What interested me in this incoming vessel was its fleet:  Spliethoff, and the name–Dijksgracht–makes her a D-type. Her D-type fleetmates can be found here.  As to cargo, I imagined she might be bringing wood pulp.

But when she came into view, another secret was revealed:  she had a deckload of yachts on a voyage that left Turkey just before Christmas and Genoa just before New Years.  It seemed counterintuitive, however, that a yacht carrier was heading north up the North River and Hudson as snow was flying up there.  Boats in cold New York/Jersey are hauled out and shrink-wrapped now.

 

I can’t identify the make of the yachts, but that brand of tank forward is certainly Turkish.

Lines . . . design . . .

these yachts–with their interstellar styling–are not for me, even if I had the budget.

But what astounded me was the speed of the vessel . . .   it was doing 17 knots under the VZ and continued with astonishing speed farther upriver.

Who knows . . . maybe there’s a snow regatta upriver somewhere.

If you’re interested, the “gracht” part of this name means “canal,” and trust me . . . pronouncing the “cht” in the western Netherlands dialect involves some “throat-scraping” you might say.

 

 

As the vessel passed the Javits Center midday today, I was wondering if any of these will be transported back here for the upcoming boat show in two weeks . . .   Too bad there’s not a pier right off Javits.

All photos, WVD.

The Spliethoff Group is comprised of other fleets such as BigLift;  you might recall BigLift Baffin was in town a few months back.  A smaller class of BigLift vessels all have names beginning with Happy, like Happy River, Happy Dynamic–which I caught hauling yachts out of the sixth boro, and a favorite Happy Buccaneer.  Two previous “gracht” vessels on this blog can be seen here. And a previous Dutch general cargo vessel with a deckload of sailing yachts . . .  here.