![]() With no expenses, savings can quickly add up, especially when they are supplemented by tips. Crew live onboard and all food is provided. Most are paid directly into offshore accounts. British law has a loophole exempting maritime employees, but few of the people I talk to seem overly preoccupied by tax. ![]() They range from a couple of days to six weeks in length, and pay starts at €2,000 a month. They are the perfect tonic for the people prepared to blow millions on a holiday: think Jay-Z, Leonardo DiCaprio, Simon Cowell, and untold numbers of hedge-funders and investment bankers.įor yachties, these charters are the goal. That’s before fuel, water, food and tips for the crew, who will cater to the guests’ every whim as the yacht hops from Sardinia to Monaco to Greece or, during the winter, the Caribbean. Roman Abramovich’s boat, Eclipse, is thought to be the priciest available to rent, at $2m per week, or $11,900 per hour. Shore leave: boats are readied in Antibes. Built by the German yard Lürssen, it is estimated to have cost $605m. At 180m, Azzam, launched last year and commissioned by Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the president of the UAE, is currently the largest privately owned vessel in the world. ![]() The rule of thumb is that they cost $1m per metre to build or buy, and more at the top end: by this logic a 50m boat, far from unusual these days, will have cost $50m to build and $5m per year to run. Many yachts are chartered out to offset the outrageous cost of maintaining them, usually considered to be about 10% of the build price per year. Toilets are cleaned with toothbrushes and cotton buds. It would be easy to have a protective coating on the teak or simply to use a different material, but the global elite value its pinkish hue. The decks are made from untreated teak, a legacy from the days of sail and as labour-intensive as floors come. A big yacht can easily take two days to clean, and in the season it needs cleaning constantly. “It’s basically a car wash on a massive scale and things have to be immaculate,” says James. The work, for the vast majority of men and women, mostly consists of cleaning. “He practically begged me to come out.” She left her job in a salon and flew out in April, and has just finished her first proper job – a two-and-a-half month charter. “My step-brother came out here and paid off all his university debt,” she explains. Growing up in Sandbanks, Dorset, she also found out about the yachting world through a family connection. “I’d had enough of cutting hair,” says Alex, 23. “And if it doesn’t work out, there’s time enough to work in an office again down the line.” He pays €1,000 a month for his room, but can make that back easily if he finds the right work. As ever in this business, money flows like water. ![]() He is staying at the Grapevine, a crew house which sleeps up to 36 potential “yachties”. I wanted to follow my dream.” He has been in Antibes since May, living off a mixture of savings and day-work while he looks for a more solid position. Family members had boats and I’d always loved the sea. “But I’d had enough of sitting behind a desk. “After school I worked as an estate agent and then in recruitment,” says James, 21. The biggest need up to 70 crew.įloating palaces: the luxury interior of a superyacht. Most of them will pass through Antibes at some point. Depending on where you draw the line (“super” is generally thought to start at around 30m long), there are more than 5,000 superyachts in the world. They are motivated by the same reasons people have always gone to sea: money, adventure and escape. The promise of a peek into this rarefied kingdom is the reason thousands of young British people head to the Mediterranean each spring. More than any other status symbol, these boats are the ultimate projections of global hyper-wealth: floating embassies of a world that is highly visible but impossible to touch. It does look rather nice, I think, but then again that’s the whole point. As I leave I take a final wistful look up at the decking. His tone makes it clear that he does not want scruffy tourists loitering and that he has ways of enforcing this wish. At the end of the gangplank a steward stands with his hands behind his back. ![]()
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