New Reviews...

We've got a few new reviews in the works, but we are on hold awaiting sea trials. YF's splash page is going to get stale. I make no apologies. It's a much needed break.

We had three sea trials scheduled for the month following FLIBS, but each of them were been postponed for one reason or another. We're hoping to get offshore in January.

In the interim, the YF editorial crew took a cruise through Ft. Lauderdale over the holidays and we're about to go live with something fun and never done. We put five writers on the water for an unbridled look at big boats. The result is some colorful commentary that left a few boats capsized in our wake.

Should land on the splash page in the next couple of days...

The first of these postponed sea trials commences tomorrow. Chuck, Judy and myself are joining Chris Caswell (who is writing for Yachting), aboard Horizon's new PC58 cat. This was the busiest boat at FLIBS 2011 and for good reason. Horizon hit a home run in design, layout and ergonomics. It's a bit pricey, but hey... you're getting two hulls for the price of one.

The only other mid-size cat I've seen that stood out in the marketplace was the Afri-Cat, built by Richard Ford. Horizon tapped into that knowledge and hired Ford as a consultant and build engineer for this boat. The sea trial tomorrow should tell the tale of how well this worked out. This will be the next review to go live, but I need 7-10 days to bring the editorial together... and that's pushing it.

The next review is Cheoy Lee's 76' Express. This was the other boat that stood out at FLIBS, and for a lot of reasons. Designed by Michael Peters, it is CL's first foray into the 'statement sector' and they did an outstanding job. A lot of neat new ideas on this boat and CL is ramping up to build the flybridge version soon. I'm not a big express fan, but this boat could make me a believer. Much like Lazzara's LSX series... these are express boats you can live with and live aboard. More importantly, Cheoy Lee is a company you can count on for after sales service and warranty.

The next sea trial is a surprise. More on this later. Sorry for letting the splash page get stale. The last quarter of 2011 presented some personal challenges that left YF in last place on my priority list.

Postponed again! We arrived at Bahia Mar yesterday as the PC58 was returning from a sea trial with PMY, but then a tranny problem gave us the shaft, sorta speak. We've got enough info to get started on editorial, but the sea trial will have to wait until next week, which means this review will be further delayed before going live.

Processing the pics now. Bet you didn't know it takes me 4-6 hours to process pics for each review. They have to be selected, cropped, color/contrast adjusted, sharpened, reduced, labeled and sequenced. In some cases, coded and watermarked too. I believe images are not only a reflection of the builder, but the quality of reviews we present on YF. It's doubtful that readers notice it, but it's important to me and hopefully readers associate a certain level of excellence with YF, albeit subliminal.