THROUGH TIME AND SPACE
With logbooks recording now 20 years’ yachting in the Baltic, Karl and Ute Jansen have owned both French and Swedish yachts, through time moving upward in both size and comfort. With better and bigger still ever in mind, Karl started talking with Contest almost a decade ago, leading to the 2023 delivery of Vinco, their new-build, 15-metre Contest 50CS.
When visiting the shipyard and seeing the open hull of their new Contest 50CS in first-stage outfitting, experienced sailor Karl Jansen took a deep breath, then smiled. “My first impression,” he says, “was, wow, what a huge sailing boat!”
Indeed, the step-up Karl and Ute were taking from their previous Najad 440CC to the Contest 50CS, two metres longer and a full metre more in beam, was suddenly made very clear. It certainly had the extra space they had sought! And as to the handling? Well, everything about Contest pointed also to this being a boat easier to manage. Karl began to relax.
THE PROMISE
Moving on through time, talking with Karl in June this year, with 4,000 sea miles already under Vinco’s keel in the two years since delivery – cruising to Norway then westabout Britain and currently heading to the Med – Karl has found the truth in the promise. “Despite her size, this is such an easy yacht to sail and manoeuvre,” he enthuses, “easier even than both the smaller Dufour and Najad before.”
This focus on eased, hassle-free operation had drawn Karl to specify the additional optional stern as well as bow thruster, in-mast furling for the mainsail, and opting for aluminium spars and North 3Di sails, including the super simple Helix top-down furling asymmetric reaching sail up front. A combination much liked and well proven, with Karl and short-handed crew sliding into shallow,
tight berths that such boat-size might otherwise preclude. “A lot of people say, ooh, 50 feet for the Baltic is very big to get in the smaller harbours, but we don't have any problems, we find the space! It was no obstacle cruising there last summer.”
TWO MODES
As is so often the case, over the years the nature of Karl’s grown-family sailing has changed, with, let’s say, the less-fanatical desirous of more comforts for their participation! So, again as is common, Karl sails in two modes: friends for passages, and family for destination and finer weather pleasures. The Contest 50CS, Karl says, serves everyone and each purpose exceptionally well.
“It’s all so easy, the electric winches, furlers, and inside with induction oven, washing machine, and all these comforts on board. You could live on the boat. That was part of our reasoning. You could think about a small holiday home,” Karl explains, “or a bigger boat.
“But with a home you have to decide where you want to be, and I never can. So, I decided for the bigger boat. And staying at anchor you always have a sea view!”
As a keen foodie, a great kitchen is also crucial for Karl and he puts Vinco’s “super galley” to full, frequent and very much appreciated use.
“A lot of people say, ooh, 50 feet for the Baltic is very big to get in the smaller harbours, but we don't have any problems, we find the space! It was no obstacle cruising there last summer.”
DISCOVERIES
Sailing out of the family’s longstanding, charming homeport of Eckernförde to the west of Kiel, last year it was seafood of all sorts all the way around Denmark, up through Sweden’s western archipelago and on to Oslo in Norway. Then earlier this year up the UK’s east coast, with its limited harbour stops en route to Scotland for a westbound transit of the Caledonian Canal, the discovery was not just of sailing new tidal waters so different to the Baltic’s current-free seas, but the apparent lack of lobsters where they might be most expected! “After Scarborough which was delightful, and Newcastle and Edinburgh where we played some golf, with Able and Holy Island between, we went into Peterhead, Scotland’s biggest commercial fishing port. Not a pretty city but we asked the harbour master where we might get lobster, and he said not possible at all, everything, all fish here goes abroad. But wandering the dockside I saw a door open and lobster tails showing. I put my head round and asked if they might be for sale … and came out with six big lobsters. Back onboard they made good meals for days!”
Leaving Peterhead and subsequently Inverness, after a quick break home, Karl and crew went on to enjoy the Caledonian Canal, “Beautiful and much like sailing the IJsselmeer,” he says, before reaching the west coast, the intention being the Outer Hebrides but bad weather suggesting the Inner islands a better idea.
SPIRITED TIMES
More golf, good fresh produce and very friendly folk. Extraordinary encounters, too, including a rare whisky moment unfolding right in the lock at Inverness when conversation with a passerby admiring Vinco’s lines turned to whisky talk and one crew member’s particular love of Springbank malts. To this, the onlooker opened that his brother-in-law was a long-time employee at the distillery in Campbeltown – away over on the west coast. With the air fizzing, a phone call was made!
"Wandering the dockside I saw a door open and lobster tails showing. I put my head round and asked if they might be for sale … and came out with six big lobsters. Back onboard they made good meals for days!”
Springbank really is an exceptional brand, family owned like Contest Yachts, and when Karl and crew later reached Campbeltown, the personal welcome and experiences awaiting them were simply extraordinary. Just goes to show: sometimes the best journeys are measured not in miles, but in moments – and good malts!
The route they’d taken through and down south to Campbeltown included the picture postcard setting and anchorage of Urquart Castle, then Fort Augustus, Loch Lochy, Corpach, Oban, Tobermory, the beautiful Claggain Bay on Islay, and after Campbeltown across the Irish sea to Belfast and Bangor Marina where Karl settled Vinco, ending the second section and fortnight of this UK tour.
It was then a few weeks at home, before the next stage of the voyage would begin, as it now has, via Brest, Biscay, and Gibraltar with all stops between en route to the Med and Mallorca, where Karl and his fair-weather Jansen clan can do what they’ve dreamed of for many years now, enjoy the very best of southern-water sailing.
Karl’s also intending participation in the Sevenstar Contest Meeting Mallorca, 2-4 October, 2025. There he’s likely also hoping to match his new ride’s name in translation … Vinco, I win!
The reality is that just owning a yacht like Vinco is to win.
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