She’s not the biggest all-carbon sport-fisher that Yachting Developments has built—that title remains with the 130-foot Lanakai the yard delivered in late 2018—but the new girl to come out of the yard in Auckland, New Zealand, is no slouch in terms of length.
Her name is Al Duhail. At 109 feet, she’s the yard’s second all-carbon sport-fisher. As you read this, she’s expected to have been delivered to her owner in time for the fishing season in the Seychelles, in the Indian Ocean.
The concept is “basically a global fishing boat,” says Ian Cook, managing director at Yachting Concepts. “You can go for extended, long periods and get in good fishing, as well as good cruising.”
The carbon construction, he says, helps to keep weight down, allowing for more fuel to be carried (and fishing range to be extended) without going overboard on displacement. The team isn’t releasing exact nautical miles yet, but they are talking about speed. Al Duhail’s twin 2,000 hp MTU V-16 2000 M96L engines are expected to get her to a 30-knot top end, with a 20-knot cruise.
Warwick Yacht Design, also in New Zealand, worked with the shipyard on interiors, exteriors and naval architecture. The two teams had worked together before, including on the 100-foot Quintessential, a partnership that apparently put Al Duhail’s owner at ease. “He gave us a pretty free run at what we wanted to do,” Cook says. “The team here had quite a big say in the way the systems all went together.”
Inside Al Duhail are five staterooms, all belowdecks, with the owner’s space amidships (the owner, an experienced cruiser, wanted to be in the most stable part of the boat).The decor, Cook says, is calming. “It’s an oak interior with a soft-tone palette, some blues and some creams,” he says. “It’s minimalistic.”
And while they’re not shown in the photograph on the previous page, two fighting chairs have been installed in Al Duhail’s cockpit, which also has tuna tubes, baitwells and ice makers sized to ensure the catch is kept cool.
Looking ahead, Cook says, Yachting Developments is shifting gears to thinking about America’s Cup festivities, which will happen in Auckland in March 2021. The yard is building a 30-foot foiling monohull that will be raced in the Youth America’s Cup. “It will be the prototype for what will be five or six boats used in the event,” Cook says.
