Watching a yacht come off a transport ship on slings never gets old. The crew rigs her, the crane takes the strain, and a 60-footer that crossed an ocean on deck swings out over the water like she weighs nothing. I’ve met boats this way in three different ports, and I still stop to watch every lift.
Yacht transport is how a boat crosses an ocean without putting hours on her engines or weather on her crew. She rides on the deck of a cargo ship, cradled and lashed, while her owner flies. For a lot of owners it beats running her on her own bottom: no fuel burn, no crew fatigue, no two weeks of weather risk — and the boat arrives without salt in every seam.
When transport beats the long way
If the boat is new to you and unproven, ship her. If the season is wrong for the route — hurricanes on one end, gales on the other — ship her. If the delivery would put eight hundred hours on engines you just had serviced, do the math on what those hours cost. Running on her own bottom is the right call when the route is kind, the boat is proven, and the owner wants the passage made.
What I check before she splashes
Before the slings come off I’m aboard with a list: seacocks closed the whole trip — open what needs to be open; batteries on and charged; engine room dry; rudder and shaft turning free; nav electronics powered up and finding satellites. Transport crews are good, but the boat is my responsibility the moment she touches water. Ten minutes with a checklist saves a very bad afternoon.
If you’re thinking about shipping a boat and want a second opinion on the quote or the prep, write to me — I’ve been on both ends of the lift.