Fifteen years after her keel was laid the 85m (278.8ft) explorer yacht VICTORIOUS has finally hit the water in Turkey.
The expedition vessel has had a long journey in every sense of the word since the laying of her keel in 2006, traversing the globe from Chile to New Zealand and finally to Turkey.
The yacht started life as 77m (252.6ft) Hull U-77, under the project name Gin Tonic II, at Marco Yachts in Northern Chile. However the shipyard ran into difficulties and the project stalled with the next update coming in 2011 when it was towed across the Pacific Ocean to a new owner in New Zealand. In early 2013 it was listed for sale but still unfinished.
In February 2016 it was announced she had been sold and in June 2016 she made her way to AK Yachts, a new shipyard in Turkey. By the time she arrived at the shipyard at the eastern end of the Marmara Sea she had traveled 37,000nm with zero hours on her engines. In March 2017 AK Yachts hauled her out and began work.
An extensive amount of work has been carried out over the intervening four years, including:
- Increasing her overall length to 85m (278.8ft)
- Adding an indoor pool to the lower deck beach club
- Expanding the Owner’s apartment on the bridge deck
- Replacing the sun deck with an enclosed top deck
- Overhauling the interiors
- Adding a fully soundproofed ten-seat cinema room which doubles as a video gaming room
- Swapping out two C9 generators for more powerful C18 465kW units
Other highlights of the six-deck superyacht include: a top deck ‘cigar lounge’ with walk-in humidor, wine cellar, bar and wood-burning fireplace; a 200 square meter (2152 sq. ft) beach club with massage room and a 5.5m x 2m (18ft x 6.5ft) heated swimming pool and an observation lounge the looks out over the touch-n-go helipad on the bow.
AK Yachts is carrying out final touches on VICTORIOUS, which can accommodate up to 20 guests across ten cabins, and then she will be ready to make the most of her maiden summer season in the Mediterranean after a 15-year-wait.
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World's Largest Yachts
With a Gross Tonnage of 2,291GT, superyacht VICTORIOUS unfortunately just missed out on the new, more accurate YachtBuyer YB100 Largest yachts by GT table despite her impressive internal volume, coming in below superyacht DREAMBOAT by just 650GT.
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