I know I have alluded to this before in my blog posts, but we think we have it all together now.
After fully crewed charters for ten years and then being off the yacht for the last year we have realized just how much we missed being on the water with our charter guests. The combined softening economy, along with the escalation of costs associated with chartering and transport to and from the Caribbean have forced us to look at the affordability of chartering.
We have seen there is nothing that would offer the accomodation, amenities, Size and SCUBA that Promenade enjoys in the Captain Only Market. We feel confident that it will be a positive step, making use of our (Kerry and Bazza) expertise and local knowledge to not only ensure the vessel and guest safety, but give the larger groups the ability to charter a fully equipped vessel while being able to better manage their costs associated with a vacation in the Caribbean.
So, what does that mean? That means that for 2008/2009 we will continue to offer charters exactly how we have for many years, and indeed, only have a couple weeks available until we close out our calendar.
Bazza and I will again run the charters this winter with Simeon Korfanty, who has worked with us on Promenade before (good looking scottish dive instructor!). We, and all our guests, enjoyed Simeon very much.
For the 2009/2010 season we will offer fully crewed or captain/ divemaster only...you decide! We will be offering only up to 10 charters a year to allow us to enjoy our yacht more ourselves as a home, and explore different areas and ventures.
For fully crewed, we will only be taking a maximum of 8-10 guests, with casual diving. On our captain/divemaster only program we can take up to 12 guests with unlimited diving!
Captain/Divemaster Only Details
Rate Sheet for 2009/2010
It is with mixed feelings that we have come to these decisions, happy because we will be spending more time enjoying our yacht and managing the costs of chartering and sad as our guests, and us as well, will miss having Richard and Lisa on board. We have all enjoyed working together for the last few years on Promenade, but they too are looking forward to a change. They will be taking their summer vacation in Belize, later on this month and then returning to England for a bit where they are both taking courses to upgrade their various licenses and skills (I will let Lisa tell you all about that in her blog post!)
They are looking for their next boating adventure and as we all will say, any yacht that takes them on as crew will be very lucky! If anyone knows of a quality yacht wanting a great crew, they are open to ideas. Lisa has promised to keep everyone updated and keep on blogging, we will hold her to that promise!
Remember, this is for 2009/2010, not this season. We are open to other ideas going forward into the future and we KNOW that this will allow us to not only enjoy time ourselves on our yacht, but also continue to offer charters to our standard.
We will of course, keep everyone updated on our blog and we are all always open to new ideas.