Scarlet Oyster
Scarlet Oyster is a Lightwave 48, designed by American Carl Schumacher. It was designed to be a safe, comfortable and very fast cruising yacht with the responsiveness and control of a racing yacht. The Oyster is perfect to sail in all weather conditions. The yacht is coded for 14 guests during the day, and has bunks for 11.
Scarlet’s owner, the late Gordon Applebey (for a tribute to Gordon please click here) first contacted the Trust in 2006 to offer the use of his yacht for our summer operations. After chatting with Gordon, the Trust discovered he was a miracle of modern medicine, and had survived his diagnosis of terminal cancer well beyond the original prognosis. Gordon was a keen sailor and had owned Scarlet since 1992. In 2005 he raced in the Fastnet as part of a crew called ‘the voyage of no hopers’, with two other sailors who were also winning their battle with cancer. Together they raised a huge amount of money for CancerBacup.
As was Gordon’s way, after going through his experience with cancer, he decided he wanted to help others in similar situations hence his contact with the Trust. Scarlet Oyster, with her distinctive red hull became the Trusts flagship over the last few years, familiar to the young people and adults alike and has featured in many of our photographs as our ‘Trust boat’ at the JPMorgan Round the Island Race and Skandia Cowes Week, as well as out trips.
The yacht will go through a big transformation this year to re-emerge sporting the Trust’s blue colours for the Round Britain voyage.
