What’s it like working on a superyacht? What does a day in the life look like? What are the crew’s various responsibilities? What are some things to consider?
One thing to consider and note when speaking about working on a superyacht, is the context in which someone is working. For example, a day’s work while the superyacht is under refit in the shipyard will look much different to when the yacht is out at sea without any guests, which will also look much different when guests are aboard. For each of these circumstances there are different goals for the yacht crew. Considering these things, we asked some amazing superyacht crew what a day in the life, or a day on the job looks like and how it varies regarding these circumstances.
In our interviews we spoke to:
- Yacht Captain, Nic, from New Zealand
- Deckhand, Brian, from LA
- First Mate, Garreth from South Africa
- Chief Engineer, Troy from California
- Stewardess, Alexandra, from South Africa
- Chief Stewardess, Crystal, from New Zealand
What They Do
As First Mate
Gareth explained that as the first mate, he’s responsible for everything exterior. His responsibilities include keeping up with maintenance, doing drills, and taking care of safety aboard. The safety aspect of Gareth’s role has to do with running drills, spanning many scenarios. These scenarios range from fire, to medical, to pollution to “man overboard.”
Gareth expresses how everyone of these safety scenarios when and if they actually occur are pretty scary on board, because boats tend to sink or burn really fast so you have to be sure to react quickly.
As Chief Stewardess
Crystal mentions that a lot of people think when guests are not aboard, the superyacht crew are on vacation, owner’s even tend to think that, but this is not the case.
“In all reality, this is when we do most of our work.”
Crystal’s work consists of taking care of the common crew areas, guest areas, protecting the carpet with runners, detailing, inventorying, provisioning, and helping out the chef.
“We could be doing anything from polishing faucets to cleaning up lunch.”
This is what Crystal’s role looks like without charter guests aboard or while the superyacht is stationed in the shipyard, but when it comes to preparing for a trip Crystal is provisioning. This means stocking up on food, alcohol, or anything else to make the trip more vibrant and fun, such as games even.
“Once the guests are on board, arrival day is a very busy day and from there, it’s getting into the rhythm of things interior wise.”
From this point on the girls then filter, up, down and around to their positions such as: laundry stew, service stew, and chief stew overseeing the service operations. The idea is to get all of the team face time with the guests and to learn leadership. Crystal adds how important it is as a part of the interior crew, to maintain open and consistent communication with all of the interior. This is especially important, in order to make certain that guests have the best possible experience.
As Chief Engineer
Troy explains how the main job of the Chief Engineer is to ensure that the boat runs smoothly and efficiently. This is crucial, not simply for upkeep of the vessel but for the safety of everyone on board.
“If anything on board breaks or anything happens, your job as engineer is to maintain it and ensure that it’s running to its full potential.”
Troy explains how different his job is than the average person, say, maintaining their home and changing out light bulbs. On a superyacht it’s not just changing a light bulb, but it’s finding where that light fixture came from. Whether it was: Italy, France, Australia, etc, the engineer then must figure out if the manufacturer still makes it, if they’ve changed it and if it has to be adjusted. All these details go into the simple changing of a lightbulb. This is an example of simply changing a light fixture, which points to the complexities that go into Troy’s job. Troy also explains that in order to run a super yacht there is shore power that plugs into a dock, kind of like an RV would to a campsite. But, while at sea the boat’s electricity comes from powerful generators and the chief engineer is responsible for all of these machines.
As Yacht Captain
The Yacht Captain wears many hats, it’s really a combination of many roles, explains Nic.
“A normal day looks like connecting with the crew in different departments and understanding what the goal of the day is to achieve and ensuring that that goal is met.”
While there are no guests on board there is planned maintenance, making sure the boat is maintained to the highest level and achieving this all within a certain time frame and budget. When guests are on board, the focus is different and becomes more about the guest’s program for the day, what the boss wants, or what the principle charter guests expect for their day.
As A Deckhand
Brian explains that when guests are on board, his role revolves around what those guests want. This usually consists of a lot of beach set ups, which looks like the crew waking up early, going to a beach and setting it up with chairs, barbecue equipment and an array of water toys. These toys include: boats, tenders, an assortment of things to tow (e.g. tubes, water-skis, and wakeboards), seadoos, seabobs, etc. Outside of charter, Brian explains that the focus of his role is really about maintaining the boat. This maintenance includes full wash down of the superyacht (which can take 1-2 days), this includes polishing the stainless, making sure the teak decks are cleaned, and guaranteeing that there is no sign of salt water anywhere (ironically in a salt-drenched environment).
As A Stewardess
Stewardess Alexandra explained how at the moment, the superyacht she’s working on, is at the shipyard going through a refit. In her instance, due to the circumstance, this means that all the crew live in crew houses, which changes her duties a bit.
“The boys will go to the boat every morning and the girls will stay behind and do laundry, what’s necessary in the kitchen and bathrooms, and give the house a clean.”
When the girls are finished with these duties, they go aboard and have a whole other list of duties to accomplish. Even the best shipyards are dirty places by nature, meaning the boat gets quite dusty. So as a stewardess Alexandra and her team work to protect the interior, allow the working areas to have repairs or upgrades accomplished, and then put the interior back together and detail it to perfection. Alexandra doesn’t only work as a stewardess, but is also a beauty therapist, and does treatments on board. So while guests are on board, part of her job is to give treatments such as massage or facials.
These impressive superyachts don’t just run on their own. They are held to the highest standard of cleanliness and luxury, so it truly takes a team to run these vessels at their full potential and for the crew to pamper the guests aboard. Whether it’s maintaining the boat, or meeting the needs of the principle charter guests, every role is important.
Thank you to those who we interviewed, we appreciate you and all you do!
If you have any questions regarding working on a yacht, or if you’re looking to hire crew then check out our crew placement page!
