Blue Book of Boats

The world’s largest aluminum luxury motor yacht NOMAD (ex Floridian and Aussie Rules) was featured in the movie “Killers” starring Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl. Nomad was built in 2003 by OceanFast of Australia, and has undergone a superb refit in mid 2005. Designed for long range exploration and comfortable cruising, it has a cruising range of 8,000 nautical miles. She is one of the most impressive and famous yachts available for charter with a massive collection of toys, tenders, fishing and dive equipment; in addition to swimming pool, wet bar, cinema and a helicopter landing pad.

In the movie Killers, there is a scene showing Spencer Aimes (Ashton Kutcher) sneaking onto a boat (The Nomad), putting a time bomb on the bottom of a helicopter, then taking out a guard. He then swims back and goes on the date with Jen (Katherine Heigl). (Photo on left shows Spencer (Ashton Kutcher) getting out of the boat through the anchor hawsepipe by grabbing hold of the anchor chain.

For technical data and interior photos on the yacht Nomad, check out Blue Book of Boat Listing. Charter rate for this yacht – ball park figures around $490,000 to $650,000 US dollars per week depending on hi or low season.

Imagine James Bond in the movie Casino Royale, sailing on the Spirit 54, entering the canal of Venice with glamour Bond girl Vesper Lynd played by Eva Green. Charter vacationers can now share this fantasy of hot sun and turquoise water because the Spirit 54 is now available for charter in Marmaris, Turkey. At a charter rate of approx. US$5700 a week may be pricey, but the Spirit 54 has two cabins and a salon, and can easily accommodate six guests, likely four adults and two youngsters who can camp on the salon.

Surrounded by seas on 3 sides, Black Sea to the North, Aegean Sea to the West and Mediterranean Sea to the South Turkey is becoming a popular sailing charter destination.

Geographically, it has Russia to the North, Central Asia to the East, European Union to the West and the Middle East to the South.

Sailing in Turkey is smooth because there is no open sea, and no tides or currents to contend with. The sailing season starts from April and ends in October. July and August tends to get very hot.

Read more about the Spirit 54 and view photo images of James Bond and Versper Lynd aboard the Spirit 54.

I am staying at the Swissotel in Sydney, Australia and spending time with Australian relatives.

Sydney is a beautiful city, prices are very high compared to Vancouver.

I am waiting for my flight home.  I had a wonderful adventure.  I am ready to come home.

The ship sails up the Brisbane River to the heart of the city. The last time I was here, in 1988, it struck me as a pretty but sleepy place with a lot of lovely Victorian era cottages. There has been simply tremendous development since then and Brisbane is now a vast modern metropolis. It has many tall buildings, parks and gardens, sophisticated culture, shopping malls and freeways. It looks affluent in an upper middle class way. I didn’t see any slums or signs of poverty, but not much sign of really high end wealth either. There are far fewer expensive cars like BMW and Mercedes than we see at home, and I saw only one Bentley.

We were picked up at the ship by a friend of Peggy and Mary, Aussie Dave, who they met on their Antarctic cruise. He is a tall, jovial guy with a bald head and a ready smile. He picks us up in a 1964 Holden Estate. It has about a million miles on it, but it is his daily driver.Later he tells me it has been restored twice, but it looks pretty original to me. Rough. It has 4X100 air conditioning. Roll down all four windows and drive 100 kmh. It works. Except the car is so old the speedo reads in miles.