Yacht Charter

Italy's most extraordinary places are not always on land. The Aeolian Islands at first light with Stromboli still smoking behind you. An anchorage under the Amalfi cliffs at dusk, after the day boats have gone. A cove in the Maddalena with no other vessel in sight, because you were there before the others woke.
 

These are places only a private yacht reaches, and only a properly chosen one does justice to. True Luxury Travels sources and manages charters across Italian and Mediterranean waters — from sailing yachts for two to crewed superyachts run as a floating residence for a week. We design the vessel, the route, the crew and the rhythm of the days.
 

And we tell you what it costs, what the rules allow, and what the sea may decide instead. That part matters more on this product than on any other we arrange.

Signature cruising routes

Italy has more than five thousand kilometres of coastline. These are the grounds that define private yacht travel in the Mediterranean — chosen for the quality of the anchorages and the density of what waits ashore.

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• Amalfi Coast and the Gulf of Naples — Capri, Li Galli, Ischia and Procida, with Positano and Amalfi reached from the water rather than the road. Berths are the constraint here, not anchorages: in August the marinas are spoken for months ahead.

• The Aeolian Islands — the volcanic arc. Panarea for the evening, Salina for the food, and Stromboli after dark, which is the single most extraordinary night at anchor in Italy.

• Sardinia — Costa Smeralda and the Maddalena Archipelago — the finest water in the Mediterranean and the most regulated. Zoned access, permits, and buoy fields where free anchoring once was.

• Sicily and the Southern Tyrrhenian — the Egadi, Ustica, the Baroque coast and Taormina from the sea, with crossings that reward a larger vessel.

• The Tuscan Archipelago — Elba, Giglio, Capraia, and Montecristo for those willing to plan around a permit issued in strictly limited numbers.

• The Ligurian Riviera — Portofino to the Cinque Terre, where the moorings are few, protected and worth securing early.

• The Ionian and Puglia by sea — the least chartered coast in Italy, and the one we increasingly recommend to guests who have already done the others.

Choosing the vessel

Twelve guests is the ceiling. Commercial charter yachts above twenty-four metres carry a maximum of twelve guests overnight regardless of size — a sixty-metre vessel and a thirty-metre vessel are capped identically, because carrying more triggers a far heavier passenger-ship regime. A larger yacht buys space, stability, crew ratio, tender and toy capacity and cabin quality. It does not buy berths. Parties above twelve need a second vessel cruising in company, or a shore base with the yacht used for days out — both of which we arrange, and both of which need deciding early.

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Sail or motor. A sailing yacht threads the Aeolian channels and anchors where a motor yacht will not; a motor yacht crosses to Sicily in an afternoon and holds a schedule. The question is not which is finer but whether your week is built around passages or around places.

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Crew before cabins. On a well-run charter the crew determine the week more than the specification does. We brief them properly — dietary requirements, preferences, occasions, the things nobody writes on a form — and we choose vessels whose crews we or our network know.