Yacht charter in Salerno · Bali - Catana — Bali 4.4 (2022)

The boat was excellent. The issue we faced was that the charter agency probably is used to the typical tourists that want to explore the islands and don’t really care about how the boat gets there …. We had clearly stated that our main objective for the week was to get to know the boat and to sail - even if “in a circle” as we did not have any specific destinations in mind. Because we plan to buy a catamaran, we are doing research by renting different types cats that are on our list. Because we are only 2 persons and still lacking some experience sailing catamarans, we paid extra for a skipper that knows the area and can show us how to handle the boat. That was utterly pointless as he obviously preferred to only motor plus go from Marina A to Marina B to hang out …. ! The weather was not optimal and there was some swells, but coming from Norway and Australia , this was still totally fine for sailing in our experience, but for the first couple of days we complied with the skipper’s advice when he said no - as we assumed there was bad weather ahead . But from the third day, we figured it was more en excuse that real concern, but whenever we requested to leave a Marina to sail - it was “not possible”. One the 5th day, the skipper agreed to sail, however declined to open the mail sail and just unfurled the jib for 15 minutes…. It was 15 km wind……. 15 min in 7 days!!! Check in was from 6 pm and we arrived at 2 pm so we paid 200 Euros for early check in - plan was to eat and do provisions before heading out, and having early access to the boat to “lay out things out” and stack the provisions would be beneficial. Having not eaten since 5 am also meant that we were starving and hypoglycemic, so we informed the charter rep that we would eat prior to getting the transport to the grocery shop that they organized . Then the messages starting coming that we had to head out at 3 pm - hurry, hurry !! Bad weather was coming so skipper told us yo go, and I had to insist to eat my pizza as totally hypoglycemic. Was almost made to feel like we were stupid tourists that doesn’t understand weather conditions . Our trip to get provisions was very rushed and we wondered what would have happened if we actually came to the real check in time at 6 pm. When we motored out about 4 pm, the weather was totally fine and remained so for the 6 hours of motoring to our first island. The rest of the week, we felt like being on a ferry that just went from A to B with no respect for any of the wishes that we tried to communicate several times until we gave up. Maybe we were too polite but we don’t want to fight with one that shared a small space with us for a week….. So renting the boat without skipper probably would have been a better idea as anyone can motor ….. Then we had to come back to Salerno the day before end of the rent period, which wasn’t a big deal - but of course “our ferry” docked at 2 pm rather than 5 pm as again no sailing “possible” and then the electricity to the hot water and AC was disconnected so couldn’t even have a shower on board on Friday evening and we were lucky it wasn’t to hot in the cabin . These are just some examples and all with the charter agency and nothing wrong with the boat. So overall - or objectives for the trip was not met and it was a rather expensive ferry experience . The boat is definitely great to stay in and having the door in the front and the “garage door” in the back really made it cost on the rainy days .