The Charter Connection Blog

New Year and Christmas have been heavily booked for months and some of the larger Catamarans have been sold out for a year, but we do have some nice options open, particularly in the $4-5,000 per person, per week range.

One of the more popular 80′ monohulls is still open in The British Virgin Islands for a party of 6.

The 76′, 10 passenger catamaran Zingara is one of the most luxurious charter yachts of her type available anywhere. Her holiday charter, which was booked months ago, had to cancel this week. She is open for Christmas but already has a tentative booking for New Year, which we can challenge if you can move quickly! They don’t get much better than this.

The 67′ Catamaran Marmot has also had a cancellation. She has four cabins but is really more comfortable for just six guests.

Smaller and mid-size sailboats are tougher to find, although there are more monohulls than cats available. The cost of flights over the holidays becomes more of an issue and they are difficult to get. If you missed out this year, you might want to think about booking for next year. You might be surprised by how many savvy charterers already have!

The owners of larger luxury Motor Yachts often announce their holiday charter plans much closer to the season, so availability is currently much better than for crewed sailing charters, but of course prices are considerably higher. Most are based in St. Martin or Antigua.

If you are considering a last minute Holiday Charter, don’t wait. Call us at 800 621 7855, email us, or contact us through the Ed Hamilton & Co site, and tell us about your plans.

We occasionally hear from clients interested in exploring the Turks & Caicos. This beautiful cruising ground, just a short 2 hour flight from Fort Lauderdale, consists of 8 main islands and more than 20 smaller islands, with over 230 miles of beach front. The area has also been rated by some, as one of the top 10 Scuba diving destinations in the world.

There are relatively few yachts who charter here, but Arabella, the 160 schooner has added another trip to this destination after their first cabin-charter cruise to the Turks & Caicos sold out!  This trip will be held from May 30th - June 5th. She books charters by the cabin and rates for staterooms vary from $1050 - $1750 per person (based on double occupancy).

If you are interested in getting more information on this chance to charter in a new cruising ground, call us at 800 621 7855, email us, or contact us through the Ed Hamilton & Co site, and tell us about your plans. .

Once again, The Sint Maarten Yacht Club is inviting guests to compete in the 29th annual St. Martin Heineken Regatta. Race dates are from March 5 - 8, 2009, but this event is not only for the racing fanatics. It’s fun to watch from a crewed yacht and spectators have plenty to do even after racing is completed, with on shore venues, parties and feasts! With the generous donations from last year’s participants, the Yacht Club was able to provide sailing lessons for one lucky local youth. This year the yacht club is hoping to triple online donations and add 3 more children to the program.

Whether you are looking to charter a bareboat or crewed yacht to participate in the race, or a spectator vessel to follow the action, give us a call at 800-621-7855, visit the Ed Hamilton & Co Website or email us to see how we can make you a part of this excellent event!

Congratulations Aaron, Shannon, Michael, Stuart, Alyssa, Edyta, Kicki, Peachy, Scott and Kim. This fine crew from the yacht ‘Four Wishes’ won the ‘Best Charter Crew For Yachts Over 40 Meters’ award in Monaco recently.

The award was accepted by First Officer Shannon Nicholson. This is the second time Shannon has accepted an award for ‘Four Wishes’ at The Monaco Yacht Club. In 2005, Captain Aaron Clark won the award for ‘Best Charter Captain’. The awards are based on comments received from guests and brokers during the summer in The Mediterranean.

The 144′ luxury motor yacht ‘Four Wishes’ charters in The Caribbean during the winter months. She is fully booked for the holidays but is accepting charters for selected weeks this season.

Ed Hamilton & Co has booked four very successful charters on ‘Four Wishes’ in the last nine months - a significant portion of her total number of charters. We take great pains to find the best boats and crews for our clients and it is nice to have this confirmed by this award.

If you are looking for a luxury megayacht charter and would like to discuss ‘Four Wishes’ or any of the other fine yachts we can offer, please call us at 800 621 7855, email us, or contact us through the Ed Hamilton & Co site, and tell us about your plans.

ALOHA MALOLO, the 65 foot custom crewed charter yacht, is joining the Green Movement and offering a low ecological impact charter.  Guests looking for a more planet friendly cruise, without the sound of a generator, will be impressed that Eric and Evelin power their batteries with solar panels and wind. All produce and meats are bought from local sources when possible and they double filter their water so that guests do not feel they have to drink from disposable plastic bottles.

Unlike many US or British Virgin Islands based boats, Aloha Malolo spent the summer chartering in The San Blas Islands, off Panama. Their guests enjoyed plenty of live lobster and crab, deserted palm fringed islands with picture perfect white sandy beaches and lots of smiling faces!
They have made many improvements to the boat, including three additional opening hatches in the staterooms, new upholstery, new canvas, new dinghy, a new tapered queen bed in the forward stateroom (she has four queen beds now), newly painted decks, new over-sized fishing gear, bigger TV, 70 more DVD movies (almost 600 DVD’s total), new sound system, which is ipod compatible, new hammock and sun awning, 8 sets of new gear for scuba diving, new watermaker and a lot more.

Ask us for details of this and other fine charter yachts. We’ll help you find the one that’s right for you. Call us at 800 621 7855, email us, or contact us through the Ed Hamilton & Co site, and tell us about your plans.

The impressive 82 foot Nautor Swan ASTRO DE L’EST is available for a unique charter, taking part in the Rolex Transatlantic Race. Her fee for the race is 90,000 EUROS all inclusive, or about 3,750 pp/pw. She accommodates 8 guests, in two double and two twin cabins. The race begins in Tenerife, in The Canary Islands, on November 24th and the yacht is estimated to arrive in The Caribbean, in Saint Martin, on the 12th of December. ASTRO DE L’EST is an excellent competitor with her PBO composite standing rigging, racing keel, carbon spars, race sails and Genackers.

We get plenty of requests for long distance crewed sailing charters. This would be a sail of a lifetime, and you would even eat well all the way across The Atlantic! Interested? Call us at 800 621 7855, email us, or contact us through the Ed Hamilton & Co site, and tell us about your plans.

Alton Brown, star of the Food Network’s Good Eats, and main commentator on Iron Chef America is taking on a new adventure. He and his producers have chartered two catamarans to dine their way through The Caribbean in the 4 part series ‘Feasting on Waves’.

If you missed the premiere last night, it will be repeated at 8pm Sept 10th, 6pm Sept 13th and 2pm Sept 14th, all on The Food Network.
The second show in the series starts at 10pm Sept 14th.

‘Chef de Mer‘ is one of the yachts featured in this special TV program.

See how Ed Hamilton & Co can help you plan your own gourmet private yacht charter in The Caribbean!

This month’s ‘Charter Connection‘ Newsletter, which was emailed to subscribers last week, included an article describing the many different yacht charter destinations around the world. Readers were invited to vote on any cruising grounds they had visited on either a crewed yacht or bareboat charter and for the purpose of this vote, these areas were divided into the following categories:

BVI / US Virgin Islands, Leeward Islands, Grenadines, Western Caribbean, Bahamas / Florida, Western Mediterranean, Croatia, Greek Islands, Turkey, New England, Pacific Islands, New Zealand / Australia and Asia

You can view the initial results as they start to come in. It seems that most people only voted on their favorites, which they naturally rated as a ‘3′, so there are some ‘perfect scores’. We expect this to change as more people vote.

If you haven’t voted yet, feel free to do so, and if you only voted for your top choice, we’d love to hear about those other areas you visited and how you felt they compared.

You can also vote on the past surveys we have run, accessed via the results page. It is always satisfying to see a surge of votes come in after each ‘Charter Connection’ mailing, some for articles over a year old! For this reason we keep all articles open and update the results as they change.

If you would like us to describe any of these beautiful cruising grounds or the fine charter yachts that sail there, call us at 800 621 7855, or email us, or visit The Ed Hamilton & Co website.