Capt. Matt Hardy
Sailing yacht Nikata

Date interviewed: December 2007

How did you realize you wanted to become a captain?
At the tender age of 1 day old, I was with my dad, who is quite an antisocial chap. All the relatives wanted to meet me, but he put me on a 33-foot sailboat and sailed me off from Poole, in England, where we lived. I started racing when I was 9, and I won the Formula 18 Racing Championship, the catamaran class.
     When I was 11 years old, I wrote an autobiography for school that said I wanted to earn my living from sailing. I later went to university for business and maritime law, and I was keen on the degree, but the suit and tie weren’t for me. I also liked racing, but not the politics of big-time racing. So I did my yachtmaster ticket when I was 21 years old, and that gave me the option of being a captain.

What yachts did you work on before Nikata?
I did some day charters for local businessmen beginning when I was 21. Then I did a delivery across the Atlantic Ocean in 2003, in a Swan 60 sailboat, to St. Lucia. After that, I flew up to Antigua and joined the industry.
     I got on the 23-meter [75-foot] J-Class sailing yacht Cambria as a deckhand. She was a private boat that did a lot of racing. That boat sold in the Mediterranean, so I got onboard the Dixon 65 Liara to do another transatlantic. That’s where I met Ayla Lewis, who was the chef onboard. We got together as a couple in May 2004 while sailing from Antigua to Gibraltar, and we eventually did another transatlantic together.
     In December 2004, I joined the 72-foot sailing yacht Pacific Wave, which is where I became a captain. I was 23. It was a private boat, but the owner’s friends were onboard often, which is similar to charter. He was an aristocratic Englishman, into hunting and proper sports, so it was service to a high standard.
    I sailed that yacht from Falmouth Harbour in Antigua to Falmouth in England in April 2005, and a month later I took over the 67-foot sailing yacht Aurora in Newport, Rhode Island. That was my first charter boat. We did New England up to the Canadian border, then down all around the Caribbean for charters.
     In June 2006, Ayla and I took off for home to race a bit and rest. She went to Le Cordon Bleu to study, and I got my MCA 200-ton license. In November 2006 I delivered the 115-foot sailing yacht Sojana to Antigua and did a couple of weeks of charter in the Grenadines as a first mate.

When did you join your current yacht?
In February 2007, I joined Nikata. She’s an 82-foot Swan sailing yacht that was built in 2005, but that didn’t start chartering until the summer after I came onboard, in the Mediterranean.
     We covered about 12,000 miles that summer, from England all the way to Turkey, with six weeks of owner use and eight weeks of charter.

What do you think makes Nikata’s crew unique or special?
The teaching side of things helps us stand out. I thoroughly enjoy teaching people to sail. If people want to drive the boat, I’ll teach them how. And if people want to push the boat hard, we can.
     Of course, we can also let the guests sit back and drink gin and tonics, too, if that’s what they want.

Describe a typical guest’s day onboard Nikata.
There really isn’t a typical day. We can cover a lot of miles, but only if the guests want to. We try to judge what they’re after, and we make no assumptions. We try to be flexible about changing things as we go.

What are some of your favorite cruising destinations, and why?
I like the variety of the Mediterranean. The cultural changes you can find there are just brilliant.
     And Maine, that isolated coastline is just spectacular.

What else should CharterWave readers know about you and Nikata?
In general, this boat is a real sailing boat. It will out-perform almost any other boat on the charter market.

Nikata is part of the fleet at Nautor’s Swan. She takes eight guests with three crew at a weekly base rate of 32,000 euros. Contact any reputable charter broker to learn more.