Why are these yachts hanging out in Orange Beach and Gulf Shores?

John Mullen • May 25, 2020

Several are floating around on Pleasure Island waterways

Yachts near Robinson Island in Orange Beach, Alabama.

(OBA®) — Waterways around Orange Beach seem to have become inundated with luxury yachts with at least three seen floating on the Intracoastal Waterway and in Perdido Pass during the Memorial Day weekend.

“You don’t see 100-foot Benittis sitting out at Robinson Island very often,” Saunders Yachtworks General Manager John Fitzgerald said with a laugh.

A 100-footer – Jazz – has taken up residence at his dock in Gulf Shores on the Intracoastal south of Jack Edwards Airport. Also seen in the area is the superyacht 164-foot Apricity as well as the 85-foot Come Monday which is taking on charter trips while here. Also cruising around are the 126-foot Le Montrachet and the 90-foot First Boat. The largest boat Saunders Yachtworks can take out of the water is 120 feet.

“There’s two that have contacted us and we only got the one,” Fitzgerald said. “Some of them are just flat out too big for us. The bigger one out there I don’t know much about it. I saw a video of it moving on your website. I don’t know that one. I think that one’s too big to even talk to us or have at the dock or in the yard.

“The 164-foot boat would not be something we could not work on. They are probably at anchor. I don’t know that there’s anywhere (they could dock). Maybe they can go to The Wharf alongside but I’m not sure about that.”

Fitzgerald said with the COVID-19 restrictions in the Bahamas and other Caribbean destinations the boats are having trouble finding a place to dock.

“They were expected to stay until June 1 and now they’ve extended it into June,” Fitzgerald said. “It may even be July 1 before they open the Bahamas but they’ll be up here for a little while.”

Florida’s marinas that can accommodate these floating palaces are full driving traffic to the northern Gulf and up the east coast, Fitzgerald said.

“They’re around,” Fitzgerald said. “I have a lot of communication with South Florida and they’ve been basically full for yacht dockage. The entire community has been overwhelmed by these boats coming from the south. Boats come here and boats are going up to places like the Carolinas that never go up there to some place to use the boat and where the owner has access to it or they could possibly run a charter trip. Just trying to use the boat somewhere where it’s safe.”

David Lindley captured this video of the Apricity Yacht near Perdido Pass

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