If you were to have one boat to keep your beer-swilling, fishing mates happy, your teenage kids and all their wake toys and loud music going, luxurious comfort to keep your better half on the water and the ability to handle anything the New Zealand weather can throw at it, you will find it in the Boston Whaler 230 Vantage.

Performance catamarans like this carbon 62-footer simply eat up those tradewind miles, while their shallow draught is ideal for gunk-holing.

With 3200 staff based in Plymouth, Princess Yachts is the largest builder of recreational vessels in the UK. It’s also one of the biggest in Europe, building up to 300 boats a year with an average length of 60 feet.

Because every boatie’s notion of perfection is different, having options when buying a new boat is useful. Whakatane’s Extreme Boats excels in such flexibility, as is demonstrated by two of its 915s.

It wasn’t that long ago a 15m cruising yacht was considered big enough to require full-time crew. How times have changed. Today many consider 15m yachts perfect for a couple.