Pursuit Of Passion
Power and Motoryachts|August 2017

A LABOR OF LOVE FOR HER OWNERS—AND THOSE WHO BUILT HER—THE HUNT 72 WAS DESIGNED TO EXCEED EXPECTATIONS.

Daniel Harding Jr.
Pursuit Of Passion

Walking along the bulkhead in West Palm Beach, my head was on a swivel trying to find the Hunt 72 I was scheduled to test. I recognized a similar lost look ahead of me in the face of Hunt President Peter Van Lancker.

“I think we’re looking for the same boat,” he offered with a handshake.

“Well at least I know I won’t be late.”

We continued making small talk as we set out in search of the 72—in itself not a difficult task. With a dark blue hull and gleaming teak everywhere, she stands out like a haystack in a pile of needles.

Our conversation wandered from the weather (it was beautiful) to the Palm Beach boat show that concluded a couple days prior, to travel schedules. Van Lancker had been in Palm Beach for the show, then returned home to Rhode Island for a spell, only to return for our test.

“You’re a man on the move,” I suggested. “It’s a lifestyle, not a job. If this was a job it would be impossible,” he replied with a laugh. This was unfiltered, off-the-cuff Van Lancker, who wasn’t spinning a line he thought would look good in print. No, it was clear: As we spotted the boat and made our way toward it, he meant what he said.

Climbing aboard the 72, I was reminded of the first time I met the boat at the Newport International Boat Show months earlier. She towered above her siblings—a mix of runabouts and weekenders— like a protective older sister. She shared a resemblance to the other models, but it was also apparent this boat was different.

Third in Hunt’s line of Ocean Series yachts, which includes a 68 and 80, and the result of a collaboration between Hunt Yachts and Taiwan’s Global Yacht Builders, she is a semicustom boat.

This story is from the August 2017 edition of Power and Motoryachts.

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This story is from the August 2017 edition of Power and Motoryachts.

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