Voila 2.0

A few of you have been wondering why the lack of posts on social media of late. But rest assured, we have an excellent reason for our radio silence as we have been busy, very busy, applying the finishing touches to Voila 2.0; and then sea trialing her; before finally getting her safely up to Fiji.

Voila 2.0 was always planned to happen – even before we purchased her. Our boat shopping expeditions to Cannes, Spain, US and Mexico failed to turn up the perfect boat. However what we did discover was that Fountaine Pajot’s Saba 50 was pretty damn close and with a few tweaks here and there, we would get our dream boat.

But first we had to be patient and sail her around for a few years, so that we could definitively decide and confirm the changes we wanted to make. This led us to Marsden Cove Marina in New Zealand, where the work began. The first item on our agenda was to lengthen the swim steps. The first ever Saba we stepped onto in Saint-Tropez had a set of beautiful extended swim steps and that set this modification in motion.

At the same time, we also decided to sex it up a bit and go for a (slightly) reverse bow. As well as obtaining a more modern look, we also managed to achieve a noticeably more comfortable ride and some extra speed, with an additional 75mm on the front waterline and 890mm on the back.

Meanwhile inside the boat we were busily ripping out the gas from the galley and going all electric with a new induction stove top and a Breville Oven/Microwave./Air Fryer combo. We’ve gone with a non-slip overlay for the induction cooktop which stops the pots and pans sliding, but as you can see it is a bit hard to clean. We also added a dishwasher (after numerous complaints that I was a lousy dishwasher) and turned some difficult to use cupboards into a nice set of drawers. The removal of the large gas oven gave us some extra storage room (which we needed as the dishwasher took two existing drawers away).

One of the things we loved about La Mischief (our previous Lagoon 421) was that the whole Port hull was devoted to the owners, with a bathroom at the front and a stateroom at the back with a sliding door for privacy. Fountaine Pajot did not offer this configuration in the Saba 50. So we had to do it ourselves by ripping out the forward stateroom on our side and put in a dividing wall so that we could have storage on one side and a new bathroom on the other.

The existing bathroom from the old stateroom was converted into a huge shower, with the head moved into the new bathroom from the old one. At the same time we added a bidet sprayer (obviously to remind us of our time in Japan – but not quite so fancy).

To connect our master bedrom to the new bathroom and provide privacy, we went with a perspex sliding door, which was bent into shape so that it curved across the top. We haven’t yet been able to source a suitable lock so it’s still a work in progress. The old shower and toilet cubicles in the Master Staterom were then turned into additional wardrobes for Dee (as a girl cannot have too much hanging space – evidently!). Whilst we were at it, we converted some cupboard space into much more usable drawer space in our master.

For the past three years, I’ve had to put up with a couple of steps pertruding into the master, right above where I slept. The newer Fountaine Pajot’s have done away with these, opting for floating steps at the back. So that’s what we did – cut out the steps and built some floating steps at the back, with a full length portlight for added airflow. So much nicer. At the same time we had a custom made pocket spring mattress from Brownies and now we sleep like babies.

One of the most exciting things for me was a new dedicated electronics cabinet, in a void we found under the cooktop in the Master bedroom. It’s really nice having the Starlink, the Pepwave router, the Synology NAS, the BRNKL security system, the Predictwind Datahub and the Sonos Port (plus some of the powertool batteries on charge) all in a centralised and easily accessible spot.

On the subject of accessibility, we also installed a hinged backboard for the saloon TV, so we could get easy access to the winch controllers etc. behind the TV. No more removing the TV every time we wanted to get in there.

This was particularly useful when we were taking out the one manual winch and replacing it with a Harken Flatwinder for the traveller lines. Now we just have to push a button to take the traveller to Port and the other button to take it to Starboard. Too Easy!!!! It turned out to be a bigger job than expected as the BMS had to be upgraded to take the extra load. We also had an issue with its thermal overload not playing ball and Harken are sending a new motor under warranty up to us in Fiji. In the meantime we are being careful as we are using it without the thermal overload working.

With all our new electrical appliances on board, we needed to up our Solar charging capacity, with two new 550W Sunpower bifacial panels out the back of the existing panels. At the same time, we added a mount for the Starlink.

Up front, we put in a couple of extra portlights, for extra airflow in the tropics, plus the biggest deck hatch we could find for access into our brand new storage behind the new bathroom.

Talking of hatches, we added a new opening hatch at the side of the helm station so I can now see the Port aft corner of the boat when backing into a slip. Great for communication and airflow is a bonus. The other thing we did was to re-route the genoa furler line forward on a frictionless ring, with a new easily accessible jammer at the helm so it no longer traps us in the helm station when it is partially furled.

We also redid the lazy jacks with frictionless rings as it was previously impossible for Dee and I to wrangle it.

We relocated the dive compressor to the one and only lazerette it would fit into (after cutting some fibreglass away) so that it doesn’t overheat in the engine room and is a lot easier to manage. One less lazerette meant we required some additional storage for tools, which we found under the BBQ and where the old useless icemaker used to live.

Lastly, we extended the stainless steel backrest on the lido deck to accommodate some extra seating, together with a new cushion to make much more use of the seating upstairs.

So that’s it. I’ve probably missed the odd item but you can see we’ve been pretty busy. Now we are looking forward to enjoying the fruits of our labour cruising Fiji for the next couple of months in Voila 2.0.