5/6/2023 0 Comments Watson news explorer![]() ![]() “It’s nice – because of my age, nobody sees me as a threat to their career. ![]() “When I qualified with my 3,000 ticket I was desperate to go off on trips so I brought a few superyachts across the Atlantic as a relief watch officer,” he explains. Watson’s other “hobby”, which he is hoping to return to shortly, is doing stints of relief work on larger superyachts. Inside she is really well appointed and fitted out, people are taken aback when they come inside by the level of workmanship.” “She may look a bit like a warship from the outside but that is just a skin. “We have joked in the past about making a plywood gun for the front and then covering it, so we look armed as well.” However, Watson warns not to judge a book by its cover. You also tend to get mistaken for a government boat, which makes it easier in terms of worrying about piracy,” Watson explains. “I rather like her raw aluminium look because you don’t constantly have to polish it. As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic his adventure aspirations were temporarily curtailed, but Grey Wolf’s rugged appearance ensures that she still gets plenty of attention in her home port. On the second time around Watson opted to let his captain return the yacht to Guernsey, leaving her in the Falkland Islands. “However, I suspect because of Covid-19 she might get into travelling more with us to some of these remote locations, because that would be the sensible way of going.” “She loves seeing the wildlife, but she tends to fly in, tour for a few days and then leave me to it,” he says. Judith, “the true boss”, joined for parts of the trip, including Antarctica. With its three guest cabins, the new Grey Wolf also made it easier for friends and family to spend time on board. Superyacht owner Anil Thadani on the highs and lows of Arctic Cruising.I remember one of the simulations was driving a boat out through iceberg-scattered Aberdeen, which was quite amusing.” “In the mornings we did theory, and in the afternoons, we would go on the simulator. This led him to Kittilä in Finland, which is one of the few places in the world that has a suitable simulator. “During that period, I had obviously been building up time in ice conditions, so I thought I had better go off and become a qualified ice pilot,” Watson explains. That wasn’t the end of the first Grey Wolf’s adventures, and as well as spending time with family in the Mediterranean, Watson also took her on trips to Norway, the Baltic and Svalbard. We had some great adventures along the way.” “It was my first real experience with a boat that was designed to do a bluewater ocean crossing. “I was very fortunate that I managed to assemble a fairly good team,” he says. Watson assembled a crew of two friends – one of whom was a retired naval architect, the other a former merchant navy engineer – and two apprentices to sail the yacht back via the Panama Canal to Guernsey. This was the first Grey Wolf and was built by Circa Marine to a Dashew Offshore design. ![]()
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