Far Niente

It’s perhaps fitting that a 32.7-metre modern classic motor yacht styled after the Dutch herring luggers of the early 1900s should land in a Dutch refit and maintenance specialist shipyard, and that’s exactly what happened in the Autumn of 2024. It was the start of November when Amsterdam Yacht Service hauled out Far Niente – built by SES Yachts in Turkey and originally launched early in 2024 – and transported it into one of AYS’s large, modern refit sheds.

The plan was to use the winter period to undertake a handful of modifications to the front of the superstructure as well as some seasonal maintenance, including refreshing the underwater paint, a respray of the inside of the bulwarks, some varnish upkeep and some interior redecoration. However, the project grew once the technically focused AYS team started works, with the focus shifting to systems upgrades around a rearranging of the engine room, work on the hydraulics for the passerelle, side boarding ladder and tender launch crane, a re-engineering of the yacht’s electronics with 80 percent of the systems replaced and overhauled, a readjustment of the engine gearbox, and redoing the anchor system.

“We knew some of the elements in advance, such as the hydraulics work, although there were some elements that were added to the list after we got stuck in,” says Robert Binnekade, managing director of AYS. “Essentially, most of the work list changed and the priorities shifted from the more fluffy elements such as the interior tweaks to the more technical. Fortunately our inhouse team is perfectly placed to take on all aspects of work, and it was our technical department that oversaw the redesign of the engine room layout and the electronics systems, for example. The hydraulics work was also intense – we ended up completely dismantling the passerelle, boarding ladder and crane to replace the hydraulics so they were like new.”

With work continuing through to Spring, and after the hull had received a fresh coat of antifouling, Far Niente went back in the water at the end of April in time for the start of the European season. “They started cruising quite a bit soon after we put her back in the water, and they are happy customers,” Binnekade concludes. “We’re happy too – we completed all the works we set out to do on her on the modified brief!”