I just received a press release with this headline: “Cruise on Your Own Affordable Private Yacht by Picasso Tours & Cruises.”

This press release caught my attention for two reasons. First, I’ve never heard of Picasso Tours & Cruises in the yacht charter industry. Second, very few proper private yachts use the word “affordable” in their press releases, even if it’s the truth.

So I did a little digging. It turns out that Picasso is a California-based tourism company, not a yacht charter agency at all. And the private yachts it’s promoting–at the bargain-basement rate of $275 per person for a week–are Turkish gulets, or motorsailers. These particular gulets (pronounced goo-LAYs) are no bigger than 80 feet long and carry as many as 24 passengers at a time.

Let’s break that information down. I have no problem with gulets, per se. There are several beautiful ones cruising in Turkey, including one that I’m hoping to get onboard later this summer for a feature on CharterWave.

But the rate for these particular gulets seems way off to me. At $275 for a week, you’re paying $39 a day. You can’t even eat in nice restaurants for $39 a day, let alone get onboard a nicely maintained, proper charter yacht with a professional crew and chef. By comparison, bareboats that you drive yourself cost more than that, closer to $600 or $700 a week per person, at least.

Red flag number two is the number of passengers these gulets carry. International regulations say that proper charter yachts can carry no more than 12 guests at a time. That’s what makes them yachts, as opposed to mini-cruise ships. That this press release promotes boats carrying 24 guests should make bells go off in your mind. Proper 80-foot charter yachts usually carry six guests, eight at the most.

I know that these kinds of press releases can be enticing. Editors who just don’t know any better sometimes turn this kind of information into promotional newspaper and magazine articles.

To protect yourself, try to read between the lines. Yes, you may want to visit Turkey by charter yacht, but you definitely don’t want to be onboard a turkey of a charter yacht.

Stick with reputable charter brokers instead of tourism companies offering discount packages. You’ll have a far better vacation experience.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 13th, 2007 at 8:58 am and is filed under Destinations, charter tips, Travel Agents, Boating Terms. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.