27/05/2026
𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭’𝐬 𝐀𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐈𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐚 𝐂𝐫𝐞𝐰𝐞𝐝 𝐘𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐭 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐫?
By Warren East, Captain & Co-Founder, East Yachts · Circumnavigating aboard Che
Most people come to charter having done a lot of research. They’ve read the websites and looked at the price lists. What they often haven’t found is a straight answer to the practical questions — the ones that determine whether they’ll actually enjoy the week or spend it worrying about what’s on the bill.
The Basics
What does the charter fee actually cover?
The base charter rate covers the yacht itself and the crew — their time, expertise, and labor for the full duration of your trip. That includes the captain planning your route and handling the boat, the chef cooking your meals, and any additional crew managing the sails, tenders, and daily housekeeping.
What it doesn’t cover is the running cost of operating the boat while you’re aboard — fuel, provisioning, marina fees, and port dues. These come from a separate sum called the APA, which you pay in advance. The APA is yours; whatever isn’t spent comes back to you at the end of the trip.
Think of the charter fee as the cost of the crew’s time and the boat’s use. The APA is the operating budget. They’re two different things, which is why the headline rate always needs that context.
What is the APA and how much should I budget for it?
The APA — Advance Provisioning Allowance — covers variable operating costs: fuel, food and drink, marina fees, port dues, cruising permits, and any activity costs outside the base rate.
The standard estimate is 25–35% of the charter fee depending on the type of yacht you select, though the actual figure varies significantly depending on where you’re sailing, how far you travel each day, and how you eat and drink. A week of calm anchorages with modest passages costs less than a week of long overnight legs or time in busy marinas.
I always give clients a realistic APA estimate based on their specific itinerary before they commit — not a formula, an actual estimate based on the route, speed of navigation and engine size. Whatever isn’t spent is refunded. It’s not a fee; it’s a float. You see the receipts, and the accounting is transparent at the end of the trip.
Is food included?
The chef is included. The provisioning — the cost of the food and drink itself — comes from the APA. The practical effect is that you get all meals prepared for you daily, with provisions sourced prior to boarding or fresh at each stop, and the cost flows through the operating account rather than appearing as a restaurant tab.
Before departure, the chef will work through dietary needs, preferences, cuisines, and any restrictions with each guest. The menus are built around your group, not a set rotation.
Alcohol sits in a similar position — provisioned through the APA. Most crews will stock what you ask for and track consumption through the operating account. If you have specific preferences — particular wines, spirits, ch*****ne — name them early and they’ll be sourced before departure where possible.
The Crew
How many crew will be on board, and what do they do?
Crew complement scales with the boat. A 50-foot monohull may carry a captain-chef alongside a first mate. Larger vessels from 80 feet upward typically carry a full team: captain, mate or deckhand, chef, and at least one steward or stewardess.
On a 115-foot catamaran, you’d expect four to six crew covering navigation and seamanship, all cooking and galley work, cabin servicing and interior housekeeping, water sports supervision, and tender operation for shore excursions.
The captain’s role goes beyond handling the boat. Engineering, Route planning, weather routing, customs and immigration paperwork, managing the APA accounts, coordinating with local marinas — that’s all on the captain as well as general oversight of every department on the yacht. Guests don’t have to think about any of it unless they want to.
The crew dynamic matters as much as the boat specification. When you’re all sharing the same space for a week, a professional, warm family oriented crew is the difference between a trip that feels effortless and one that has awkward edges.
Are gratuities included?
No. Gratuity is separate from both the charter fee and the APA. It’s not obligatory, but it’s industry standard and crews rely on it as a meaningful part of their compensation.
The convention is 10–20% of the charter fee, paid directly to the captain at the end of the trip, who distributes it among the crew. If you had an exceptional experience, 15–20% is appropriate. The captain will not bring it up; it’s left entirely to the client’s discretion.
Worth factoring into your overall budget before you book rather than after — it catches people off guard if no one mentioned it beforehand. A good broker will tell you upfront.
The Experience
What water toys and equipment come with the boat?
It depends on the vessel, and this is worth checking specifically rather than assuming. Most crewed charters include paddleboards, kayaks, snorkeling gear for all guests, a dinghy or tender for shore runs, and fishing gear in many cases.
Mid-range and larger vessels often add wakeboards, towables, water skis, and sometimes a jet ski or foil board. Dive equipment — tanks, BCDs, regulators — is less common as a standard inclusion, partly for insurance reasons. If diving is important to your group, ask early.
When I’m matching a charter to a client, I always check the toy list against what the guests actually want to do. There’s no point booking a boat for a group of keen divers if the dive gear isn’t aboard and can’t be arranged.
Who decides where we go?
You decide the broad shape — which region, which islands, what pace — and the captain handles everything else. Before departure, the captain sits down with guests to understand priorities: do you want to cover distance, or stay put in one bay for three days? Do you prefer local shopping and restaurants ashore, or prefer to stay on the boat? Are there specific anchorages or diving spots that matter to you?
From there, the captain builds the route. Weather, sea state, local knowledge, and timing all factor in. The itinerary isn’t rigid — if the anchor drops somewhere exceptional, you stay. If conditions shift, the route adjusts.
After years of sailing waters in most charter destinations, I know which anchorages are worth the detour and which ones have gotten crowded and commercial. That local intelligence is part of what you’re paying for and why my customers come back to East Yachts year after year to book their next yacht vacation.
What does a typical day look like?
There’s no fixed format, which is part of the appeal. Guests wake when they like. Breakfast is served when you’re ready. The crew has usually been up for an hour or two before anyone emerges. Passage decisions are made with the morning weather, and the boat moves when it makes sense — not to a timetable.
Afternoons tend to be anchored. Guests swim, paddle, snorkel, or simply sit with a drink and watch the water. The chef is preparing dinner. The crew is running a tender ashore for fresh provisions or running excursions here and there.
Evenings are the best part. Dinner on deck, sometimes with other boats nearby, sometimes completely alone in an anchorage nobody else seems to know about. The pace drops. There’s no check-out time and no other guests walking past your table.
The thing people don’t fully appreciate until they’ve done it: you wake up somewhere different every morning. The view from your cabin changes overnight while you sleep. That never gets old.
Money & Planning
What’s not included that surprises people most?
Gratuity catches people off guard most often — especially after a week of exceptional service. A good broker tells you upfront.
The other common surprise is scuba diving. Snorkeling is almost universally included. Scuba — tanks, fills, a dive master’s time — usually isn’t, for insurance and logistics reasons. If your group dives, assume it’s extra and ask what the arrangement is before you book.
Flights and transfers to the boat are also separate, which sounds obvious until someone in the group hasn’t factored it in. On a Pacific itinerary — Fiji, Tonga, French Polynesia — the flights are a real cost that changes the total number significantly.
How far in advance do I need to book?
Earlier than most people expect. The best boats in popular destinations — Caribbean high season, Mediterranean summer, Pacific island windows — book up six to twelve months out. Not the entire fleet; the boats people actually want, at the dates that work for their group.
Charter has gotten more accessible and more digital over the past decade, which has trained people to assume they can book a great trip three weeks out. Sometimes you can. But last-minute availability means working with what’s left, not what’s right for your group.
Book early and you have real choice — boat, crew, itinerary. Book late and you’re compromising somewhere.
Is a crewed charter worth the cost compared to other holidays?
The question worth asking isn’t whether it’s expensive — it is — but whether the math works for your group and the experience justifies the number.
When you split the total across a full group of six or eight, a week aboard a well-crewed yacht often compares favorably to the equivalent in resort costs, restaurant bills, activity fees, and transfers. The headline rate on a 70-foot yacht looks very different once it’s divided by eight people and measured against what they’d each spend on a comparable land holiday.
What you can’t replicate ashore: waking up in a different anchorage every morning, eating at your own table on deck with no one else around, spending the day on water that has no road access. The privacy alone — a group taking an entire private vessel to places most tourists can’t reach — is genuinely difficult to put a number on.
I’ve watched people talk themselves out of a charter they could afford because the headline rate scared them before they ran the real calculation. If the numbers might work for your group, it’s worth the conversation.
Warren East is a professional yacht captain and founder of East Yachts, a crewed yacht charter brokerage. He is currently captaining the 115-foot sailing catamaran Che on a circumnavigation. Currently available in Fiji for up to 6 guests.
