Chartering for the first time
Bareboat, skippered or fully crewed
Should I charter a bareboat, take a skipper, or book a fully crewed yacht?
The short answer
Should I charter a bareboat, take a skipper, or book a fully crewed yacht?
Bareboat means you sail the yacht yourself and it starts around four thousand dollars a week for a monohull; it needs a certificate and, more importantly, a sailing resume the operator accepts. Skippered adds a professional at roughly two hundred dollars a day and removes every navigational decision. Fully crewed adds a captain, a chef and usually a stewardess, starts around sixteen thousand dollars a week on a catamaran, and turns the boat into a hotel that moves. The question that decides it is not budget: it is whether anyone in the group wants to be responsible for the yacht at three in the morning.
What each one is
| Bareboat | Skippered | Fully crewed | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who drives | You | A professional skipper | Captain and crew |
| Who cooks | You | You | A chef, to your preference sheet |
| Who cleans | You | You | A stewardess |
| Typical week, 14 m catamaran | $6,500 to $9,000 | add about $1,400 | from about $16,000 |
| Qualification needed | Certificate plus resume | None | None |
| Provisioning | You, or a delivered package | You, or delivered | Included via the APA |
| Best for | Experienced sailors, a crew of friends | Families who want the sailing without the responsibility | Anyone who wants a holiday rather than a passage |
Bareboat in the Andaman specifically
Phang Nga Bay is genuinely forgiving: sheltered water, good holding, short passages. It is one of the better places in the world to bareboat. But two local features are unfamiliar to a Mediterranean skipper.
- Real tidal range. The marinas at Boat Lagoon and Royal Phuket sit behind tidal channels, and several cave and lagoon entrances open and close with the tide. Passage planning here includes a tide table, which it does not in the Med.
- No anchoring on coral. National park anchorages use park moorings, and picking up a mooring in a crowded bay in a fresh northeasterly is a different skill from dropping a hook wherever you like.
The compromise most people miss: take a skipper for the first two days and sail the rest bareboat. Many operators offer exactly this. It costs a few hundred dollars, it converts a hesitant operator into a willing one, and it front-loads the local knowledge.
The honest case for fully crewed
The jump from skippered to crewed is not really about driving the boat. It is about the other nine hours of the day. Somebody provisions, cooks three meals, clears up, makes the beds, runs the tender, sets up the paddleboards, deals with the park rangers and knows that Maya Bay has a visitor cap and what to do when it is full.
On a bareboat, all of that is your holiday. Some people find that is the holiday. Others discover on day three that they have become the catering manager of a small floating hotel.
The question that actually decides
Not what you can afford. Ask instead: when the anchor drags at three in the morning in a squall, who gets up? If there is a clear and willing answer in the group, bareboat is a real option. If the honest answer is that everyone would look at each other, take the skipper.
Questions people also ask
- Can I charter a bareboat and hire a cook separately?
- Yes, several Phuket operators offer a hostess or cook as an add-on to a skippered charter. It is the cheapest route to something that feels crewed, at roughly a third of the step up to a properly crewed yacht.
- Is a skippered catamaran cheaper than a crewed one of the same size?
- Considerably, because the skipper sleeps in a cabin the guests would otherwise use and there is no chef, no stewardess and no provisioning service. The trade-off is that you still cook and clean.
Next
- Which sailing certificates Thailand actually accepts for bareboatWhat sailing licence do I need to charter a bareboat yacht in Phuket?
- How many cabins a group actually needsWhat size yacht do I need for my group?
- Who is in the crew and what each of them doesWhat crew does a charter yacht have and what do they do?
Last checked 6 September 2026. Rates, fees and regulations in this market change every season, so figures on this page are correct as at that date and not afterwards. How the figures are gathered.