History

"After high school I went to sea as a sailor. This was in 1976 and I just turned 17. My first vessel was an old 500 tonner called “Twebro”. On Sunday, we did not sail because it was the day of rest. So quite often we anchored on Saturday late evening at a shallow part of the Sea, also during bad weather. At Sunday midnight, the anchor was hoisted again and the voyage continued. One year later, after learning a lot, I went back to school to pick up my study to become mate/captain. At the age of 23 I became the youngest Dutch Merchant Marine captain of MV "Marco", at that time a modern river going coaster of 1040 tons which traded between Holland and Scandinavia."

"Mr Teuben, the owner of Dutch shipyard “Scheepswerf Harlingen” asked me if I was interested in having my own coaster. I thought that was a fantastic idea. So, a meeting was set up and this resulted in the building of a 3035 tons river going coaster called “Waddenzee” The vessel was handed over to me in Harlingen on 20th April 1985, which was also my father’s birthday. We were both very proud."

"In 1987 the shipping market went downhill rapidly and it was difficult to run my vessel profitable. One day on a voyage from England to the Mediterranean I passed a yacht struggling against the Northerly winds of Portugal. I looked at my empty deck and suddenly I had this fantastic idea: “Why not use the deck for the transport of yachts???”.We loaded our 1st yachts in Harlingen in 1987 with destination Malaga. After a while we changed the destination to Palma de Mallorca. A few years later I bought a cement carrier with a weekly cement run between Stettin and Harlingen. We used this vessel for our second line in yacht transport between Harlingen and Kiel."

"Business grew rapidly those days. By the end of 1999 Zevenster Yacht Transport was contacted by the Amsterdam based shipping company Spliethoff. They followed the growth of our activities. At that time we shipped yachts between Ijmuiden and Palma de Mallorca, but also transatlantic, the middle and Far East. So this would suit them perfectly as they had a fleet of around 85 vessels with cranes on a worldwide trade. The company was sold on 1st January 2000 and renamed Sevenstar."

"I moved to the Côte d’Azur to enjoy the sun and the Southern life style. However the requests for transport kept coming. Therefore in 2002 I founded Starclass Yacht Transport in Monaco. First I operated as a booking office for transport worldwide, but during the coming years I noticed a growing demand for yacht transport within Europe and we developed the European hub between Rotterdam and Turkey v.v. We used vessels from various Dutch shipping lines such as Flinter Shipping and Hartel Shipping.

After using several shipping lines, I found a trustworthly partner about 10 yeears ago. They have great cargo vessels and have the right expertice about yacht transport.

In 2013 we changed to Amasus Shipping which manage fantastic cargo vessels and with enthusiasm to yacht transport. Since then we specialised to operate our European Yacht transport line with the same 2 vessels called Deo Volente and Eemslift Hendrika with a strict time schedule and on a set route. We organised a network of European booking agents, load-masters and sales representatives and we specialised ourselves exclusively to this European route. A real lift on/lift off yacht carrier was never build but the 2 Amasus vessels MV Deo Volente and later also Eemslift Hendrika were converted into yacht carriers by extending the decks, the purchase of special loading equipment and self designed certified cradle system. The crew is continuously trained by our loadmasters to safely handle and lift yachts. The result is a reliable, high quality yacht transport service with less delay, less inconveniences, transparent, and with a set sailing schedule. We call this Yacht Transport 2.23