Southern Wind builds performance cruisers in Cape Town for owners who want to arrive under sail rather than under power, and Farfalla is a clean example of the type. Her hull and deck are carbon and epoxy, her lines came from Farr Yacht Design, and Nauta drew both the deck plan and the interior. Delivered in 2014, she is 31.78 metres of boat that will hold ten knots upwind without anyone raising their voice.
What that means for a charter week is simple: the sailing is not a photo opportunity. Passages between islands are made under canvas because it is faster and quieter that way, and the crew of five is sized to work the boat properly rather than to serve canapes while the engine runs. Guests who want the wheel get it.
Her deck is the giveaway. Everything to do with sail handling – winches, tracks, lines – is arranged so it does not cross the guest areas, which leaves a run of flush teak from the cockpit forward that is unusually clear for a boat this size. The result is a foredeck you can actually use, and a cockpit under a bimini that seats eight around a single table without anyone straddling a runner. At anchor the transom folds down into a teak bathing platform with the water a step away, and the tender and toys come out from underneath it.
Inside, Nauta’s work is warm and quiet: pale oak, white deckheads, blue linen and long horizontal window bands under a skylight that runs most of the saloon. The saloon and dining are one open space rather than two, an L of settees forward around a low table and the dining table just aft, so the room stays light and nobody eats in a separate box. It is a layout that suits eight people who know each other.
The galley sits forward of the saloon, open to a small crew mess and properly equipped for long passages rather than marina catering. Opposite it, the navigation station is a working chart table with a full electronics stack, a pilot berth alongside and the kind of detail – barometer, clocks, a working chart table – that tells you the boat is used.
Four cabins sleep eight. The master takes the after end of the accommodation with its own bathroom and a settee under the hull windows. A guest double sits opposite, and two twins follow, all in the same oak and cream with individual heads. There is no compromise berth in the layout, which for a 32-metre sailing yacht is worth noting.
She works the western Mediterranean through the summer and crosses to the Caribbean for the winter, which is the classic pattern and the right one for a boat of her range. Farfalla suits a group of eight who want the yacht to be part of the holiday rather than the backdrop to it – who will take a reef in at four in the afternoon, anchor off an empty beach, and put the tender in the water before the sails are even flaked.
