December

Over 120 delegates attended the Gulf Superyacht Summit 2022 held in Dubai in early November. Previously known as The International Superyacht Summit the event was acquired by[Superyacht Times](https://www.superyachttimes.com/)in May 2022. The fourth edition of the Gulf Superyacht Summit in Dubai highlighted the interest in the growing GCC Superyacht market.Mike Derrett who is an advisor to the Sri Lanka based Sea Leisure Yachting Group (APSA member), attended and reported on the event.

Kaohsiung City, Taiwan is hosting a series of Christmas themed events that started on the 12 th November and continue onto January 2023. The Love River Bay has been turned into a combined ‘Light and Sound’ extravaganza that incorporates the Kaohsiung Pop Music Center complex, the harbour, and the Christmas market festivities.

The world’s largest trade exhibition of leisure marine equipment once again sprang to life with the welcome buzz of thousands of industry professionals gathering from across the globe for meetings, researching, networking and much-missed socialising. METSTRADE 2022 showcased a total of 1,400 exhibitors from 49 countries across 10 halls at Amsterdam RAI covering every facet of marine equipment, systems, and materials.

With Australian borders reopened, Superyachts 153° is offering cruising superyachts a streamlined process for accessing many of the stunning Marine Parks that dot the east coast of Australia. Superyacht 153 has worked with local authorities to formulate a simple system so that Captains can just ‘click and upload’ online forms that allow their yacht to access in some of the most unique places in Australia.

SYL JAPAN has worked hard since 2015 with various government departments and the Parliamentary Association for Luxury Travel, to educate them about the superyacht industry, the economic benefits of superyachts visiting Japan and how the previous rules in Japan (which were basically aligned with commercial ship rules) were detrimental to the superyacht industry in Japan.

With Thailand opening to superyachts, now is a good time for foreign-flagged yachts to consider cruising or chartering. Thailand’s high season from November to February, is when the weather is generally at its best throughout the country.

Howden Insurance Brokers (HK) Ltd recently completed the purchase of the business portfolio of Expat Marine Ltd, a long-established insurance broker in Hong Kong focussing on SME business, High Net Worth, Employee Benefits, and yacht insurance. Colin Dawson, a Founding Member and APSA’s first Chairman has partnered with Expat Marine Ltd, looking after yacht owners and their covers for the past 12 year. He has confirmed that this partnership will continue with Howden, adding “This partnership will allow us to benefit from Howden’s reach in the market, have access to insurers we previously didn’t have and join with a network of Howden offices, enabling us to improve our offering to clients. It also allows teams at Howden to access my 25 year’s specialist experience with yacht insurance, assisting them give greater value to their clients,”

Port Louis Marina recently welcomed the ARC+ fleet of yachts that sailed from Cape Verde to Grenada. The first to arrive was Piment Rouge, who successful made the crossing in 12 days 14 hours at sea. Arriving after 2,424nm of sailing, there were loud cheers from the crew and music blasting out from the comfortable deck of the catamaran to hail their arrival.

For the past year Indies Trader have been working on the launch of the Indies Trader Apparel Division. The online store is now live in the USA and Australia and they are happy to ship internationally.

It has been a long wait but Australia is now welcoming Superyachts and crew again, exemption and quarantine free, after the Covid Pandemic slammed borders closed in March 2020.