Sailing Vacations: Your Own Private Boat

Jumping for joy in the Caribbean.
Jumping for joy in the Caribbean.

Cruising on a Catamaran: “A Floating Hotel On Water”

By Eleanor Harte

How do unlimited cocktails, a private boat with a personal chef, and the chance to choose your own itinerary sound? How about visiting various Caribbean islands or sailing in the Mediterranean?

We spoke with Festiva Sailing Vacations, a company that offers fully crewed week-long vacations on a personal catamaran that holds six to eight people, to find out more about their trips.

A Festiva catamaran sailing
A Festiva catamaran

“Living on the boat is very luxurious; it’s like a floating hotel on water,” said Sarah Ferguson, the company’s marketing coordinator. Festiva offers four sailing packages: the British Virgin Islands, St. Maarten Netherland Antilles, St. John, and Greece and the Cyclades. Participants can sit back and allow the boat’s crew to take care of everything for them.

“This is more of a relaxation trip,” said Ferguson, comparing it to trips that might be constant action.

The Group

All Festiva trips start with the group meeting at the boat in the country they are visiting; the cost of flights is the one thing that isn’t included in the trip cost. The crew – made up of the captain and the chef – greet the guests before everyone settles down to enjoy a cocktail and appetizer and chat about the week ahead. It’s here that the guests meet the other couples they’ll be traveling with for the next week – possibly meeting each other for the first time.

“I understand it can be worrying to be paired with couples you don’t know,” said Ferguson. “But we have a compatibility form and it works really well.” She’s referring to the preference form that Festiva requires everyone to fill out, listing demographics, dietary requirements, and what guests are looking to do on their cruise.

They seek to pair couples of the same age together, and sometimes a lasting friendship emerges among the couples. “We’ve had couples who didn’t know each other come to us the next year and say ‘We really liked traveling with them and we all want to go together again’ and we pair them up,” said Ferguson.

The company has had groups of all ages, and they offer a family package, which means renting out the entire boat for the week.

“We have single trips but the best value for people is two people per room,” said Ferguson, adding that most of the couples are married and the average age of guests is around 50 years old.

One of the benefits that Ferguson sees in this type of trip versus a cruise i that it’s very intimate. There are a maximum of 10 people on the boat: eight guests and two crew members.

“It’s a catamaran, it’s not a big cruise ship,” said Ferguson, “and it’s your private boat for the week. We don’t kick you off the boat at a specific time.”

Greece
Greece is a fantastic sailing destination.

Guests have their own stateroom on the boat and all meals and drinks are included, save for two on-land meals during the week. Beyond mealtimes, guests have complete freedom to do what they want.

If guests want to hang out on the boat and read a book while the rest of the group goes to explore an island, they are free to do so. This might not be the case with a big cruise company, which sometimes requires passengers to disembark at certain stops.

Ferguson calls cruise trips and Festiva trips “apples and oranges; it’s two very different products.” Because the catamaran is a much smaller boat, guests are able to go into small islands that a big cruise ship can’t access.

“Some of these islands are very serene and secluded, and others have a more traditional Caribbean culture. You wouldn’t see them on a cruise just because they aren’t accessible by any other boat,” said Ferguson.

Festiva trips are tailored so that guests can decide for themselves what they want to do. The first day of the trip is the time for guests to voice the different places they want to go and discuss the itinerary for the week.

“A lot depends on the group, and the crew is there for you. You can do whatever you want, you don’t need to know what time it is to be somewhere at a certain place,” said Ferguson.

All the food for the trip is made on board. This is where the guest preference form is crucial to guest satisfaction; if a person is allergic to seafood or doesn’t like certain foods, they need to tell the company so that they can have another option for that guest.

Relaxing on a Caribbean island
Relaxing on a Caribbean island

“We accommodate all diets, but it just all comes down to that form.” The menu is pulled from the preference form, and is good on the grill on the back of every yacht.

What do guests do with the week? That’s up to them. There are options to purchase a scuba dive from a company on land or other similar excursions. Guests can fish, they can explore the islands they’re stopped at, or they can stay on the boat all day.

There are no requirements to be anywhere at certain times or to move around with the rest of the group.

Great for Those Sailing for the First Time

Ferguson said first-time sailors who have never done this type of trip before need to be sure they’re comfortable with where they go. She recommends the British Virgin Islands for first-timers because the water there tends to be smoother. Guests never go into ports; they always moor further out and take a smaller boat into the different islands. For guests who have more experience with sailing, she recommends the trip to Greece, which has longer sails in the Mediterranean, which can be rockier.

Another consideration is the time of year. Festiva sees the calendar in three seasons: winter/spring, summer, and the value season, that time in the weeks on either side surrounding hurricane season. “We actually pull all our boats off the water from mid-August to mid-October because of what the industry has termed ‘hurricane season and we don’t run any trips then at all.

Guests can always check with Festiva to see what they recommend, too. “Because we’re a smaller company, we have more intimate interactions. All the guests know the names of the people in the office because they’ve spoken to all of us,” said Ferguson.

Though the ship is crewed and guests are free to relax entirely, what about people who want to try their hand at sailing? “That’s an option too,” Ferguson said. “We don’t offer any kind of certification or lessons, but if guests want to get up there and stand at the wheel, that’s an option. You can participate too.”

“But then,” she added, “you might want to sit down and have a cocktail.”

Festiva Sailing Vacations, 866-575-3951

Love Cruises? Find out about dozens of unusual cruises in our Unusual Cruises ebook for your Kindle.

Eleanor Harte

Eleanor Harte is a journalist and writer based in Boston, MA. She’s fortunate to have studied abroad in Paris and to have visited Ireland, Belgium, Scotland, the Czech Republic, and a few other countries, but she has many remaining on her list! She’s always looking for the next adventure.

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