Guest contributor Roxanne Hughes speaks to Owner Kim Vibe-Petersen about refits, regattas and bringing an exciting charter yacht back to the market.
Refit for Purpose
"First of all we had the whole boat refit," explains Kim Vibe-Petersen, "we took most of the old interior out and gave it a new look. We made her lighter in colour, before this, she looked more like Disney World inside - it didn’t match with our Scandinavian style. We basically took all the varnish off the floor and gave them all a ‘white soap’ to give the Scandinavian look, added large white sofas, and we found very nice materials for the rest of it [...] We installed new 3Di Sails and had the rig tuned so she was fit for racing – the yacht has never raced before. At Loro Piana Caribbean Superyacht Regatta we did pretty well, she performed very well and we were very happy with the result."
Charter with Soul
"She’s already very popular but also, we always have a very good crew on board and we put the family soul into it. People see us as a family and how we use the boat and they say ‘ah, I would love to do the same thing with my family’. They want to race, and have holidays on board and parties on board and that’s what we sell – that’s exactly what we did at the Bucket.
We like to have a lot of guests on board and with crew & everything it can be 50, 60, people on a daily basis (at a regatta). It shows the boat performs and you can use it as a nightclub, you can use it as a holiday home, and you can move it around the world to where you want to have it. I think nothing can beat that.
If you don’t like the scenery today, you can make it different in half an hour, just move the boat to another anchorage, or move it from St Barths to New York – go see the Statue of Liberty, or sail around Martha’s Vineyard, or go to New Zealand! Be wherever you want to be. Go around the world and have Q wherever you want. Of course what I’m saying is nothing new but sometimes you have to remind yourself that this is the optimal summer house, because the views can be different everyday."
A Year Well Travelled
"We haven’t used her so much yet, we’ve mostly been doing promotional charters and at the Bucket Regatta, but we have a week here and there planned. The boat has already been very busy on charter – she’s booked for the whole summer, it’s already back-to-back and that’s seldom found these days, for most owners they only get last-minute charters but we have all these bookings. When Parsifal was built we had bookings for a year in advance and with Q, it’s basically a year in advance again.
The programme is to possibly bring her to New York – we have some engines that need to be serviced – and we might go to Bermuda for the regatta & the America’s Cup. That’s what we plan at the moment. And then we go straight into the charter season."
Having style is all about simplicity, and the new refit of Q (formerly Mondango 2) has brought a new sense of space and comfort on board. Listed with charter for Camper & Nicholsons, Q will be sailing across the West Med this summer with a view on the Caribbean during Winter.
