We do hope you have enjoyed this week's characters as much as we have enjoyed writing them. The finale for the week (and we feel probably the one we have the most insight about) is the yachtie 'widow' girlfriend. With Tatler's recently published Yacht Guide 2015 in mind, Real Riviera is taking another look at the yachting characters you might encounter in the industry – an industry like no other.   The yachtie 'widow' girlfriend She usually works in recruitment, sales or marketing. A yachtie 'widow'is usually a girlfriend who has either retired from yachting or discovered that being on a yacht isn't quite for her so is working for a company within the yachting industry instead. She lives in her own place and her b...

LUXURY yachts and other shipping in the Mediterranean could come under attack from heavily armed Isis fighters using speedboats to conduct attacks from the Libyan coast, a former Royal Navy admiral warned this weekend. Rear Admiral Chris Parry said he feared the "super-rich" could be singled out as part of a piracy campaign that would threaten shipping from Gibraltar to Greece. "Yachting, any leisure activity, is going to be under threat," he said. "If I were the likes of the super-rich I would be getting a bit concerned about my physical security." Isis pirates would pose a greater danger than the Somalis who have attacked shipping in the Indian Ocean because they are better armed. "You are going to get them turning up with sur...

Elaine Bunting heads to the rescue co-ordination centre of Falmouth Coastguard where they handle six or seven rescue calls a day   On a headland outside the town Falmouth Coastguard station looks out to sea like a sentinel. Binoculars lie on the window ledge, but the days of watching, at least physically, are long gone. Inside the operations room, watch officers sit at two rows of desks. It could be any office apart from the air of calm and expectancy. They wait. They listen. For anyone who ever needs to be rescued far out into the Atlantic – sometimes even on the other side of the world – this is where the race to help begins. Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre (MRCC) Falmouth, aka Falmouth Coastguard, is one of the busiest rescue co-ordination centres in the...

Swarms of unmanned vessels successfully tested in Virginia· Technology inspired by fatal 2000 attack on USS Cole An unmanned boat operates during an Office of Naval Research demonstration of swarmboat technology on Virginia's James River. Photograph: John F Williams/AP Associated Press in Norfolk, Virginia Sunday 5 October 2014 13.41 BST Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share via Email Share on LinkedIn Share on Google+ Shares 576 Comments 29 Self-guided unmanned patrol boats that can leave warships they are protecting and swarm and attack potential threats on the water could join the navy's fleet within a year, defence officials say, adding the new technology could one day help stop attacks like the deadly 2000 bombing of the USS Cole off Yeme...

By Maarten Janssen, photo by Charl van Rooy   Seven Seas in Fort Lauderdale The 86.01 metre superyacht Seven Seas was delivered by the Dutch Oceanco shipyard in November 2010 and was designed by Nuvolari & Lenard with naval architecture by Azure Naval Architects. Seven Seas was built under the project name Y706 follows in the legacy of Oceanco's thriving Y700 generation that includes award winning yachts such as Amevi, Alfa Nero, Anastasia, Vibrant Curiosity, and Sunrays.

TOM HUNT/Fairfax NZ The 134-metre super-yacht Serene, docked at Queen's Wharf in Wellington. Conference and incentivesgoisrael-conference-and-incentive.com/Plan your next conference in Israel One place endless possibilities! A $431-million super-yacht owned by an exiled Russian vodka magnate has docked in Wellington. Parked up at Queens Wharf in Wellington, the yacht is drawing hoards of onlookers today. CentrePort marine services manager Charles Smith said non-disclosure documents meant he could not reveal how long the ship would remain in the capital. At 134 metres long - longer than New Zealand's two navy frigates and multi-role ship Canterbury - Serene is said to feature an internal seawater pool, two helicopter platforms and a helicopter h...

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) - Yachts are supposed to be white, so when a dark, angular, $33 million stealth ship pulls up at a local marina next to a bunch of fiberglass pleasure boats that haven't changed basic designs in 50 years, heads turn, cameraphones are raised, and questions are asked.  Answers, however, are not given. This week, what is believed to be the "Galeocerdo" was anchored off Sausalito.  The Cayman Islands flagged super yacht is described by Super Yacht Times  as a 118-foot, 17,000+ horsepower, 70 mile per hour jetboat tested in the Ferrari wind tunnel and built to do unbelievable things on the water by boat builder WallyPower for the Kondakji family, according to several blogs. It's the only one built yet in a class called the Wally...

If you want to know which are the best new production yachts out on the market at the moment, the best indicator is to look at the winners of the European Yacht of the Year (shown below). image: http://inspire-ipcmedia-com.s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/inspirewp/live/wp-content/uploads/sites/21/2015/01/Advanced-44-032.jpg Advanced Yachts 44 during European Yacht of the Year trials The European Yacht of the Year is the most thorough competition there is for production boats, the only one that comprises 11 different magazines, from 11 different European nations, testing 25 yachts in five different categories, over two weeks in two different seas. Following the running of the seatrials in the autumn of 2014, and the long jury discussions, the awards for the winners of ...

07:00 17 January 2015 Sophie Morton Nicole Scherzinger at the lauch of Sunseekers stand at the London Boat Show at Excel in Newham Picture by Ellie Hoskins What do Princess Anne and Nicole Scherzinger have in common? Comment Princess Anne meets representatives at the London Boat Show (picture: onEdition)The answer is a bit closer to home than you might think. HRH The Princess Royal and the former X Factor judge were among those attending the London Boat Show, which runs at the ExCel until tomorrow.The singer, who rose to fame with the Pussycat Dolls, cut the ribbon on board a Sunseeker yacht to launch the 10 day event.Princess Anne paid a visit on Wednesday to tour around the exhibition, meeting companies showcasing cutting-edge products and boats.Visitors at the London Boat Show ...

Practical advice for all sailors. Tom Cunliffe has sailed tens of thousands of miles all over the world and has been a Yachtmaster Examiner since 1978Earlier this summer I was obliged to leave my boat in a Plymouth marina for a week. Hurricane Bertha was powering along and locked-in Sutton Harbour was full.Despite paying top dollar, the berth that fell to my lot was clearly subject to surge, so the yacht was going to grind away at her fenders day after day. Bad news. The opposite berth was free so I was given dispensation to heave her clear of the pontoon with a couple of haul-off lines. Success.A week later, the fenders still hadn't touched the woodwork. If you find yourself making similar arrangements, be sure to dangle a rag off the outer line. An unwary nocturnal arrival might not s...