A visit to a superyacht

On Saturday Mr B and I had an early Christmas present – a visit to M5, one of the world’s biggest superyachts, and the one with the tallest mast in the world (see picture).

She’s been sitting in Falmouth Docks for several months now, having a refit with Pendennis Shipyard, and every time I look out of the window, I see her 89 metre mast towering over the docks.

We’d had a few trips in Echo to visit her – she’s 75.2 metres long and is incredibly sleek, majestic and utterly beautiful. But the thought of actually stepping on board was another thing altogether.

So on Saturday we headed down to the docks and met the captain on board. He showed us around, introducing us to “the second largest furler in the world”. So which is the biggest, we asked? He laughed and pointed to the bow. “There!”

When he asked us where we kept the sails on our boat, we didn’t like to say that Piran is a 12 foot fibreglass dinghy so we keep the sails on the mast. Instead we looked down into this huge room below decks that was purely for M5’s sails.

The engine room was also jaw dropping – could have been the size of Apollo’s – with the most amazing technology involved, and the bridge was also out of this world. This superyacht cost US$ 50 million to build, and the refit must be adding another few million to the bill.

It was an unforgettable privilege to go on board her, and I intend to be waving her off when she finally leaves. As Mr B said, this reflects another level of wealth. One that we couldn’t begin to comprehend.

So he bought me some chips on the way back.