a comment below.

In terms of her lines and profile, her bow is high and strongly raked, with a long raised foredeck behind hefty bulwarks, and her sheer is modest rather than swept, giving her the profile of a small ship. High freeboard runs back to a full aft body and a broad, squared-off transom. The wheelhouse sits forward with the accommodation area behind it, sheltered seating on the lower aft deck and an open deck above.

As with many explorer yachts, the foredeck is her working space. A fixed mast and boom handle tender lifting, a RIB stows between mast and wheelhouse (the inventory counts two aboard), and winch and cable hardware for what the broker describes as steel batwing stabilisers, fitted this year, sits on deck. Everything in those proportions reads as a displacement passagemaker drawn around a steady 8-knot cruise.

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The spec sheet lists a single Gardner 6LXTD in the engine room, a 250hp turbo diesel with around 1,900 hours, serviced in July this year. For those wondering about single-engine redundancy, a three-phase electric get-home motor sits behind it, credited with a modest 5 knots. Power comes from 36kVA and 8kVA generators, 800W of solar and a 5kW inverter under a Victron Cerbo GX; navigation is Furuno with 64nm radar, plus Starlink Offshore.

Below deck, she sleeps 8 across 4 cabins, and every cabin has its own shower and head, which is unusual generosity on an 18.29 metre hull. With 5,500 litres (1,450 US gallons) of fresh water, that layout would keep 2 couples or a family living aboard comfortably for weeks at a time.

One more detail before you ring James Paul at World Wide Boat Brokers: the listing says the owner is open to property or vessel swaps!

For a potential buyer based in North America or Northern Europe who is wondering whether she could be bought ‘home’, the distance from Queensland makes the cost of delivery a central part of the decision.

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This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”

In the premium section below, I cover:

- Own bottom to the US East Coast: route, fuel, crew, Panama, and the delivery insurance some owners forget

- Own bottom to Northern Europe: Suez versus the Cape, and the honest elapsed time

- Shipping her as deck cargo, and how VAT and duty change the budget

- My honest assessment of her price against named comparables, and who should bring her home

The budgets below are illustrations in US dollars, using stated assumptions, and are therefore not delivery quotes. Route, fuel availability, crew, insurance and import treatment need confirming for the actual voyage, but you can use the information below as a rough guide.

Her own bottom to the US East Coast

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M/Y ‘Lady Marjan’ stood out to me for several reasons. First, her current asking price for a boat of this size and calibre struck me as very good for a 27.8 metre steel explorer-style superyacht. You would be hard-pressed to find something close to Lady Marjan for a similar asking price.

At the time of writing, she is currently listed for sale with Yacht Broker (DK) - link to the broker's website below.

Second, her history. Based on what I could find, this beautiful vessel with her sleek, unassuming lines did not start life as an explorer yacht. Instead, she began life as a purpose-built cargo vessel, laid down in Broager, Denmark, a small industrial town on the Baltic coast.

If you know Europe, you will know that any boat builder based on the Baltic coast builds extremely capable vessels engineered to endure the harsh conditions found in and around the Baltic Sea.

The fact is that in the Royal Navy, when you are absolutely freezing and the wind conditions are howling, it is common to refer to the conditions as being ‘Baltic ’, on the understanding that everyone will know exactly what you mean owing to the reputation of the Baltic Sea.

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In the 1987 Danish Ship Register, this vessel appears under call sign ‘OVPF’ as a ‘Motorskib Lastskib’, which, according to Google Translate, means a motor cargo ship.

The name Reinhard Tychsen also pops up and, based on a bit more research, suggests that ‘Lady Marjan’ might have started life working for a local brickworks, moving bricks or building materials along the coast.

For her next owner, this means you have a solid steel hull beneath you, designed by naval architects to endure very tough conditions with a heavy load. Talking of stability, she weighs 86 tonnes, but I couldn’t find any reference to stabilisers in the broker’s listing.

However, this makes sense, given that her stability is largely inherent in her hull form and displacement. I don’t think this boat would suit someone who prioritises motion over the vessel’s seakeeping. So if you or your partner is prone to seasickness on multi-week voyages, this might not be the boat for you.

However, her length-to-beam ratio is about 4.7:1, and the relatively shallow draft is only around 6.5% of her length. So that combination, together with her weight, makes her surprisingly stable even without any stabilisers fitted.

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Between 2001 and 2002, she was transformed into the liveaboard explorer yacht that she is today. JB Marine oversaw the major refit at Hvide Sande Shipyard, working with Lars T. Olsen of CDE Danish Marine Design.

Hvide has an interesting history: it was founded in 1950 on bare sand and built on handshake deals with Jutland’s fishing fleet, then grew into the wider Seasight Group, which covered shipyard work, port services, and offshore wind farms.

If you are outside of the European boatbuilding community, then you would be genuinely surprised at just how many niche boatbuilders have businesses which are based on trust and handshakes, rather than thousands of pages of legal caveats and conditions.

It might sound odd, but it works…most of the time.

As she is now, her LOA is 27.8 metres, or 91.2 ft, with a beam of 5.9 metres and a draught of 1.82 metres. Power comes from twin Mercedes V12 OM 424 diesels (420hp each) driving twin shafts. She has two generators, dual bow thrusters and a stern thruster.

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The engines are listed as dating from 2002, with 2,950 hours recorded; she can carry 13,000 litres of fuel (3,434 US gallons), and can cruise between 9 and 12 knots. Fuel burn and range data have not been included in the listing, but assuming a fuel burn rate of around 70 litres per hour at ten knots, you would be looking at a range of around 2,000 nm.

Reduce the speed to 8 knots, which is more in line with traditional explorer yacht speeds, and I would expect a range of around 3,500 nm, but, of course, do not quote me on those figures!

Since her refit, she has had a varied second life as a private motor yacht, including stints as a private residence, an events vessel around Copenhagen, Skagen and Bornholm, and a guest entertainment platform.

She is also approved by the Danish Maritime Authority for operation under a Yachtskipper 3 certificate, which, according to the broker, can be gained in just two weekends, so this keeps her accessible, at least in Danish waters, to owners who might not have a professional ticket.

When you step inside ‘Lady Marjan ’, any reference to her commercial vessel heritage quickly slips away. She is laid out as four separate living areas, each with two metres of headroom. On most motor yachts of this size, you tend to get open-plan multi-purpose spaces, but in northern Europe, the vibe is more cosy living than Med open-plan summers.

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On quite a few of the steel conversions I have featured in this newsletter and on my YouTube channel, you end up ducking under deck beams or squeezing past machinery casings. But the broker’s description reads more like a house than a boat, leaning into its previous use as a private residence.

One of the benefits of converting a commercial cargo vessel into a private motor yacht is the sheer amount of space that you have to work with. I saw this with the converted beam trawler, Scintilla Maris, which you can also find on my YouTube channel.

The listing states a sleeping capacity of 8-10 across four cabins, with 220cm-long berths. However, the listing doesn’t confirm which cabins are en-suite and which have shared facilities (or, if it does, I couldn’t find it).

For those cold winters, her steel is fully insulated throughout, with no significant thermal bridging. She has double-glazed windows, an oil-fired boiler running hydronic heating and two insulated freshwater tanks. There is also a dedicated workshop space and a heated laundry room.

Shore power comes via a 400-volt Landstrøm connection, and she carries 12 batteries alongside her two generators.

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To read the rest of this analysis, upgrade to a paid subscription. In the premium section below, we explore:

• Liveaboard Credentials: How Lady Marjan stacks up as a year-round, off-grid home.

• The Math: A breakdown of how she could generate 400,000 DKK (~$62,100) per year in charter, Airbnb, and event income to cover her running costs.

• The Financing Deal: An in-depth look at the seller’s unique 5-year interest-only financing offer and the part-exchange option.

• Market Comparison: How she compares directly to three other steel hulls from her era (ranging from €87,000 to €13.5 million).

Thanks to my premium subscribers, I can keep this publication completely independent, unbiased, and sponsor-free. In addition to unlocking these deep-dives, premium subscribers also get exclusive, behind-the-scenes content, including private walkthroughs, market analyses, and early access to listings.

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It’s not often that I head over to the Netherlands for a one-day trip to film one boat. And when I do, it is usually because a boat deserves all the time and effort (and expense) that goes into planning such a trip.

From a business perspective, I usually try to film at least four boats in a single day, although the growing number of paying subscribers to this newsletter means I can increasingly start scoping out more single boats to film in a single day.

The No Limit Ships 1320 is one such boat.

I write this having just taken off from London City Airport aboard my usual KLM ‘commuter’ flight towards Schiphol. In around 40 minutes, I will land, and after navigating my way through security, which in itself can feel like a military exercise, I will be picked up by Hans from No Limit Ships before heading to the spot where the 1320 is currently berthed.

If you are new to the No Limit Ships brand, I encourage you to check out the videos I have uploaded to my YouTube channel, which feature the 1550 and the 1650. In summary, No Limit Ships builds some of the most capable explorer-style motorboats you will probably encounter.

The yard has been building boats for more than 25 years, having originally established its operations in Groningen back in 1996, and has a loyal following of repeat owners who understand what rugged, durable boat building is all about. These boats are not only extremely durable and seaworthy, but they are also fast.

You would not ordinarily expect a boat made out of steel, Corten steel in this case, to be able to top 30 knots, but that is exactly what the 1320 is capable of. Interestingly, the US Coast Guard 44-foot surf rescue boat, world-famous for the ability to self-right, is made of Corten steel, so the material has to be pretty darn good steel to stand up to that standard

The 1320 is a CE Cat A vessel, meaning that she can endure some lively sea states in excess of 4 metres with the peace of mind that comes with knowing that should you make contact with a subsurface object that evades the usual sensors such as radar and your line of sight, then the hull will be able to maintain its integrity, which, in itself, is often worth the added peace of mind that comes with owning a steel boat. Especially if you intend to take your family on board, and especially if you are cruising along at 30 knots at night.

This 1320 was built for an existing No Limit Ships client who previously owned two NLS vessels and wanted to downsize from one of their larger vessels, but still wanted the superior build quality and workmanship that comes with a No Limit Ships vessel.

Each vessel in the NLS range is built by hand by a dedicated team of craftsmen, many of whom have worked at the family-run business for years.

Having got to know many members of the team at No Limit Ships over the last year or two, I can see why the staff turnover is low and why many of No Limit Ships’ clients are repeat customers.

In addition to their private motorboats, NLS also crafts custom commercial vessels designed for hydrographic surveying, search and rescue operations, and demanding offshore maritime work.

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But back to the 1320. Designed and crafted in the Netherlands, she features a robust Corten steel deep-V hull and decks paired with an aluminium superstructure. Her dimensions include a 4.65m beam, a draft of around 1.20m, and an air draft of 3.30m.

Rated for CE Category A ocean passage, power comes from twin Volvo Penta IPS600 engines, backed by a 2,250-litre fuel capacity, 690 litres of fresh water, and a 385-litre waste tank. If an owner wanted to, then hull number two could be fitted with 650s, but you won’t get much difference in performance with the extra horses (although your fuel bill will go up).

Official specs list an overall length of 13.20m, top speeds reaching 30 knots, and a displacement of roughly 18.5 tonnes. Equipment onboard includes Raymarine navigation electronics, Victron energy systems, a Northern Lights generator, and a Kabola boiler powering underfloor heating.

The full 1320 boat tour video will be coming very soon to my channel and will be available to everyone. So keep an eye on my uploads and turn on YouTube notifications so you don’t miss it. However, if you are a premium subscriber to this newsletter, you will find a short preview video of the 1320 below the paywall.

After all, it is only thanks to my premium subscribers in this newsletter that I can fund these often hectic, last-minute trips to film explorer yachts, which I think you will all like.

Having filmed and featured over 500 explorers, I am confident the 1320 will appeal to a broad range of seasoned boat owners who want something fast, solid, and usable year-round.

If you are not in a position to become a premium subscriber just yet, then fear not, as the full boat tour will be coming to my channel in the next few weeks (subject to any more last-minute trips!)

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There is something about the word ‘Aquanaut’. I am not sure what, exactly. Maybe it has something to do with the connotations which come with the space version of the same word. Anything ‘Astronaut’-related must be, from an engineering perspective, really impressive.

So, when I saw the Aquanaut Global Voyager 1500 (stabilisation version) sitting unassumingly inside De Valks Sneek-covered mariner (currently listed for sale with Pieter Bosma - link to listing below), my curiosity alone ensured that I went over to this CE Cat A explorer motor yacht to take a closer look.

Before we go into too much detail, let’s take a moment to cover the main specs of this boat. She has an LOA of 14.05 metres, a beam of 4.8 metres and a draft of 1.4 metres. Her max air draft is 6.7 metres and her min air draft is 3.77 metres.

With dimensions like this, if you are thinking of using this boat on Europe’s inland waterways, then you might be wondering where you can, and more importantly, where you cannot go.

Without listing every single waterway in Europe, if you are thinking of staying in the Netherlands, then she can comfortably navigate most of the major canals, rivers, and lakes, including routes through Friesland, the IJsselmeer region, Amsterdam, Zeeland and the main commercial waterways.

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If you were thinking of heading south to Belgium, then this boat would also be well suited to the Scheldt, the Ghent-Ternuezen Canal, the Albert Canal and selected routes around Brussels and Wallonia. Although I have driven through Belgium many times, I have yet to explore the country via its inland waterways, so I cannot offer any personal advice on where to go.

If you’ve cruised through Belgium by boat, let us know in the comments where the best places to visit are!

France is a bit more complicated, as its minimum air draft of 3.77 metres excludes much of the smaller canal network. But if the Rivers Oise, Seine, Moselle or Rhone are on your radar, then this boat will serve you well.

But I doubt that a boat as capable as this will spend much of her time pottering around the inland waterways of Europe. This boat was designed to be taken offshore, in the sort of gnarly weather that salty sea dogs like you and me actually enjoy cruising in.

With her steel hull and steel superstructure, you would be hard-pressed to find an offshore sea state (excluding mid-ocean) that this boat would not be able to handle. Most explorers opt for an aluminium superstructure to save weight and fuel.

But this Aquanaut Global Voyager, built in 2010 by Aquanaut Yachting in the Netherlands, is more concerned with its ability to punch through big waves than with saving a few thousand of your local currency on fuel. Exactly my kind of boat!

SeaKeeping

Her EU Recreational Craft Directive CE Cat A credentials mean she can handle wind forces above 8 (gale, wind speeds of 34-40 knots) and wave heights above four metres. Your guests on board might not enjoy the ride, but at least they will take comfort in knowing this boat was designed for it.

Her hull features a long keel and a hard chine. The long keel improves directional stability, which is very useful in a following sea or beam wind where a fin-keel or shallow-draft hull would tend to wander. But remember, this long keel also means her props and rudders have additional protection, should you misjudge the tide times.

Meanwhile, her hard chine increases her initial stability, meaning that she resists the first few degrees of a roll more firmly than a round bilge would. The trade-off here is that hard chine hulls can feel a bit quicker, in terms of movement once they do start rolling, compared to the softer, more rounded motion that you would get with a round bilge displacement hull.

Her 34 tonnes of displacement for a platform that is 14.95 metres means that, when it does get rough, her frequency of motion will be relatively slower and, combined with the boat’s increased inertia, she will resist being thrown around by short, sharp wave trains.

Considering this boat can carry a maximum of 12 passengers, this high level of sea-keeping and seakindliness is very important should you and 11 of your oppos find yourselves outwitted by a gnarly weather front.

And let’s not forget that this Aquanaut is also fitted with Vetus hydraulic fin stabilisers. These active underwater control surfaces reduce rolling while the boat is moving. Sensors detect the start of a roll, and the hydraulic system adjusts the fins’ angle, generating an opposing force that helps keep the hull level.

They don’t eliminate every movement at sea, and they are primarily a roll-control system rather than a cure for pitching or yawing, but when combined with her hull configuration, they help keep the boat steady when other boats would be rolling all over the place.

Naval Architecture

This boat has most of the lines and naval architecture I love in an explorer motor yacht. She has a beautiful sheer that slowly starts to increase as you move towards the bow from midships. The flare on her bow not only reminds me of commercial vessels, but is just enough to ensure that rogue waves from passing tankers will not get the deck too wet.

I also love the proportions of her steel superstructure, with the wheelhouse nestled low to keep her centre of gravity down. You might think that this would mean restricted visibility in the forward sectors of the boat, but overall, visibility was very good.

She reminds me a little bit of the Shannon Class lifeboat operated by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution in the UK (a vessel that I never actually had the chance to work on during my own time in the RNLI). And when a vessel resembles the profile of a SAR vessel, you know it was designed with seakeeping in mind rather than as an afterthought.

Accommodation

As you no doubt saw in the walkthrough video, she has 8 berths in four cabins. And yes, your guests might have to ‘rough it’ when it comes to sharing a bathroom, but at least they get to stay on board with six of their best mates.

Heating comes from a Kabola 14kW system, and although she isn’t fitted with air conditioning, she has plenty of windows for fresh air. If your guests enjoy long showers, her 800-litre freshwater capacity should be enough, though you can always top up the fresh water tanks thanks to her 60l/hr Robwink watermaker.

The rest of this article continues below in the premium section. After all, it is only thanks to my premium subscribers that I can cover the costs of travelling around and showcasing these boats for you, both on my YouTube channel and here in this newsletter. If you do become a premium subscriber, then thank you! I appreciate the support.

In the premium section below, I talk about the Builder, Aquanaut Yachting; how much it would cost to ship this boat over to North America, Service costs and service intervals on the engines; what I would be looking out for during a sea trial and pre-sea trial inspection; as well as what the boat’s range is, in nautical miles, as this is not covered in the spec sheet, what other Aquanauts are on the market and how they compare and then finally, my honest assessment of this boat including the listing broker’s details.

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Aquanaut Yachting

Aquanaut started in 1961, and since then they have not only been building boats but also refitting and maintaining them. This yard knows a lot about motor yachts. It was founded in Sneek by brothers Johan and Wim Bakker. Initially, they concentrated on yachts between 11 and 15 metres…[article continues below]

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Twelen is a 21.40-metre steel motor yacht, currently for sale through De Valk and viewable at their Monnickendam sales marina (link below), with one of the more interesting histories I’ve come across recently.

Built in 1979 at the Wisla shipyard in Gdansk, she began life as a sounding vessel for the German government. De Valk’s own listing states she’s been in private hands “for many years” since, and she’s currently on the market asking €149,500.

Personally, it is the first time I’ve come across a former European sounding vessel converted into a private cruiser which is one of the reasons why I wanted to feature her in this explorer yacht newsletter.

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The yard that built her

Stocznia Wisla Gdansk isn’t a name that trips off the tongue like some of the more famous Polish yards, but the pedigree is there. The yard traces back to the rebuilding of Poland’s shipbuilding industry after the Second World War, became a state enterprise in 1950, and was folded into Poland’s Union of Sea Ship Repair Yards in 1967.

Over its history, it has built more than 1,500 vessels, many reportedly still working today, spanning specialised research, inspection, rescue, military, and passenger vessels.

Gdansk is better known internationally for the shipyard forever linked with the Solidarity movement, but Wisla built its own quieter reputation across that broad range of purpose-built working vessels. Twelen carries that pedigree in her steel.

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What a sounding vessel actually does

I get asked some version of “what did she actually do” every time I feature an ex-working vessel, which is understandable.

Sounding vessels exist to measure water depth and map the seabed, a job that used to run through a simple echo-sounder and, on modern boats, increasingly means multibeam sonar. That data feeds nautical chart production, dredging surveys, cable and pipeline route planning and coastal engineering projects, work that keeps entire waterways navigable and safe for everyone else.

In practice, that would have had Twelen holding a steady course or sitting on station while onboard instruments took careful readings, nothing to do with speed and everything to do with being a stable, reliable, seaworthy and dependable platform.

That heritage explains a great deal about why she’s built the way she is.

What her lines tell you

A length-to-beam ratio of roughly 4.5 to 1 is notably slender for a vessel her size and the kind of proportions naval architects associate with an easily driven displacement hull.

Her bow carries a moderate rake and a fine entry, with the sheerline lifting gently as it runs forward. That shape typically helps keep a bow dry in a head sea.

Aft of the wheelhouse, freeboard drops away, and the working deck runs low and long all the way to a near-vertical transom.

The wheelhouse itself sits forward of amidships, leaving most of her waterline length as clear, useable deck. That layout would have suited handling survey gear over the stern in her working life, and today suits tenders, diving kit or simply extra space under an awning.

Below the waterline, her hull curves smoothly from keel to waterline rather than breaking at a hard chine. That round-bilged shape tends to reduce wave-making resistance at displacement speeds and give a gentler motion through the water.

The usual trade-off with a round bilge is a greater tendency to roll in a beam sea, and her small bilge keels are the standard way of damping that roll without sacrificing the efficiency the hull shape offers. A rubbing strake runs the full length of her topsides at deck level. That is practical protection for a boat that spent decades working alongside quays and other craft.

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The boat as she stands today

On paper, Twelen is 21.40 metres long with 4.81 metres of beam and a modest 1.50-metre draught, displacing 47 tonnes on a steel hull with an aluminium superstructure.

That shallow draught, combined with a mast that lowers electrically, points to a boat that can get into places a deeper, taller vessel can’t, and that matters for anyone weighing European canal cruising alongside coastal passages.

Power comes from twin Wola 53 ANM 59 H6AA diesels, 210hp apiece, driving through shafts to four-bladed fixed propellers, backed by a 25kVA Newage Stamford generator. Steering is hydraulic, with an inside helm position, and she was ashore in May 2025 for hull measurement, antifouling and hull painting, alongside fresh CVO certification.

Rockwool insulation and a Kabola KB45 central heating system, installed new in 2022, make her comfortable for a longer stay aboard.

For some buyers, she might be too ‘rugged looking’. But, for a buyer who understands the engineering that goes into these former commercial/worker vessels and who wants that engineering in their own explorer yacht platform, then the boat, along with her asking price, makes me think that she will not be on the market for long.

This article continues below in The Wardroom, the premium section of my newsletter. Thanks to my premium subscribers, I get to keep finding boats like Twelen and telling their stories.

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In the premium section below, I cover:

- Why her fresh CVO certification matters for a private buyer

- The Wola engines, and the specialist businesses still supporting them today

- Her three-tank fuel capacity, and what it means for real endurance

- Where €149,500 sits against the wider market for steel-built vessels of a similar scale

- Who I think Twelen suits, and her liveaboard credentials as she stands today

- The sensible additions that would sharpen her for full-time life aboard

Why her CVO certification matters…[article continues below]

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For years, the easy answer to “which Nordhavn should I look at first” for anyone thinking of travelling the world on their own Nordhavn explorer was the 41: smaller, manageable, ocean-capable, and a favourite among newcomers to the brand and the lifestyle.

That answer no longer exists. Pacific Asian Enterprises quietly ended production of the 41 and 51 on 28 July 2026, a story I covered in detail at the time, leaving a gap at the entry level of the range.

The Nordhavn 46 MK II enters that void, making it the smallest model Nordhavn has announced for production since the 41’s retirement. It is ideal for a buyer wanting an entry-level Nordhavn vessel for ocean crossings, especially one who was considering the now-retired 41.

The original Nordhavn 46 ran from 1989 to 2003, with 82 hulls built, and Nordhavn claims more of them have crossed oceans than any other production motoryacht in history.

The MK II is not just a refresh of that hull, but an entirely new design altogether and developed using computational fluid dynamics rather than the same tank testing the original relied on. Hull 1 is being built at South Coast’s yard in Kaohsiung, Taiwan.

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She measures 46’3” on deck, 44’7” on the waterline, has a 15’9.5” beam and a 4’9” draft, and displaces 57,498 lbs.

Where the original 46 was single-screw, the MK II runs twin Nanni N4.140 diesels at 135bhp each. The setup matters more than the horsepower suggests, because redundancy at sea is a different proposition to redundancy just a nautical mile or two off the coast.

I have lost count of how many times viewers on my YouTube channel comment on single-engine explorer yachts, citing their preference for two engines rather than one. So I am sure that the N46 MKII will resonate with many of the potential explorer yacht buyers who watch my YouTube channel.

Standard equipment runs close to something akin to a full options list: lithium-ion house bank, proportional thruster control, factory-fitted stabilisers, diesel heating, a full-size washer and dryer and air conditioning, all included rather than optioned.

Nordhavn says only a tender and a watermaker sit outside the standard specification.

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That watermaker exclusion is worth highlighting as the single most obvious liveaboard addition a buyer needs before any serious passage: cruising full-time without one means planning life around marina water, which is exactly the kind of constraint a liveaboard owner would want designed out early.

Pretty much everything else you would need from an entry-level (in terms of this range) explorer yacht can be found on this N46 MKII, and of course you are acquiring an exploration platform that comes from a builder who you can genuinely rely on.

Why do I say this? Well, you only have to look at the very tight-knit Nordhavn community to understand just how well loved this brand is. You do not get a community that close unless the owners in that community really love and trust their vessels.

When it comes to the N46 MKII, Nordhavn claims a range of around 3,000 nautical miles from 1,200 US gallons, up from the legacy 46’s tankage. As soon as the first MKII hits the water, more detailed information on the boat's range, fuel burn, etc. will no doubt become available. If you haven’t already, sign up for this newsletter for updates.

Freshwater capacity sits at 400 US gallons.

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Layout, per Nordhavn’s official general-arrangement drawing, is a forward master with a walk-around island berth and ensuite, and an amidships guest cabin with its own head, giving her two heads in total.

A sensible liveaboard addition, alongside the watermaker, is dedicated deep freeze capacity: standard fridge/freezer volume on a 46-footer built for two rarely stretches to weeks between provisioning runs.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”. Thanks to the premium subscribers of my newsletter, I can write about boats like this one, so if you are a premium subscriber, thank you!

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In the premium section below, I cover:

- The real cost of getting in early: what Nordhavn’s dated $1.65 million introductory price actually meant and how she compares against a Selene 49 currently asking $1.1448 million and a Kadey-Krogen 44 AE on paper

- What “sell the house, buy the boat” actually requires: an honest finance scenario, and the uncomfortable truth about which lenders might not finance a boat you intend to live aboard

- Servicing and running costs: the Nanni engine manufacturer’s own maintenance schedule, and what routine ownership actually looks like year to year

- A day aboard mid-Atlantic: what the watch-to-watch engine room and machinery routine on a boat like this actually involves, for anyone who has never lived this life before

- My honest assessment of where she sits in the market: whether the term “entry level Nordhavn” remains a worthwhile deal at this price.

Why $1.65 million does not tell the whole story

Nordhavn set a dated introductory price of $1.65 million for early N46 MKII hulls, a figure the yard itself has said would rise, starting at hull number six. It was an early-adopter price that moved upward as production continued, and by the time you read this it may have moved again…..[article continues below]

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If you’ve just watched the full tour video on my YouTube channel, you’ll already have a feel for her: that vertical, slightly flared bow rising into a sheer line that climbs gracefully all the way forward, the Midnight Blue hull against a crisp white superstructure, stainless sea railing running the full length of the upper deck.

She has the look of a pocket explorer yacht that is built to go somewhere, not just look good tied up in a marina.

We will also take a closer look at her liveaboard credentials. After all, she has the looks, but does she also have the capability?

Of course, she is the Steeler Explorer 50 Pilothouse. Launched in March 2024, and currently lying in Sneek in the Netherlands, listed with Sjoerd at De Valk, with an asking price of €1,749,000, VAT paid (broker’s details below)

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A Young Yard With Old Sea Legs

Steeler Yachts isn’t a name every reader will know, but if you live in Europe, there is a good chance you know the brand.

The yard was founded in 2010 by Hans Webbink, with two production sites at Steenwijk and Meppel in the Netherlands, both Dutch inland boatbuilding towns with generations of steel and aluminium fabrication behind them, even if Steeler itself is a relatively young company.

Steeler builds two distinct product lines. Aluminium hulls go into their faster, lighter, planing designs. Steel is reserved for boats like this one, the long-range, displacement Explorer series, where the extra weight of steel plating buys you strength, sound-deadening and offshore resilience.

Steel and aluminium are matched to what the boat is meant to do, not chosen on cost alone. Steeler putting steel under an “Explorer” badge tells you exactly what market they’re chasing with this design, and the rest of the spec sheet backs that up.

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Built Around Living, Not Just Cruising

Here’s what struck me most when I first stepped on board, before I even got my camera out: this is a 50-foot boat with only two cabins. Most builders in this size bracket would find a way to squeeze in a third berth to widen the resale pool.

Steeler didn’t, and the reason becomes obvious once you look at what they did instead.

Both cabins get their own en-suite heads. The galley runs a full suite of Miele appliances rather than a compromise version. Underfloor heating runs throughout, the best answer to the damp cold of a North Sea or North Atlantic winter rather than an afterthought. A Northern Lights 16kW generator, a high-output watermaker producing 120 litres an hour, and four 375-watt solar panels give her real independence at anchor, not the token single panel you sometimes see bolted onto a boat’s brochure to tick a ‘solar’ box.

Put together, that’s a boat designed for a couple who intend to live aboard for extended periods, generating their own power and making their own water, rather than a boat designed to entertain eight guests for a long weekend. It’s a different design brief, and Steeler committed to it fully rather than trying to be everything to everyone.

For someone like me, married with two young kids, then this Steeler would be perfect if I decided to leave my home port of London and head down to the Med.

When it comes to her power, she is fitted with twin Vetus Deutz engines (from the DT66 family, rated 170hp/125kW each) with only 744.8 hours on them since launch, giving a cruising speed of 7 knots, a top speed of 10 knots, and a quoted range of 2,000 nautical miles at around 12 litres an hour combined.

She also carries Humphree zero-speed stabilisers, a stabilisation system worth understanding in a bit more detail: unlike traditional fin stabilisers that only work while the boat is moving, zero-speed stabilisation actively counters roll while she’s sitting at anchor.

So, if you’ve ever tried to cook dinner or sleep on a boat rolling gently in a swell at anchor, you’ll know exactly what that’s worth. It’s the difference between a boat that’s comfortable underway and one that’s comfortable to actually live on when you decide to drop the hook for a few days.

Starlink Maritime rounds out the liveaboard picture, meaning great connectivity wherever she ends up, which matters more than it used to for anyone planning to work, bank, or simply stay in touch while living aboard full time.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”; the premium section of this newsletter. It is thanks to my premium subscribers that I am able to pay for the travel costs associated with filming these boats so if you do become a premium subscriber, or, already are one, then thank you!

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In the premium section, I cover:

- Engine maintenance costs: what the real Vetus service intervals are (not the 250-hour figure I originally assumed) and what a realistic annual bill looks like at her current hours

- Steel hull upkeep at two years old: what maintenance regime a near-new steel hull needs, and why “nothing’s gone wrong yet” isn’t the same as “nothing to do”

- CE Category A, properly explained: what the rating certifies and, just as importantly, what it doesn’t

- My honest assessment of shipping her to North America or Australia, and how her €1,749,000 asking price compares against a genuine same-builder sister-ship

What a Near-New Steel Hull Actually Needs

I think that there is always a temptation with a 2024-launch boat to assume the hull maintenance conversation can wait 3 or maybe 5 years down the line. In truth, it can’t, and it shouldn’t.

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A few years ago, I set up a public group for trawler, explorer and expedition yacht enthusiasts on Facebook. It now has over 45,000 members and often surfaces fantastic explorer yachts I haven’t come across before. Boats like M/S ‘Northwestern’.

This stunning vessel still looks like what she was built to do: 78 feet of Norwegian timber, built in 1982 at a yard shaping wooden and steel hulls since 1946 and currently sitting at Godøya, near Ålesund, asking 2,250,000 Norwegian kroner, roughly £172,000 to £175,000 at current exchange rates, a figure that will of course move a little with the market.

For that money you get a 78-foot vessel listed at 137,000kg with a genuine working pedigree, and not a finished product. She is a hull, an engine and a history, and what you do with that combination, should you choose to buy her, is completely up to you.

The yard that built her

Sletta Verft is not a name most of my subscribers will recognise, and that is precisely what makes her even more interesting. Founded in 1946 at Mjosundet, in Aure, the yard built its early reputation in timber, turning out wooden fishing boats for a demanding and relentless coastline, before expanding into steel construction and fishing vessels up to 90 feet. Never a hobbyist’s boatyard.

Northwestern was built there in 1982, registered under the category “Yrkesbåt/Sjark/Skøyte”, Norwegian shorthand for a genuine commercial coastal working vessel. This was never a private motorboat dressed up to look ‘salty’.

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Three names, one boat

Before I get into what she is now, it’s worth knowing where she has been. Vessel-tracking records show three names: Ole Elvan until December 2002, then Oksnes from October 2019, and Northwestern from March 2023. A neat postscript: a new aluminium fishing vessel also called Ole Elvan was delivered in March 2020 to a different operator, suggesting the old name was released for a replacement rather than simply abandoned, though I could not confirm the exact ownership chain behind that.

I am pretty sure my readers can fill in the gaps, so feel free to comment below if you know anything.

What her numbers actually mean

The listing records her weight at 137,000 kilograms, a figure easy to misread alongside her gross tonnage of 137, since the two happen to land close together despite measuring different things.

Weight is how heavy she is; gross tonnage measures enclosed volume. The coincidence doesn’t reflect any technical relationship, but it does suggest she is built solidly for her length and designed to work a coastline.

Her listing shows a 720hp Mitsubishi diesel inboard entry, driving her to a stated top speed of 11 knots. The engine count, shaft arrangement, and propeller configuration aren’t confirmed. What I can say is that 720hp and 11 knots, for a hull this size, points to an engine built for torque rather than speed, exactly what you’d expect from a boat built to move gear and catch, not people in a hurry.

When I share these articles on my socials, I often read comments which are left by people who point out that engines of this size on a boat with an LOA like this one seem ‘underpowered’. But it is all about torque rather than speed.

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How she is likely to handle at sea

Heavier displacement hulls of this general type often carry a reputation for a steadier, more load-carrying motion offshore than a lighter boat of similar length. But I don’t know Northwestern’s draught, hull form beneath the waterline, centre of gravity or whether she carries any stabilisation, and none of that is published anywhere I’ve found.

So her actual seakeeping remains unverified, something only a sea trial would confirm. But it is fair to say that she will be comfortable in anything up to a Force 8 (I have to point out here that my definition of ‘comfortable’, having served in both the Royal Navy and RNLI, is very different to what most other people class as ‘comfortable’).

Is she ready to go exploring today? This is the question I suspect most readers would like to know the answer to.

I found no suggestion that she is unseaworthy, and equally none that she has been surveyed, refitted, or converted for private cruising use. An advertised top speed alone doesn’t establish range, seaworthiness or ocean capability.

The FINN listing includes a full specification table and nothing else: no description, no condition report, no engine hours, no history of recent yard work. Her passage capability stays open rather than settled. The romance is obvious. The passage plan would have to wait for the paperwork.

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That extends to her range too.

A boat this size, built for coastal fishing work, would typically need serious fuel and water capacity, the kind of numbers that would normally headline a listing like this. Neither figure is published, in litres or US gallons, and I haven’t been able to source them independently.

A survey would be the natural starting point for establishing tank condition and capacity, though tank plans or calibration records may also be needed. Despite the gaps in the information I could find, I am sure you no doubt can see why I still wanted to feature this boat in this newsletter.

She is, by all accounts, a very rare find or certainly not a pedigree that I come across that often. I will leave the broker’s details below so anyone interested can contact them directly.

For me, just her lines and naval architecture are worth featuring, because she has all of the hallmarks of boats which I know my readership and indeed my followers will love. Plus, we all love a good conversion project, and I think this boat would suit a buyer looking to turn a project into a dream.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”, the premium section of my newsletter. Thanks to my premium subscribers, I can write about and film explorer yachts.

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In the premium section below, I cover:

- Her machinery and what remains unknown about it: what a 720hp Mitsubishi entry does and does not tell us about her running condition

- Who she actually suits: the realistic owner profile for a boat like this, not the aspirational one

- Can a couple run her alone?: the honest realities of manning a heavy, ex-commercial vessel of this size

- Her liveaboard reality and what she needs: current configuration versus sensible upgrades

- My honest assessment of the £172k price tag: what that money buys, and what it does not

Her machinery and what remains unknown about it…[article continues below]

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On 28 July 2026, Pacific Asian Enterprises (PAE) quietly ended production of two of its most popular models. No farewell fanfare, no final edition hull, just a short statement confirming that the very popular Nordhavn 41 and Nordhavn 51 were finished.

54 boats in total (44 of the N41 and 10 of the N51), built over six years at a yard called Telgeren & Partners in Istanbul. The moulds are being destroyed, which in Nordhavn’s world has always meant permanent as opposed to paused. Later in this article, I will cover why they are probably being destroyed rather than being shipped elsewhere.

When I first started researching this story a few weeks ago (I have just returned from a five-day filming trip, so I am running a bit behind schedule), I honestly thought that the moulds would be preserved. I can imagine how many potential buyers out there will be gutted that they aren’t. The 41 was an amazing ‘entry’ model for people who were thinking of selling up and moving to an explorer’s life on the water.

I’ve spent a lot of time following this brand (even though I never get access to these boats in Europe), and, to be frank, my first reaction was the same as most people who love these boats: what went wrong with them? In truth, nothing did.

That’s actually the strange, slightly unsettling heart of this story.

PAE president Dan Streech said the 41 and 51 “were just hitting their stride” and are “going out on top.” He went further, by adding that the most recent hulls off that Istanbul line were among the finest boats ever to carry the Nordhavn name.

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So if it wasn’t the boats, what was it?

The official explanation (from PAE) is that Turkey’s persistent high inflation, combined with a government-managed lira, made production costs too unpredictable to plan around. That’s a fair summary, but in my humble opinion, it undersells just how brutal the underlying mechanics actually were, and I think that mechanism is worth understanding in a bit more detail, because it’s the part of this story almost nobody in the explorer yacht community has actually explained.

Here’s the part that doesn’t always get said out loud in the trade press coverage that I found: this wasn’t a clean or pre-planned retirement of a model. We all know just how popular the 41 and 51 were.

When Telgeren’s finances buckled under the macroeconomic strain they had to endure, there were still around ten boats on the books under fixed-price retail contracts.

So, real deposits, real buyers, and boats mid-build.

That’s the moment many manufacturing partnerships fall apart in ways that leave customers exposed. It’s not what happened here, and that detail deserves far more attention than it’s had so far.

When a boatyard faces a difficult situation caused by factors beyond its control, it’s often the client who ends up having to pick up the tab, so to speak. I have seen this happen to contacts I have built relationships with over the last 7 years, who started their dream build project, only to be shafted by a shipyard that wanted to preserve as much capital as possible.

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But Nordhavn is no ordinary company. They genuinely care about not only their existing clients, but their ‘soon-to-be-clients’ as well. Below, you will understand the chain of events which unfolded and the decisions which Nordhavn perhaps did not have to make, but made anyway because they wanted to and not because they were forced to.

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This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”. My premium subscribers make this newsletter and my YouTube channel possible, so if you are a premium subscriber, thank you!

In the premium section below, I cover:

- The brutal currency mechanism that actually killed the programme: why a fixed-price contract becomes a slow-motion trap when your costs are in one currency, and your revenue is locked in another

- What PAE actually did for the ten contracted buyers: the specific commitment behind “nobody lost a deposit,” and why that’s a genuinely rare response in this industry

- What happens to Telgeren, and to existing 41/51 owners needing parts or warranty support: two separate support commitments now in place

- My honest assessment of what a displaced buyer faces today: real historical and current pricing, and what the current Nordhavn range does and doesn’t offer someone who wanted exactly this boat

- Why owning a N41 or N51 could now be an investment: Why an N41 or N51 owner might have inadvertently acquired an investment rather than a depreciating asset.

Why a fixed-price contract can sometimes turn into a trap…[article continues below]

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Most of what pops up on my radar, as I search for explorer yachts to write about, was built to look the part of a long-range explorer yacht. But this vessel, called ‘ALK ‘, excels beyond what you would typically find on an explorer yacht. This is because ‘ALK’ was originally launched as an oceanography vessel.

Built in 1966 by Hitzler Werft in Germany as the research cutter ‘Alkor’, she spent the next 24 years supporting German oceanographic science, logging a whopping 326,000 nautical miles and carrying an estimated 30,000 scientists out into the Baltic and North Sea. GEOMAR, the Kiel-based research institute, operated her for most of her working life.

With her steel hull at just over 30 metres LOA and her unmistakable working vessel lines, she has lived at least two private lives since leaving research service.

According to the broker’s website (detailed below), she was first converted into a pleasure yacht and then later into a submarine-support platform (hence her huge A-frame on her stern).

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In fact, that A-frame is certified up to 8 tonnes, which, when combined with her integrated dive centre, gives you just some idea of how unique a proposition this boat represents for a buyer who does not just want to explore above the water, but below it too.

In reality, she has the form and function of what you might call a true mothership. You can just imagine disappearing beneath the waves as you explore a world that very few people get to see.

At the time of writing, this incredible explorer is listed for sale for €450,000 and is currently lying in Ireland.

She is powered by a single 425hp Deutz diesel driving a variable-pitch propeller, giving her a top speed of around 12 knots. Her cruising speed is cited at 9.5 knots, with a range of around 4,000 nautical miles, so she sits at the upper end of displacement speeds. She burns around 60 litres per hour at cruising speed.

It follows a similar philosophy to the one behind [another steel Dutch cruiser I featured recently](https://newsletter.yacht-buoy.com/p/the-235000-noorderlicht-50-spiegelkotter), where range mattered more than speed.

In 2023, she underwent a substantial yard period, with keel, hull, and propulsion work. For a hull that was launched in 1966, this is very much meaningful work, rather than just routine ‘bare bones’ maintenance.

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As for her accommodation, she can accommodate 13 people on board, including crew. The exact crew/guest configuration isn’t noted, which suggests the crew and guest accommodation may be similar. Remember, although this boat is now offered as a private explorer yacht, she has not been refitted out as a luxury explorer.

If you are thinking about acquiring this boat and want my input regarding where best to get any work done on her, then feel free to reach out. I have fantastic contacts at some of the best yards in Europe and North America.

As it stands, anyone picturing her as a 13-berth luxury explorer yacht should hold that thought loosely until they visit her in person. Since she is only in Ireland, about a 60-minute flight from where I live, I might even head out and film a yacht tour video for my channel.

If the owner, or their representative, reads this article, please feel free to reach out if you would like me to head over to Ireland to film her.

For me, ALK offers real capability and genuine all-weather pedigree. The style and comfort are something you would still need to build in, assuming, of course, that you wanted to upgrade the accommodation and living areas.

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I have got to know explorer yacht owners who are quite happy “roughing it” so long as the boat can take them where they want to go without having to worry about avoiding bad weather fronts (usually, it’s their wife who ends up demanding an ‘upgrade’ when it comes to living on board).

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”. My paying subscribers not only make this publication possible, but also cover the travel costs I incur when I feature boats on my YouTube channel. For less than the price of your average light lunch, you can become a premium subscriber.

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In the premium section, I cover:

- The submarine on offer: what a submarine of this type actually lets you do at 300 metres, and why it is not included in the asking price

- Why the market prices her the way it does: a sourced comparison against two similar ex-research conversions, one lower-priced, one considerably dearer

- What “up to 13 aboard” really means: what would need to change for a liveaboard-ready layout

- My honest assessment of the €450,000 asking price: what you are paying for, and what you would still need to spend

The submarine on offer…[article continues below]

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Over the years, I have featured hundreds of explorer and trawler yachts on my YouTube channel. Salvator is one of those boats that make the case for herself the minute you board her.

Westvlaamse Scheepwerven NV built her in 1961 in Oostkamp, Belgium, as a steel fishing trawler. She was designed to take on some of the harshest conditions the unforgiving North Sea could throw at her. Fishermen do not have the luxury of deciding not to go to sea when the storm sets in; their livelihoods depend on capable vessels that can withstand some of the toughest conditions.

Salvator is just under 25 metres long, displaces 130 tonnes, and has an S-bilged hull with bilge keels below the waterline. She has a steady and predictable motion when battling through big waves. This predictable motion was vital for her former fishing crews, who needed to anticipate what to hold and for how long when a rogue wave found them in the middle of the night during a winter storm.

An S-bilger hull, sometimes called an ‘S-spant’ in European naval architecture or sometimes referred to as the classic wineglass hull, is a displacement hull form that is built around a continuous compound S-curved cross-section

Rather than breaking sharply from the topsides to the bottom at an angular chine, or meeting a separate keel abruptly, the steel hull plating curves convexly around the turn of the bilge and then reverses into a concave, hollow sweep down into a deep, integrated keel.

Before we carry on, if you have not watched my YouTube video yet, then here it is (remember to come back to this article once you have watched the video!):

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As a result, you get a hull with no hard angles, an organic keel that emerges from the hull structure rather than being welded on, and a deep central V-shaped sump low inside the hull.

Traditional and ocean-going trawlers working the North Sea, North Atlantic and Baltic have long favoured an S-bilge hull for a number of different reasons. The softer stability means the boat tends to yield gently to passing waves rather than snap back like a hard-chine hull might. This helps to prevent fatigue on deck.

The deep hollow section low in the hull allows the engine(s), generators, ballast, fish hold and fuel bunkers to sit very low, which in turn keeps the centre of gravity down, and thus the vessel’s inherent stability is very good in very rough weather.

The long, deep keel also ensures excellent course-keeping under trawling loads, and the boat resists leeway motion when heavy gear is deployed off the stern. The curved surfaces of the hull also allow the energy of the waves to be spread out evenly through the framing of the hull, rather than concentrating the energy on the sharp chines which would, in turn, lead to a more abrupt movement in heavy seas. This also helps keep fuel burn lower on long passages, as the engine does not have to make up for loss of motion.

In comparison, a hard-chine displacement hull has stiffer initial stability, a much sharper and more noticeable snap roll, a wider flat floor with a shallower bridge, and slightly higher resistance at lower speeds. Hard-chine hull boats usually need larger skegs or rudders to match the tracking of a boat that has an S-bilge hull.

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Boats with a hard chine hull are also simpler and cheaper to build because flat-sheet welding or moulding is more straightforward than the compound-curve plate rolling and framing that an S-bilge demands. This is why the ‘wineglass’ hull has stayed a hallmark of serious, purpose-built working boats.

Why trawlers make such good bones for an explorer yacht

In part, the answer lies in the fact that most of the really expensive parts already exist. Commercial trawler hulls were built to a completely different standard to leisure motor yachts of the same era. A builder knew that if their vessels did not keep crews safe, then the tight-knit fishing communities would never forgive them.

Of course, no fishing trawler is unsinkable. But no builder would want to face a scenario in which their boat capsizes in a ‘normal’ sea state. Human error, especially when working 24+ hour shifts, does and can happen. But crews trust their vessels because they trust the designers and builders who put them together.

Owners who take on these projects understand this design-and-build philosophy and trust it to take them and their families to parts of the world few other private motorboats can reach.

Her tank capacity includes 20,000 litres of fuel, plus a 450-litre day tank and around 10,000 litres of fresh water.

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At 7 knots, she burns around 25 litres an hour, giving her a range of around 5,000 NM, which, for a boat of her size, is very impressive.

When you head down into the engine room, her machinery sits in a keel-cooled space with a dry exhaust, an installation a commercial surveyor would instantly recognise and appreciate.

The machinery Salvator still carries

Her main engine is an ABC 6MDX, rated at 250hp (184kW), installed in 1961. It drives a large 1,600mm four-bladed prop via a Brevo 3510 hydraulic gearbox and starts on compressed air rather than a conventional start battery.

Anglo Belgian Corporation (ABC) is still trading, and its current spare parts programme confirms that around 99% of certified parts for its DX, DZC and VDZC series are available, with support guaranteed for over 25 years.

Gardec, an authorised ABC Service agent, lists servicing and overhaul work on 6MDX engines as part of its offering. Whether every individual part for Salvator’s engine remains available today is unclear, but a manufacturer still supporting its older families puts a 65-year-old diesel in a very strong position.

Salvator carries twin generators, comprising a 20kVA Stamford unit and a 15kVA Lister Petter Stamford, backed by 1,760Wp of solar through a Victron MPPT controller and Quattro inverter/charger. Heating comes from an ACV/Elco system, supplemented by a pellet stove and four solar panels.

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On her deck, she has a hydraulic windlass, capstan, deck crane, and removable davits.

When you combine this extremely reliable main propulsion with her impressive redundant off-grid power generation and heavy-duty deck gear, it is clear that Salvator's systems are not just a nod to her past; they are the solid foundation of her capability as a true go-anywhere explorer.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”

Thanks to my premium subscribers, I can self-fund the trips I make to film boats like Salvator. Without them, none of this would be possible, which is why the article continues below. In the premium section, I cover:

- The real cost of keeping her engine in place: what the evidence actually supports about repower costs at this scale, and how to think about the maths of overhaul versus replacement

- What a full conversion budget looks like: editorial planning ranges for taking a hull like Salvator’s from working trawler to a functional or yacht-standard explorer, and where the money mostly goes

- Where to actually find a boat like this: the ports and fleets where sound ex-commercial hulls still surface, and what to check before you buy one

- My honest assessment of why she could be harder to sell than you’d think: the narrow buyer pool for bespoke trawler conversions, and what the current market spread actually shows

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Keeping the original engine is one saving among many costs...

Typical benchmarks for repowering a 150 to 300hp diesel come in around the tens of thousands of dollars/euros mark. This normally applies to boats in the 30 to 45 foot range. Salvator is 82 feet, and a comprehensive repower on a vessel her size (replacing the engine, gearbox, shaft line, exhaust and controls would sit well above that figure.

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Somebody always asks it after the third pint at the yacht club, or in the comments under a YouTube video of a boat with the curtains drawn and a light on inside. Does living on a boat in the UK cost less than renting a flat, or is that just something boaters tell themselves? The answer needs numbers, not a feeling, so here they are.

The quick answer? Sometimes, and it depends almost entirely on three things:

whether you own the boat outright or are financing it, where you are legally allowed to moor her, and whether you have set aside real money for maintenance rather than hoping for the best.

Get all three right and living aboard can beat renting by a real margin. Get any one wrong, and it can cost more than the flat you were trying to avoid.

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What renting in the UK costs right now

The Office for National Statistics puts the average UK private rent at £1,388 a month as of June 2026 (a provisional, UK-wide figure across all property sizes, not a one-bedroom-specific number). That is the baseline figure I will compare both boat scenarios against.

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Scenario one: the inland narrowboat

Narrowboats are a classic UK entry point into liveaboard life, partly because purchase prices can sit well below a coastal boat’s equivalent. Aqueduct Marina’s brokerage listings have shown a 59ft narrowboat at £89,995 and a 60ft boat marketed as “Ideal Liveaboard” at £179,995.

Under a standard Canal & River Trust licence, without a home mooring, boats must generally move every 14 days unless exempt, and a valid Boat Safety Scheme certificate or exemption is required. Continuous cruising is a genuine lifestyle and not a loophole for free permanent parking.

For a fixed mooring instead, Cambridge City Council’s published 2026/27 residential fees range from £1,356 to £1,992 a year, roughly £113 to £166 a month, though the waiting list is currently closed, so treat the fee as a benchmark, not guaranteed availability.

Insurance is comparatively gentle: Craftinsure’s narrowboat customers pay an average of £291 a year (roughly £24/month), including liveaboard cover.

Mooring and insurance together come to roughly £137 to £190 a month, well below the rent baseline on that subtotal alone. That excludes licence fees, fuel, heating, utilities and any maintenance reserve, so treat it as a floor, not a total.

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Scenario two: the coastal motor cruiser

This scenario perhaps matters more to my subscribers, since it is closer to coastal liveaboard life than a canal.

A modest coastal cruiser in the Fairline Turbo 36 class, roughly 12m LOA, has recently been listed at prices including £45,000 and £64,950. As a simple capital-allocation illustration, not depreciation or a finance quote, spreading that over 10 years works out to roughly £375 to £541 a month.

Berth cost is where location does the talking.

Falmouth Harbour’s 2026 rate for a 10m berth is £653/month, plus a 10% liveaboard surcharge, taking it to roughly £718/month, and Falmouth currently is not accepting liveaboard applications at all. On the Solent, Hamble Point’s 2025/26 rate for a 12.5m berth works out to roughly £1,189/month, still below the £1,388 baseline by around £200, before a boat, insurance or maintenance are added.

Head to Essex Waterways, my home county, and 2026 long-term rates run £14.97 to £22.05 per metre/month, so a 10m Premium Plus berth comes in at roughly £220.50/month, a very different proposition.

The legal reality nobody mentions

A liveaboard mooring licence is not a tenancy. Bristol City Council’s terms state the licence confers no property rights and requires marine insurance and a valid Boat Safety Scheme certificate. Council tax can also apply: GOV.UK guidance confirms a mooring used as a sole or main residence can be treated as domestic property for council tax, depending on the local authority’s valuation.

What determines whether it costs less

1. Ownership structure. A boat owned outright removes the biggest cost variable here. Finance changes the sums considerably, and a full comparison needs an actual quote, not the simple capital-allocation maths used above.

2. Where you legally moor. The gap between Essex Waterways at roughly £220/month and Hamble Point at roughly £1,189/month, for boats of similar size, is the clearest single number in this piece.

3. Whether you have budgeted for maintenance. The commonly quoted 10%-of-value annual rule is an informal guideline circulated in boating media, and not really an industry standard, and actual costs vary widely.

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This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”

In the premium section below, I cover:

- The full itemised cost model both ways: every line item I can source, inland and coastal, set against the £1,388 rent baseline

- What licences and insurers ask for: BSS, mooring terms and the paperwork that catches people out

- The maintenance reserve, built correctly: how to work out a realistic number rather than relying on the 10% rule alone

- My honest assessment: when it genuinely beats renting, and when it does not

The itemised cost model..

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There is a certain type of capable explorer yacht (or ‘boat’ depending on your own interpretation of where ‘boat’ meets ‘yacht’) that gets built as a one-off because a visionary owner knows exactly what they need and, more importantly, what they do not need.

When a buyer finds a yard that understands this no-nonsense capability over luxury brief, then you get a very capable boat that has none of the usual “luxury” of a high-end motor yacht, but instead, all of the capability of a commercial vessel that is designed to be operated 365 days a year, in all weather types.

According to the register for Gladding-Hearn, a Somerset, Massachusetts yard that was established in 1955, hull number 34 of their build run was delivered in 1958 as a 39-foot vessel called ‘Pilgrim’, built for John Austin.

The same register notes that she is “now Redoubt”, the boat that I am going to feature in this article, and that is currently listed for sale for $147,000 and lying in Juneau, Alaska.

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When I shared some pictures of Redoubt on my socials in order to let my 300,000 combined social media followers know about the boat that would be featured in my next article, a follower sent me a picture of what appears to be a 1950s feature written about ‘Pilgrim’in Yachting magazine.

The piece described her design brief, her original specifications, and her builder in great detail. It never ceases to amaze me when it comes to the collective knowledge of my social media followers, as this is something that my own research did not surface.

I am always humbled when I read the comments on my posts and realise that former owners, captains, designers (and their family members) are fed my content by an algorithm that seems to already know their connection to a boat that I am featuring, even if that connection happened decades ago.

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What the Magazine Feature Describes

If the text in the image above is hard to read, the feature describes John Austin as a former comms officer whose brief to the yard was to build a no-nonsense boat that could head out to sea and stay there regardless of the season, wind or sea state. He was not bothered about a boat that could reach in excess of 20 knots. He was not in a rush, and did not want to have to worry about avoiding bad weather fronts that would keep most other boats tied up alongside.

The piece describes a double chine hull with a deep profile, a high flaring bow, slack bilges, considerable deadrise and a cruiser stern divided into five watertight compartments partitioned by four bulkheads.

For those who might be unfamiliar with the term, ‘slack bilges’ describes a hull geometry where the turn from the bottom to the topsides of the hull is a gentle, rounded curve rather than a sharp, hard angle.

Although a hard-chined hull offers good levels of stability when the boat is stationary, it can produce a harsh, almost snappy motion in large swells. So, slack bilges trade off that initial stiffness for ‘seakindliness’ offshore, allowing the hull to roll softly and more predictably in heavy sea states rather than fighting them.

Mr Austin clearly understood what it took to keep a boat at sea without having to worry too much about whether or not the boat was up to the challenge of gnarly weather.

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The piece also gives an original engine spec of 125HP, a Cummins diesel and a displacement of 42,500lb. It goes on to describe an unusually elaborate electrical spec for a private motor boat of that era in the form of an Onan 110/220-volt AC alternator run off the main engine, a Petter diesel auxiliary, Formsprang automatic clutches and five separate electrical systems covering starting, the main engine, lighting, AC appliances and the galley.

The original tankage is stated as 2x600 gallon fuel tanks and 2x150 gallon stainless steel water tanks. The original sleeping arrangement comprised seven berths, three in the owner’s cabin aft and four forward in the forecastle. When the feature was published, she was reported as “currently bound south”, suggesting that perhaps she had recently left New England on an early delivery passage.

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Pilgrim becomes Redoubt

What happened to this capable steel coastal explorer in the decades between her delivery in 1958 and her current listing status in Juneau is not something the available material that I could find documents.

The register gives her original length as 39 feet, whereas the current listing describes her length as 42 feet. A 3ft difference on a 1950s hull is usually a matter of documentation rather than being related to an actual structural alteration.

When ‘Pilgrim’ was originally entered into the yard’s register, length was often recorded as ‘Registered Length’ or ‘Length on deck’ and strictly measured the hull itself.

Today, most brokerage listings usually use ‘LOA’, which includes everything from the anchor pulpit or bowsprit to any swim platforms, etc.

The current fuel and water capacity (1,000 gallons and 270 gallons, respectively) is actually lower than the 1,200 gallons and 300 gallons in the original spec information. This could mean that her tankage was reconfigured at some point. But also, this loss of volume is a standard occurrence on vintage steel boats. As the original integrated tanks sometimes corrode over time, owners often install slightly smaller replacement tanks depending on their cruising requirements.

The current accommodation is advertised as 7 to 9 across two cabins as well as a convertible dinette.

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What Redoubt Offers Today

As per her current listing, Redoubt runs a single 175HP Cummins HR6M through a twin-disc MG509 gearbox. She has a dry exhaust, keel cooling and centrifuge oil cleaning. Since 2016, her engine has notched up 2,192 hours.

For readers who might be unfamiliar with commercial engine room specs, a centrifugal oil cleaner is a huge upgrade over the standard spin-on filters found in the bellies of most recreational craft.

By using engine oil pressure to spin a rotor at extremely high velocities, the device generates centrifugal forces that strip out microscopic soot and abrasive wear materials to literally a single micron.

This process prevents sludge, or dirty oil, from continuously looping through the bearings and cylinder liners, which in turn reduces internal wear and helps to preserve the mechanical integrity of the engine block. It is a very smart device to have installed.

The listing states a 7-knot cruising speed with a fuel burn of around 4 gallons per hour and a range of around 1,000 NM. When you run the numbers, you get a theoretical range of 1,750 NM before reserve and assuming normal load and conditions.

Beyond the equipment in her machinery spaces, the remainder of her equipment list reads exactly as a high-latitude explorer yacht should. The inclusion of hydronic heating and a Northern Light 6kW generator means that she can accommodate an owner who wants a four-season liveaboard platform.

Above deck, the walk-around deck allows safe line handling even in a seaway, whilst the pot puller, steel dinghy davit and Warn deck crane reflect her utilitarian priorities.

You might not be familiar with ‘Hydronic heating’, but it is a highly efficient climate-control system that uses a dedicated diesel boiler to heat a closed loop of recirculating water. The water is pumped through insulated lines to radiators of fan-matrix units, so you get dry heat to all zones without the big electrical load that a reverse-cycle AC unit needs.

I also love the fact that this boat has a pot puller, not because I like seafood; I actually cannot stomach eating anything that lives in the sea as it makes me want to heave, but it transforms the boat into a self-sufficient cruiser that is capable of harvesting its own food in remote anchorages.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”, as it’s my premium subscribers who enable me to keep this newsletter independent and advert-free. My premium Subscribers also enable me to travel around filming boats, which I think my audience will find interesting.

So, if you do become a premium subscriber, or are one already, then ‘thank you’

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In the premium section below, I cover:

- What a nearly 70-year-old steel hull needs: ultrasonic thickness measurement, what it involves, and what a survey can and, perhaps more importantly, cannot tell you

- The engine and tankage questions worth finding out more about: a closer look at the horsepower difference and the current tank capacity

- The insurance conversation for older steel: what survey documentation insurers typically ask for

- My honest opinion of $147,00: what can and cannot be said about value without a survey and comparable listings in hand

What a 70-Year-Old Steel Hull Often Needs

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There is a particular kind of very special Dutch boat that I keep coming back to time and time again. It is the Vlet: low-profile, workmanlike, steel-hulled, and built by skilled craftsmen who needed a sturdy boat that could navigate seamlessly on Dutch inland waterways without grounding or clipping a bridge.

M/Y ‘Timeless’ is one of those boats and I have just featured her on my YouTube channel. She is a Klaassenvlet 13.60, built in 1991 by Klaassen in Voorschoten, and she is currently listed for sale in Drimmelen for €149,500. During filming, she was on the hard and was coming to the end of an extensive maintenance cycle.

I think it says a lot about an owner when, despite being on the market, they invest thousands of euros in their boat, even though they will soon no longer be the owner who will benefit from the upgrades.

At 13.60 metres long with a 4 metre beam, she carries a steel hull and steel construction throughout. She is finished with a teak deck and teak interior joinery. She has a draft of just 1.25 metres with an air draft of 2.85 metres.

Those two important numbers are really what is behind the whole design philosophy of a Vlet, and I will come back to them later in the article, as they matter a great deal more than they might look on the spec sheet.

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For the last 25 years, she has had the same owner and has spent every winter of that ownership stored indoors rather than being left exposed to the elements. That is the sort of detail that tells you quite a bit about a boat’s condition but also about the levels of care that went into her whilst under the stewardship of her current owner.

Indoor winter storage for 25 years is not something an indifferent owner bothers arranging. This is a vessel that has been incredibly well looked after, and I do not doubt that her current owner will be sad to see her go.

As you would expect, the maintenance record backs it up. This year alone (2026) she has had her brightwork stripped and relacquered, her hull paint gone over and inspected, a new wiring loom fitted, a full service carried out on her MAN engine and a new service battery pack installed as well. Whilst not glamorous, this work is the sort of attention to detail that keeps a 35-year-old steel boat in fantastic condition.

Power comes from her single MAN diesel that produces 113 horsepower (83kW), driving through a Twin Disc transmission that gives her a speed of 8 knots. This speed with 113 HP on a 20,000 kg steel hull is a canal cruising set-up by design, matched to a hull form (roundspant, or round bilge in English) built for efficient and comfortable displacement cruising.

Fuel capacity comes in at 1,300 litres, with an impressive fresh water capacity of 1,200 litres. Below decks, she sleeps four people across two cabins.

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Klaassen built her in Voorschoten, which is a small town between Leiden and the Hague that has been producing high-quality Dutch inland and coastal craft for generations. The Vlet is a traditional Dutch working-boat form, built shallow and low so that it could move people and goods through an intricate canal network that is defined by its low bridges and shallow water.

That shallow draft and low air draft are a big part of what makes this boat very interesting for buyers who want to explore inland waterways rather than heading off across the Atlantic. Having said that, there are plenty of inland cruising waterways outside of Europe that would make a perfect home for this boat.

And the cost of shipping her to both North America and Australia (chosen because anywhere in between Europe and Australia can be judged by shipping cost, as Australia has been accounted for) works out to be less than you might think.

This article continues below in the “The Wardroom” as it is thanks to my premium subscribers that I can fund the trips necessary to feature boats like this one on my YouTube channel. So, if you are a premium subscriber, or indeed you become one, then I would like to say a massive ‘thank you!’

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In the premium section below, I cover:

• What it could realistically cost to transport her to her new home: realistic budgeting ranges for shipping Timeless to North America and to Australia and how those figures compare with her current asking price.

• Where a boat like this actually belongs outside of her native European cruising grounds: the specific shallow, low-bridge inland waterways in the US and Australia that could suit her draught and air draft and why it matters for resale.

• What she costs to run once she is there: a full annual ownership budget built from Dutch inland-cruising benchmarks with a note on where American and Australian costs are likely to differ.

• An honest assessment of the current asking price: what a single-owner, indoor-wintered steel Vlet with a 2026 refit is worth against that backdrop and where she sits in the current market.

Thinking of shipping her to North America or Australia? This is how much that would cost.

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Each day, I check dozens of websites and listings to see what is currently on the market or what has appeared that I might have missed. Whenever I see a boat with the commercial lines that I fell in love with as a kid, my instinct is always to take a detailed look at the boat in question and what she offers for her asking price.

When I saw this steel-hulled Pilot 50, I immediately recognised her lines. If you are already familiar with Dutch coastal explorer-type motor yachts, then you too might also recognise this boat (I recently featured an aluminium-hulled version on my channel, which you can watch by clicking HERE).

For readers who might not already know, pilot boats are the vessels that go out in weather and sea states that 99% of other boaters want to venture out into. An incoming ship needs a harbour pilot, regardless of how big the waves are. Pilot boat crews are incredibly brave when it comes to the conditions in which they have to venture out. The economies of many nations rely on them being able to do their jobs.

If you want to see a pilot boat up close and personal, I also have a video on my YouTube channel that features a boat tour aboard a brand new SafeHaven Pilot Boat that you can watch by clicking HERE.

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Pilot boats often have a high freeboard and a pronounced bow flare, both design features refined over generations of pilotage services. They help a boat stay drier and, more importantly, more stable when embarking and disembarking a pilot on and off ships coming into or leaving port. During my time in the Royal Navy, we would often embark pilots when entering certain harbours around the world.

When you first see the Pilot 50 that is featured in this article, someone who is not familiar with this particular model might indeed ask whether she has any commercial pilotage history, or whether the look has inspired her.

In the case of this boat, being a Willem Nieland design, her lines are indeed inspired by workboats. She is not a conversion; instead, she is a purpose-built private motor yacht, so if you have been looking for a boat that resembles a pilot boat, then this could be a perfect option.

She was built in 1998 by VDL Shipyard, and she is currently listed for sale for €349,000, VAT paid, lying in the Netherlands (broker details below).

The reason why commercial pilot boats look the way they do, although there are many variations, is not down to aesthetic preferences. Raked, flared bows and generous forward freeboards help a boat to stay drier during inclement weather conditions.

So, the same benefits would apply to a private owner of a boat that has similar lines to that of a commercial, or working, pilot vessel. After all, if you do not mind the motion of heading out to sea during rough weather, then why not enjoy it with the peace of mind that comes with knowing that the hull beneath you was specifically designed to operate in the conditions in which you find yourself.

As well as the wonderful lines, this gnarly weather operation is exactly what this boat was designed to endure. She is 14.99 metres LOA, 4.82 metres in beam and has a draft of 1.45 metres. Her hull is steel, with a multi-chine configuration, and she has a displacement of 32 tonnes.

This is a serious amount of steel, and it shows in the way the hull carries its lines aft rather than pinching them in for outright speed.

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Above the waterline, she emanates a completely different aesthetic. And this is where the “purpose-built motor yacht” half of the story takes over. She has central heating, air conditioning, a lush mahogany interior, hydraulic steering and an inside helm position for all-weather comfort.

You have probably already noticed the array of solar panels scattered across her coach roof (ten in total). She has two cabins, with a total of four berths, which is modest for a boat of this size, but remember, these are no production run vessels. Each one is built according to the demands and needs of the buyer.

Down in the engine bay, the beating heart(s) of this boat still carry the pilot boat DNA or, at the very least, comparison. She has Twin Volvo Penta TAMD73 EDC diesels (400 hp each) with 6,800 engine hours logged. In terms of fuel capacity, she can carry 4,000 litres of diesel.

The rest of the spec sheets tell a familiar story for this genre of boat; A Fishcer Panda generator and a Mastervolt Mass Combi 24/4000-120 charger-inverter give her the electrical capacity to run her AC and full galley away from shore power.

Add the ten Sunwave solar panels into the mix, and you have a boat that is designed to spend extended periods of time away from busy marinas. She has enough capacity for 1,250 litres of fresh water and can carry 500 litres of blackwater (in stainless steel tanks).

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This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”. It is thanks to my premium subscribers that I can write about and film the boats I feature, as I do not earn any money from advertisers or sponsors, which means I can stay 100% independent.

In the premium section, I cover:

- Fuel burn and realistic range: my assessment of fuel burn and range, taken from the published fuel capacity and engine specification.

- What 6,800 hours means for these particular engines: what a survey should establish before anyone can say whether that number is a concern

- Steel hull maintenance at 28 years old: what ongoing upkeep on a hull like this one actually involves, and what questions I would ask before moving forward

- My honest assessment of €349,000: how she compares against other high-quality Dutch steel motor yachts of similar size and age currently on the market

What 6,800 Hours on a Volvo Penta TAMD73 Means…[article continues below]

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M/Y ‘Jezebelle’ offers a staggering entry price into the heavy-displacement market. We break down her commercial Gulf Coast pedigree, the exact yard budget required to finish her, and whether the final numbers actually make financial sense.

Over the weekend, I happened to stumble over another boat that currently fits somewhere between two explorer-yacht worlds. This boat is not a ‘motor yacht’ in the conventional sense. But she is not a commercial boat anymore either. So, for me, that in-between space was worth a much closer look.

The boat’s name is ‘Jezebelle’, and she is an 84-foot steel-hulled former shrimp trawler that is currently, at the time of writing this, sitting in Bayou La Batre with an asking price of $175,001. For 84 feet of steel, that is a very sensible number. My initial reaction was: how is that number possible, and is there a catch?

Well, depending on how you look at it, one could conclude that there is a catch. Personally, I would call it an opportunity, and really, it is the entire premise of the boat.

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From the Gulf to the Yard

‘Jezebelle’ was built in 1977 by Master Marine, a yard with deep roots in Gulf Coast commercial shipbuilding. My research found that she is documented as a former refrigerated Gulf of America shrimp trawler, and records show that the same hull (#580685) was originally called ‘Master John’. So, already, we know that this boat was built for hard and unglamorous work on very demanding and unpredictable fishing grounds. Exactly the kind of work that would make her an exceptional explorer yacht.

Her LOA is noted as being 84 feet, though the reproduced survey records her registered length as 74.1 feet, which is often a normal gap on a working commercial hull. She has a beam of 22 feet and a draft of 7.6 feet. Tonnage is 121 tonnes. Her fuel capacity comes in at 12k gallons, with 3k gallons of water. As is to be expected, this boat was designed and built to spend extended periods of time at sea in all sea states.

She is powered by a 500hp 2014 Cummins KTA-19 M with 3,000 hours of operation logged. The current listing (details below) quotes an 8-knot cruising speed with a max speed of around 12 knots.

For anyone interested, Cummins published test-cycle data for the 500hp KTA19-M3 that gives fuel burn figures of between 17.5 and 25.4 US gallons per hour. So, we can deduce that her range is around 3,800 to 5,000 NM when motoring along at 8 knots. However, the listing only IDs the engine as “KTA-19 M” without confirming the exact variant, so this is a conditional model and not a measured burn rate.

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When you factor in a 10% fuel reserve and a standard hotel load, then I would suggest that 3,000 to 4,400 nautical miles is probably the realistic ceiling. The broker does also note on the listing that the engine hours cannot be guaranteed.

‘Jezebelle’ currently holds USCG recreational documentation that was issued in November 2022. A condition and valuation survey was carried out towards the back end of 2023 and into 2024 while she was on the hard in Alabama, recording her official number as 580685 (IMO 7730367)

The survey does not ID a class cert, and its regulatory analysis found a trim and stability booklet was not required, and that is different from a blanket finding that no class requirement could ever apply. Of course, her future owner would confirm the details with a naval architect, flag state authority and an underwriter.

Put simply, she is currently a recreationally documented vessel and is not classed as a commercial vessel.

The part that explains the current asking price for ‘Jezebelle’ comes down to the fact that she is mid-conversion and therefore is not finished. The bow cabin is reported as being around 85% complete. The former fish hold, which will become the bulk of her accommodation, is still an open shell (the insulation and construction materials are noted as being on site.

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She already has some ‘private motor yacht grade’ equipment, including a bow thruster, a hydraulic windlass, AC, inverter and a generator (although I could not find the exact make and model of the generator).

It is not often that you find a conversion of this calibre on the market with an asking price of $175,000, and I do think there is a very focused, albeit relatively niche, pool of buyers who will be looking for a vessel just like ‘Jezebelle’. I have a feeling that her future owner could be reading this article, as has been the case with many of the articles which I have written!

This article continues below. It is thanks to my premium newsletter subscribers that I am not only able to keep all of my articles independent, but also able to travel around and film explorer yachts for my YouTube channel.

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In the premium section below, I cover:

- The conversion cost breakdown: budget estimates for survey, steel work, machinery recommissioning, systems, interior fit-out, and project management, from a bare minimum path to a fully finished expedition yacht

- The value-risk verdict: what this boat could realistically be worth once finished, weighed against genuine market reference points for similar steel trawler conversions

- M/Y ‘Pink Shrimp’, the proof of concept: how a comparable ex-fishing steel hull became a genuine charter yacht, and what that transformation can and cannot tell us about this boat’s future

- My honest assessment of the economics: whether buying cheap and finishing the job well actually beats buying an already-converted trawler yacht

- More pictures (including the interior) and broker’s details

For me, the real question with a boat like ‘Jezebelle’ is not necessarily “can I afford to buy her”, as the current asking price is a modest entry point for 84 feet of steel.

The real question for many people with the financial means needed to buy ‘Jezebelle’ is “can I afford to finish her,” and that is a completely different equation altogether.

Building the Conversion Budget…[article continues below]

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As I mentioned in the video, this is a Yacht Buoy feature with a difference, because I have now filmed the same boat twice: once in the shed during her build, and again after she was handed over to her owner. If you have subscribed to my channel for any length of time, then you will already know that I was the first YouTuber to feature the Arksen 85, Safehaven Marine’s T-2000 Voyager, and later, the Archipelago 45, so you might already know that, from time to time, I do feature brand new hulls on the channel.

Ordinarily, I show you around boats which are already on the market, or that I have ended up on board after an owner’s invitation.

But when I visited No Limit Ships to film two of their 1550s, and they told me about the 13.20, I knew I had to film her during the final stages of her build. I also had a strong feeling my readers and viewers would absolutely love this boat.

Hull number 1 of the 13.20 is now in the water and has been handed over, and stepping aboard the finished boat was well worth the wait. I can only imagine how excited her owner must be to finally have this fast, steel-hulled CE Cat ‘A’ vessel to show off to the explorer yacht community!

In the yacht tour video, I promised to highlight three things in this article: the yard's history, where they sit today as a builder, and what I think stands out on the 13.20. If you have not watched the full tour yet, then here it is:

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Who Are No Limit Ships?

No Limit Ships is a Dutch yard based in Groningen, in the north of the Netherlands. Their story started back in 1996, when yacht designer Evert Stel and builder Piet Wierenga were forced to take shelter during a storm and watched in awe as a KNRM lifeboat punched through the rough Wadden Sea.

That is where the idea for a serious, offshore-capable pleasure boat that matched the seakeeping and speed ability of the KNRM lifeboat came from. And when you think about it, the concept makes total sense.

I have often thought that a private motor boat version of the Shannon RNLI lifeboat here in the UK would make a fantastic platform for adventurous explorer yacht enthusiasts who are not put off from boating by the sight of large waves.

As a former RNLI volunteer, I can say first-hand that the design philosophy behind search and rescue vessels is worth its weight in gold. You cannot put a price on peace of mind or safety at sea.

After a few years of trial and error, and a demo model called ‘Meander’that Gasunie tested as a guard vessel and Rijkswaterstaat once called “the last boat to return in bad weather”, the first models were launched in 1999.

Today, Piet’s sons, Peter and Bart, run No Limit Ships and became co-owners in 2024. So, essentially, No Limit Ships is run by a boatbuilding family with a track record of building 28 No Limit yachts and 29 Blauwe Stad commercial vessels, with professional clients including Van Oord dredging and the Port of Rotterdam.

If you browse my channel, you'll see I have covered several of their boats, including Friend Ship, a No Limit 1550 featured back in June, and the No Limit 1640 Odyssey, filmed on the same Groningen trip.

One of the things that connects each of their boats is the same underlying philosophy behind each model and hull number: deep-V hulls, steel below the waterline (unless a client specifically requests aluminium), aluminium above the waterline to help keep weight down, and a build standard that complies with commercial standards, rather than just complying with private motor yacht standards.

Once the handover is complete, the relationship continues. I am yet to meet an owner of a No Limit Ships vessel who does not stay in contact with the yard. Not because they are having issues, but because the yard makes an effort to keep in contact with their clients because, well, they love hearing about the adventures their clients have with their vessels.

Where the 13.20 Sits in the Lineup

The 13.20 cannot be regarded just as a “smaller No Limit”. By the yard’s own admission, the 13.20 is proof that great things come in small packages and that a smaller LOA does not mean that you have to compromise on seakeeping or long-distance offshore cruising, regardless of what the weather is doing.

The current range of boats on offer comprises three base models.

Before the 13.20, the entry point for a No Limit Ship vessel was the 15.50, a 15.5-metre steel-and-aluminium explorer-style motor yacht fitted with twin Volvo D9 engines at 575hp each. She can power all the way up to 25 knots, or she will comfortably motor along at her displacement speed of 9 knots.

The choice is yours, and the range at speed is a massive selling point for clients who want the safety of steel, coupled with the speed of a planing GRP vessel.

Next up is the 16.40, which is developed from the yard’s professional 1640 PRO workboat and the 16.40 FB, which is an aluminium flybridge version that runs twin Volvo Penta IPS900 pods, pushing her aluminium hull to a top speed of 32+ knots (I got to experience a sea trial on this boat - scroll through my playlist for the video).

No Limit ships also builds the Blauwe Stad Line, a tugboat-styled touring vessel in 8.8 and 10.4 metre versions that have been coming off the production line since 2004.

They also build the No Limit 17.50 FB and non-FB version, which, despite never having been on board (as it currently operates in Canadian waters), is one of my favourite mid-range explorer yachts.

I aim to head over to Canada at some point to film the 17.50 FB, but that depends on how many paying subscribers I have on my newsletter, as it is thanks to my paying subscribers that I can fund these trips aboard (I never take a payment for reviewing a boat, as my journalistic independence is very important to me).

The Finished Boat

Despite her name, she measures 13.25 metres overall, with a 4.65 metre beam and a draft of around 1.2 metres, and she is the smallest private vessel that the yard currently builds. Like her larger siblings, her deep-V hull and decks are built from Corten steel plate, and her superstructure is made from seawater-resistant aluminium. Fully loaded, she displaces around 19 tonnes.

Twin Volvo Penta IPS600 pod drives power her, but an owner can spec a different propulsion and power setup if they want. The yard’s spec sheet quotes a design top speed of 28 knots, but in practice she achieves 30 knots, which is exactly what I expected when I saw her in the shed and seriously quick for a 19-tonne steel boat. She carries 2,250 litres of diesel in an integrated steel tank.

With her mast lowered, her air draft is just 3.3 metres, so low enough for bridges and canals that would otherwise stop most CE Cat ‘A’ vessels in their tracks.

Below deck, she has an owner’s cabin and a guest cabin, around 1.95 metres of headroom and a full-size walk-in shower with Grohe fittings. Underfloor heating runs throughout, with the aft cabin, shower and wheelhouse/saloon each controlled individually, fed by a Kabola 7kW diesel combi boiler that also supplies the hot water. The galley has an induction hob with four burners, an oven/microwave combination, and an integrated Isotherm Cruise Inox 130 fridge/freezer; she carries 690 litres of fresh water, along with a 385 litre blackwater tank.

She comes kitted out with a full Raymarine nav suite as standard (twin Axiom² Pro displays with an RMK10 remote keypad, Evolution autopilot, a Quantum Q24D Doppler radar, an AIS700 transponder, twin Ray90 VHF radios, a YachtSense Link WiFi router and an Airmar 110WX weather station, all networked over SeaTalk NG). Power comes from a Victron system with 10kWh of LiFePO₄ batteries, topped up by a second alternator on each engine, a 5kW Victron Quattro inverter/charger and a Northern Lights 5kW generator for time at anchor.

The rest of this article is for my premium subscribers, who make the whole ‘Yacht Buoy’ outfit possible, so if you are already a paying subscriber or you become one, then I would like to say a huge thank you for making all of this possible.

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In the premium section below, I cover:

• What hull number one actually means: why being the first of a new model is a genuine, albeit exciting, consideration and what I would want confirmed before ordering my own

• Corten steel, explained in full: what this material buys you below the waterline.

• IPS Drive: why IPS drives are a very clever option for this boat

• My honest assessment of the 13.20 as a proposition: who this boat actually suits, what she costs and what it would realistically cost to own one

PLUS much more, not just in this article, but in all of the articles I have written and am yet to write!

What Hull Number One Actually Means…[article continues below]

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If you have subscribed to this newsletter for any length of time, then you will know that I am always on the lookout for exceptional boats. Whilst one’s own definition of ‘exceptional’ can indeed differ, I like to think that I have a good appreciation of what you, my subscribers, like when it comes to explorer-style motor yachts.

And I think you will love this boat, for reasons which will be abundantly clear as you read on.

M/Y ‘Our Choice’ is a Kempers 2200 built in 1992. She is, of course, steel and is currently lying in Copenhagen awaiting her new owner and is listed for sale for €995,000, VAT paid.

When I first glanced my eyes across her impressive spec sheet, it became obvious that she is a serious long-range cruiser capable of the sort of trans-oceanic passages which suit the explorer yacht community.

But, as I started to research more into the details of this boat, I surfaced some intel that appears to have dropped off the radar, but that tells you a lot about exactly what kind of explorer yacht you would (could) be buying.

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The boat herself

She has an LOA of 22.6 metres, with a beam of 5.76 metres. Her draft is just 2.05 metres, and she displaces 90 tonnes. Along with her steel hull, she has an aluminium superstructure, so overall weight is kept down, which is important for fuel efficiency.

Below deck, she has two cabins (more on that later), six berths and a clever layout that puts the aft deck, saloon, galley and owner’s cabin on a single deck. So, if you have been looking for a sub-24 metre boat with an owner’s deck, then this vessel could be very interesting.

The pilot house is above the owner’s deck (yes, some boats have the pilot house below the owner’s deck!).

She is powered by twin Cat 3406B diesels (300HP each), which are the same powerplants installed when the vessel was built. However, these engines have just 2,550 hours on them, which means that they have been run, on average, just 75 hours a year. Suffice to say, these Cats have plenty of working life ahead of them (I will also come back to that a bit later on).

She is fitted with a hydraulic bow thruster but, rather unusually, her stern thruster is electric. She has five-bladed props on stainless steel shafts and is fitted with Koopnautic Searock retractable stabilisers (refurbished in 2023).

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The current owner has clearly spent a good amount of money, ensuring that this vessel is ready to set sail. Her exterior paintwork was redone in 2022, and the entire hydraulic system was completely renewed, at considerable cost, in 2021. The electrical system was renovated, with the work being completed in 2023.

She was also fitted with a six-camera monitoring system in 2021, and her galley was refitted with Siemens, Bosch and AEG appliances between 2020 and 2023. If a potential owner is thinking of operating this boat in European inland waterways, then some come with a valid CVO certificate

What does all of this tell us? Well, whoever owns her now has clearly treated her as a long-term asset rather than something that they have had enough of. Having filmed over 500 boats for my YouTube channel, the relatively minor maintenance being left often means that the major maintenance also gets overlooked, but given less priority. Of course, there will always be exceptions to this rule.

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The Builder.

This is where the story became even more interesting as I researched this boat, and it reminded me of the largely forgotten Dutch yard behind the 1971 Haak 60, which is another case where a boat’s real story only shows up once you turn up the gain on the research radar!

The Kempers name traces all of the way back to 1894, when Theodorus Kempers was given permission to set up a shipyard in Alphen aan den Rijn. The facility started as a repair yard and grew into “TH. Kempers & Son Shipbuilding and Repair Yard” (eventually renamed Scheeps- en Jachtwerf Kempers B.V. in 1979).

One source dates the yard’s founding to 1894. Another, from the Doeve brokerage’s own brand history, simply states the yard was “founded in 1900”.

The better-supported reading is the 1894 permission date, since it comes from the more detailed of the two accounts. But either way, we are talking about a yard with well over a century of history behind it before it changed hands.

Throughout most of the 20th century, the yard built hundreds of steel Kempala cruisers, which are hard-chine motor yachts that built up a reputation for being extremely tough. Indeed, many of them are still cruising today!

In 1994, 2 years after she was launched, the yard was taken over by Van der Valk (the Dutch hotel and leisure group) and was renamed’Scheepswerf Falcon’. So, the Kempers-branded yacht building era ended there after what was a very successful period of 1st class boatbuilding. According to my research, the family business carries on today as Kempers Watersport, a marina and dealership in Aalsmeer, but, alas, it no longer builds yachts.

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In 1985, Kempers built M/Y ‘Esmeralda’, a 23.89 metre steel motorsailor ketch with exterior design by R. van den Akker. She was powered by a MAN diesel. This project proved that the yard was capable of custom builds over 24 metres LOA. “Our Choice” sits in that same bespoke tradition of one-off large-scale builds.

By the way, if you like a boat with a story behind her, then I think you will also enjoy taking a look at North Darling Yachts, which I featured a few weeks ago.

There is no established, so to speak, brokerage market for a Kempers 2200 because there has only ever been one of them. But for many buyers, that will make her even more appealing, especially as, by all accounts, she has been very well looked after.

A valuation of this boat has to be based on first principles, which is what makes her an interesting find, rather than just another steel explorer yacht

Where she sits against the market

Whilst doing my research for this article, I had a look around for comparable listings for steel motor yachts

I found a Van der Valk Explorer 24M, same year, 1992, slightly longer at 23.74 metres, listed at €649,950, so, some €345,000 less. Her own near-sister vessel from the same closing chapters of the Kempers era, a 1993 Kempers Excellent 65 at 19.75 metres, is listed at €695,000.

However, when you climb up the asking price ladder, a Vripack 69 Expedition Trawler, 2004-built, asks €1,200,000, and a De Vries Lentsch 22M from 1990 asks €1,495,000.

So “Our Choice” sits somewhere in the middle. Above the same-era production Dutch steel boats, below the true pedigree names and the more recent expedition-purpose builds.

The premium that “Our Choice” is asking for over the lower-priced comparable hulls tracks with what you actually get in terms of the recent refit work, the retractable stabilisers, and a one-off hull (rather than one of many).

Buying into that rarity means you are not just buying a Dutch steel motor yacht; you are buying the only Kempers 2200 that exists.

The Engines

The twin Caterpillar 3406B units deserve a mention on their own merits, because this is great news for anyone who is seriously thinking about purchasing this boat.

The 3406B is a fully mechanical, 14.6 litre inline-six, arriving in the mid-1980s as the improved successor to the original 3406, and itself superseded in the early 1990s by the electronic 3406C and 3406E. A 1992 boat running B-series engines is period-correct, not outdated for her age.

These engines are among the most proven, most rebuildable diesels Caterpillar ever made. No engine control unit, no electronics to fail, and a global spares network that still supports them decades after Caterpillar stopped building them new.

Any competent diesel mechanic anywhere in the world, from Copenhagen to the Caribbean, can service a 3406B.

At 300 horsepower per side, these engines are also running well below their rated ceiling, which some variants push past 480 horsepower. That is a de-stressed, longevity-first installation and is precisely what you want to see in an explorer yacht.

It is worth noting that 2,550 engine hours over 34 years is very low use. Of course, low engine hours can be a positive, but an engine, or engines, that sit idle for long periods of time can develop their own issues. But, let’s face it, I doubt any potential future owner will advance beyond initial negotiations without first commissioning a survey

When it comes to her performance stats, no speed or range figures have been published. Based on her hull form and displacement, a boat of this LOA and weight usually has a hull speed of between 9 and 12 knots with a cruising speed of between 7 and 8 knots.

Her fuel tanks hold 11,880 litres (combined) and a stated consumption of around 75 litres per hour, so we can estimate her range to be around 2,000 NM under normal sea states and typical load.

This article continues below, for my premium subscribers. Without the support of my premium subscribers, I would not be able to bring you these articles and my YouTube videos. So, if you are a premium subscriber, then ‘thank you!’

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In the premium section, I cover:

- What she can actually do: a full look at her likely speed, cruising range and sea-keeping given her hull form, displacement and twin 300hp Caterpillars

- A genuine builder-history verdict: what buying a one-off, end-of-era Kempers actually means for resale, valuation and long-term ownership

- Full running-cost reality for a 90-tonne, twin-engine steel motor yacht: berthing, insurance, and what those low engine hours really mean for your first survey bill

- My honest assessment of the €995,000 asking price: where she genuinely sits against her nearest comparables, and whether this is a boat worth taking seriously

Why only two cabins?

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If you subscribe to this newsletter (rather than being forwarded this article by a friend), then you will already know that I have written about loads of Dutch steel motor yachts. Each time I see a new listing for a boat that looks like a working vessel, I always tend to ask the same question: is this a conversion or a purpose-built private vessel, with commercial lines?

‘Jip’, the boat featured in this write-up, is the second kind, and it is the sort of vessel that I absolutely love. And, judging by the feedback that I get from my followers, these purpose-built commercial-looking boats are becoming even more popular.

She is a Noorderlicht 50 Spiegelkotter and was built in 2005 to a design by the well-known Dutch naval architect, Willem Nieland. And have exchanged many messages with Willem over the last few years about lots of his designs, and, judging by what he has got on his drawing board, more and more boat owners are embracing his unique design philosophy.

At the time of writing this piece, ‘Jip’ is currently listed for sale in the Netherlands for €235,000, VAT paid.

If you are unfamiliar with the name ‘Spiegelkotter’, then let me break it down for you. “Spiegel” is Dutch for mirror, which in this case I believe refers to the flat transom that has defined Dutch coastal and inland cargo Kotters for centuries.

“Kotter” is the Dutch word for this working-boat type and has always been used for fishing or coastal bulk carriers operating around the Dutch coast and through the IJsselmeer and Wadden Sea.

The mirror stern goes back further in time, originating in the 18th-century spiegeljacht, which was a private pleasure yacht often acquired by well-off Dutch citizens who wanted an enclosed cabin, but without the wait or cost of a larger vessel.

The flat transom allowed designers and builders to fit a spacious ‘pavilion’ at the stern, and the full-beam owner’s cabin behind a vertical mirror (you will often see these in the walkthrough videos on my YouTube channel) is what today’s modern version of the spiegelkotter is still renowned for. It is one of the oldest ideas in Dutch yacht design, and it has never really gone out of fashion.

Despite her lines, ‘Jip’ was never a former worker boat, forced into retirement and then converted into a private motor yacht. She was purpose-built new, in steel, with an LOA of 14.99 metres. Willem drew her with those traditional lines because that is still what a lot of European and, increasingly, North American, buyers want.

The owner who commissioned her build decided that the round-bilged, steel hull with the mirror stern was still the best design choice for their cruising needs. However, I would guess that nostalgia also played a big part in her design philosophy.

Her steel hull was expertly welded by a small yard called ‘KBS’ in Koudekerk aan den Rijn, South Holland. When I looked online, I could not find a website for KBS, which is not really that unusual for a small Dutch boatbuilder where most of their work is from word of mouth or existing clients.

Many of these build projects start their lives as a casco, a bare welded hull, and then get finished by another yard.

In Jip’s case, that ‘another yard’ was her owner. A former listing described the work that was carried out on the boat as “afwerking in eigen beheer”, which Google Translate informs me means ‘fit-out managed in-house’. That owner clearly knew exactly what they were doing.

‘Jip’ is fitted with Corian worktops in her galley, Miele appliances and a full Raymarine nav suite. I have never met so many people in a relatively small country who understand boat building better than the Dutch. For many Dutch people, boatbuilding is a part of their DNA.

Willem has been drawing and designing boats for over 30 years, spanning aluminium expedition vessels under the ‘Globemaster’ name (I have featured two on my channel, M/Y ‘Borr’ and M/Y ‘Yeti’ - both now sold). Willem has also collaborated with an Antwerp-based design studio on a boat called ‘Firmship 42’.

I do not think that Willem would mind me saying that the spiegelkotter is very close to his nautical heart. He still sells a current version of this concept designed (in his own words) so that an owner can safely choose the ‘more adventurous’ waterways.

Indeed, Jip is an earlier take on that very idea. Slightly beamier and with a deeper draft than his current design, and single-engined (many of his newer boats run twin engines).

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I had a look on the internet and found that Jip is not the only Noorderlicht out there. The first hull off this design, Brandaris, was built in 2002 by a different yard, Jachtbouw Noorderwind in Stadskanaal, and has since had a full refit.

She is also currently listed for sale, through a different Dutch broker, at €325k, so nearly €100k more than what Jip is asking for. I will come back to what that difference buys you, because it is perhaps the most useful number in this whole story.

Jip has a paper trail that almost went off the radar. Back in Feb 2021, a Dutch brokerage called Kempers Watersport listed what is, spec for spec, the same boat. Built in 2005, the same DAF 1160 engine at 158hp, the same Mastervolt Whisper 6000 generator, the same two-cabin, six berth configuration.

Dutch boating site BootAanBoot also featured her as their “Video of the Week” in the same month and praised her as a fantastic family boat. They echoed the sentiment that the engine is well known for its great reliability and very long service life.

From what I could see, that listing is gone now, along with any reference to the price that she carried at the time. The only reason I am sharing this with you is that the text did actually survive in a search engine’s cached index in the form of a few sentences in Dutch, describing a boat that, on paper at least, no longer exists.

Somewhere around 2021, she evidently found a buyer and is now back on the market (link to broker’s website can be found below).

But what does that shallow, mirror-sterned hull buy an owner? Here is a useful number: a draft of just 1.3 metres...

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Most steel yachts of this size typically draw between 1.4 and 1.8 metres. When you combine that with a minimum air draft of 3.2 metres, which is achieved by lowering her mast electrically, then you will find that this boat can get into places many of her contemporaries cannot.

The provincial Dutch canal network, the wide but shallow IJsselmeer and, with some careful tidal planning, the Frisian harbours of the Wadden Sea all become viable options for this boat when it comes to planning an itinerary.

Below her decks, she sleeps a total of six people across two cabins. The owner’s cabin has an en-suite bathroom and a full-size double bed. The guest cabin has a double plus a stacked bunk, so you are getting a clever layout that works well for when the family or friends come and stay on board.

As mentioned before, the galley has a Corian worktop and a Miele fridge/freezer. Hot water runs off a 220V system, and the electrical installation spans 12V, 24V and 220V throughout.

Power comes from a single DAF DK1160 MG diesel (158hp/1116.29kW) driving a fixed prop through a stainless steel shaft on hydraulic steering. The DAF 1160 family of engines has a good reputation. They began life as a Leyland design that DAF developed and enlarged under the licence, and the same 11.6 litre six-cylinder block powered DAF’s own trucks and buses through the 1970s, 80s and 90s before they were marinised.

A heavy and robust industrial truck engine of which tens of thousands were built means that they are still very much understood by both owners and marine mechanics who still work on them decades later. Many specialists in the Netherlands still stock parts and recondition units for this family of engines today, alongside an owner-run barge association that still hosts the full factory manual completely free of charge.

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This boat also carries a Mastervolt Whisper 600 generator, a Victrom Qauttro inverter-charger and battery monitor and solar panels. So, a sensible spec for a boat that was built to be used a lot.

Her digital nav suite comprises a full Raymarine suite, backed by dual VHF sets and an AIS transceiver. But for me, the beauty and functionality of this boat comes with her naval architecture and trawler-style lines. Those are what drew my eye to this boat, along with her very reasonable asking price.

This article continues below, in “The Wardroom”, which is the premium section of this newsletter. It is thanks to my premium subscribers that I can travel around filming boats for my YouTube channel. So, if you do become a premium subscriber, then you are very much a part of the Yacht Buoy network.

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In the premium section, I cover:

- The €90,000 question: what actually separates Jip from her professionally built, refitted sister ship Brandaris, and whether the gap is money well saved or money you will end up spending anyway

- The owner-completion risk: what “afwerking in eigen beheer” really means for a buyer doing due diligence, and the survey questions I personally would be asking.

- The DAF 1160’s real-world running costs: parts availability, what a truck-derived marine block actually costs to keep alive in Europe today, and where that leaves you against a more common marine-specific diesel

- My honest assessment of the €235,000 asking price: how it stacks up against three comparable Spiegelkotters currently on the Dutch market.

- Range & Speed assessment: Based on what we know about this boat, I work out her estimated range, cruising speed and top speed

Let’s start with that €90,000 gap to Brandaris.

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