It's a 90-minute flight from Hamburg, where I live, to Nice on the Cote d'Azur. It used to take about the same time to get from northwest London to southwest London by train when we lived there.
So 90-minutes in the air, an hour on a local train, 40 minutes in a taxi and a short walk brought me to the helm of the latest superyacht to leave the Nautor's Swan shipyard in Finland. All that travelling for just 10 minutes in charge of the new Swan 95S was a thrill even on a near windless day off Monaco.
In just 4 knots of wind, this 60-something tonne carbon creation made a comfortable 4 knots, making me wonder what on earth she would do in a gale.
Called Lot99, she is the first of the new line of 95-footers from Swan and is designed for fast cruising. The boat has already cruised from Finland to the south of France, and is destined to cross the Pond, pass through Panama and explore the Pacific.
She has acres of teak and a vast cockpit, but handles easily under sail for a crew of three/four. The interior is grown-up and unflashy, with lots of entertaining space.
See her at the Monaco Yacht Show this week (27-30 September). My full story is going into a winter edition of Boat International magazine
