Most sea trials of big, glamorous craft like this Sunseeker 100 Yacht take place in the Mediterranean for good reason. When the sun is out, the sea is flat and you're surrounded by beautiful scenery, it's hard not to fall for the charms of anything this large and luxurious. But the true test of a boat's mettle comes when the wind is whipping across the foredeck, the sea is a roiling mess and the sun is setting over a grey and foreboding Solent. These were the very conditions facing us as we set off from Southampton bound for Poole the evening after the Southampton Boat Show. A starker contrast to the boat's unveiling at the Cannes Yachting Festival almost exactly a year earlier would be hard to imagine but as the crew scurried around packing, wrapping and taping anything that wasn't already nailed down, we were excited to see how such a glamorous craft would cope when faced with such inhospitable conditions.
Before we get to that, though, it's worth explaining why the 100 Yacht makes such a tempting proposition for warmer climes. In contrast to rivals such as the Princess X95, WallyWhy 200 and Ferretti Infynito, which prioritise interior volume over exterior deck space, the Sunseeker 100 has a more even split between the two. It still packs a voluminous interior with that all-important main deck owner's suite, four further guest cabins and a raised pilothouse bridge, but it's the outside spaces that still shine brightest. That starts at the stern where the vast garage is designed to swallow a formidable arsenal of toys, including a Williams Sportjet 460, Sea-Doo GTX 255 jetski and a couple of Seabobs, but once vacated can also be converted into a sheltered beach club. Or you can close the garage door and deploy Sunseeker's clever X-TEND seating system as a pair of sea-level sunloungers or raise it up so that it becomes an extension to the aft cockpit.
CASCADING LEVELS
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