Frequently Asked Questions

The Voyage 500 is a 50-foot cruising catamaran designed by Simonis Voogd and built in South Africa by Voyage Yachts, which has retired the 500 model but actively builds larger luxury cats. There is an active and supportive Voyage Catamaran Owners Worldwide Facebook group. Voyage yachts are known for their solid build quality, comfortable living spaces, and strong bluewater sailing performance. The owner's version, like Tropicalia, is popular with long-range cruisers and liveaboards. Voyage also made a 4-cabin version of the 500, which was popular in the Caribbean charter circuit. Voyage has an active luxury crewed charter base in the Virgin Islands.

In short, our planned sailing sabbatical trip (the second one we've done with our young kids) is coming to an end. Tropicalia has been an amazingly comfortable and reliable platform for our adventures, but it has been our plan from the start to return to land life in Wisconsin. We hope the next owners enjoy her as much as we have.

Yes, but pretty lightly. The previous owner held the boat in an LLC and got it MARAD certified. He told us he did about three crewed day charters in Florida and specialized in ashes-spreading ceremonies at sea. The boat was not built for charter, nor did it ever have any overnight charter guests or do any bareboat chartering in Florida or anywhere else. The original owners never had the boat in charter.

Yes! There are extensive spares, such as oil and fuel filters for the engines and generator, among many other spare parts and supplies for various systems. One of the first things we did when we took ownership of the boat was to go through all the spares and parts and organize and label them.

Yes. The boat was struck on the starboard sugar scoop by a motor yacht in a marina in 2023. It damaged the exterior fiberglass and starboard engine mounts. It was repaired at the St. Augustine Marine Center and covered by insurance. The previous owner's damage disclosure statement is available for download.

The twin Yanmar 3JH5E engines have 3,323 hours on port and 3,213 hours on starboard. Both have been regularly serviced and run well, and were paired with brand-new Yanmar SD60 saildrives in 2025. We are still cruising, so these numbers will tick up modestly as we make our way back to St. Augustine. Note that the starboard Yanmar control panel was replaced; the hours displayed on that panel are lower than the actual engine total because there is no way to set a Yanmar hour meter to a non-zero value at install. We recorded the engine's true hours at the time of replacement, and the figure above reflects that running total.

The boat was last out of the water at the St. Augustine Marine Center November 2025. As we wrap up our sailing sabbatical, we are heading back there for a June 17 haulout date.

The original owners would have the St. Augustine Marine Center pull the mast every year when they hauled the boat out there for hurricane season storage. The riggers there inspected the rig on the hard and replaced any components that exhibited wear. When we were considering the boat, we fully expected to replace the entire standing rigging as our first project, but we commissioned a rigging report, which came out clean. Our insurers did not require new rigging, and our plans involved short island hopping, so we opted not to replace it right away. We've had no issues and would be very confident doing the same type of Caribbean trip on this rig. However, if we were to plan an ocean crossing, we would have it replaced.

When we purchased the boat, this was another item we expected to replace right away because the seller did not know when the sails had last been replaced. However, when we did the sea trial, we found the sails to be in better condition than expected, and we opted to hold off on replacement. I would categorize them as serviceable. The genoa still has quite good shape, and all sails are of high-modulus cross-cut Dacron. The main's numerous full battens give it decent overall shape, but the leech is starting to look a little loose, and the UV covers on the genoa and storm jib need replacement. In my opinion, you can sail the islands for probably the next three years with these sails and do perfectly fine, but new canvas would likely add a half a knot of boat speed and be advisable if you are planning to cross any oceans.

We are the third owners. The original owners, who commissioned the boat from the Voyage factory, were a South African couple, one of whom was an aerospace engineer. The boat's original name was Panache, and we understand that they cruised it to the Caribbean each winter and hauled it out at the St. Augustine Marine Center each hurricane season. It was then purchased by a Florida resident (about 5 years ago) and renamed God's Grace. The second owner kept the boat in Florida, in the Gulf Coast area, and then back in St. Augustine. He made many upgrades and took much pride in ownership. He got the boat MARAD certified and ran a few day charter trips, mostly specializing the spreading of ashes at sea.

Nothing major. We have tried our best to take great care of Tropicalia during our ownership, and we have upgraded a lot of systems to make her suited to our style of cruising. That said, every boat has issues, and we want you to know everything we know after living aboard for a year. All of it is spelled out in the Known Issues & Disclosure document.

Tropicalia has Starlink satellite internet, which provides reliable broadband-speed connectivity virtually anywhere. We also have a backup 12V Starlink mini and voltage step-up converter still in the box. I worked part time from the boat during our trip without any connectivity issues.

Yes. Dual-zone Mabru air conditioning: a 12,000 BTU unit (12V DC, soft start) serving the master cabin and salon, and a 17,000 BTU unit (120V, installed June 2024) serving the port hull and salon.

We plan to be back in St. Augustine by June 1, 2026, and we already booked a haulout at the St. Augustine Marine Center for June 17. If we reach an accepted offer, this could be a good place to conduct the survey and sea trial. We are also open to meeting you here in the Caribbean or the Bahamas (useful if you wanted to take the boat south for the 2026 hurricane season). All costs of the survey, including haul-out and dry dock charges, are at the buyer's expense. We will cooperate fully with your chosen surveyor.

We would use a standard marine purchase and sale agreement. Once we reach an accepted offer, the buyer places a 10% deposit into escrow to hold the boat and then conducts their survey and sea trial. If everything is to the buyer's satisfaction, they put the balance of the agreed-upon purchase price in escrow, and the escrow agent holds it until all contingencies have been met and the boat has been re-documented in the buyer's name. Once the USCG documentation paperwork has been submitted, the escrow agent releases the funds to the seller, and the transaction is complete. We sold our last boat, a 2017 Hanse 415, this same way in 2022 — our original FSBO listing site is still online — and the entire transaction went smoothly. All the high-stakes parts of the transaction, like the search for liens, ownership verification, and escrow, are handled by a neutral third party closing agent, whose modest fee the buyer and seller would split. It allows us to not have to factor into the price the 10% commission a yacht broker typically takes.

This is a direct sale by owner. If you are working with a buyer's broker, we are open to cooperating with them. Please contact us to discuss the details.

Tropicalia is currently sailing in the British Virgin Islands. You can see our live location on the About page, updated in real time via our PredictWind Hub over Starlink. We will be heading to Saint Martin and then south to Dominica and then north to Florida starting in May 2026. We are happy to arrange viewings at our current location or along our route.

As of April, 2026, we are still cruising the Caribbean. We are heading to St. Martin and then down to Dominica in the coming weeks, before turning around and heading back to St. Augustine in May. We expect to be back in Florida around June 1. We are going to be moving around a lot, but we could potentially coordinate a showing somewhere in the islands, or, of course, in St. Augustine after we return. When we sold our last boat, we had planned to sail it back to Florida, but a buyer ended up viewing it down in Puerto Rico, and we closed the sale there. We can also provide a video walkthrough if you are not able to visit in person.

We are open to discussing delivery options depending on the destination and timing. The boat will be heading north to Florida in May 2026. Delivery arrangements and costs can be discussed as part of the purchase agreement.

Tropicalia was properly imported and is US Duty Paid.

We have the original as-built schematics and wiring diagrams, survey reports, rigging inspection report, equipment manuals, and all purchase documentation. These will be transferred to the buyer.