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Boat Reviews

96 Nordhavn Motoryacht Walkthrough [Boat Review + Video]

Denison Yachting | July 20, 2023



Take an extensive tour of the 96 Nordhavn Motoryacht [LACEY KAY] in West Palm Beach, Florida with Kurt Bosshardt.

This article is a transcription of the 96 Nordhavn video from Denison’s Youtube Channel. Tune in daily to discover the latest yacht video walkthroughs from the world’s largest yacht video collection. Watch the full video below:


Kurt: Hi, I’m Kurt Bosshardt from Denison Yachting, and I am standing in the Rybovich safe harbor Marina. I absolutely love this Marina. It’s my favorite spot. From the Motor Yacht Cafe, one of my favorite sushi bars, to the beautiful yachts in this harbor. I am proud to be able to present LACEY KAY to you, a 96 foot Nordhavn yacht, which we’re going to walk through.

Let me tell you about the three things I love about this yacht. The first is the two master staterooms she has in addition to three extra guest cabins. The second are the large fuel tanks that were built into her, giving her the range to cross the Pacific Ocean. And the third is the rugged ‘can go anywhere’ quality built into this yacht with redundancy and systems that allow you to explore any ocean anywhere in the world.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY SUN DECK

Tyson: I’m Captain Tyson Von Bonde. I’m from South Africa. I’ve been onboard LACEY KAY for the last four and a half years, 65,000 miles in the four years. Central America, South America, North America, across to Galapagos and ended up in Fiji across Hawaii. Everything’s built for redundancies, so times zero, the TZ touch, an admin system, dual radars, they’re all tying together, which is very lovely. With the equipment on board, we’ve done some amazing trips and I’m looking forward to happy doing the next one.

Kurt: As we walk from the stern, you can see a generously sized fishing cockpit, a nice aft deck with ample seating for the entire crew and party, side decks with a formal entry to starboard and a bullwark, which is massive. Look at the size of that bow and how she raises very proudly up in the ear. You can imagine a 10, 12, 15 foot swell hitting that bow with no problem at all.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Sun Deck Hot Tub

The first space for us to look at is this sun deck. Of course, the entire deck is a sun deck. We have a hot tub and back with bar seating, and then we really have a fantastic space up here, which I call the sun deck for observation and sunny, you can see the two chairs. Imagine yourself in a Norwegian fjord or a glacier with your hobby camera, taking pictures of whales or other wildlife. Truly great space to sit out.

Stepping back inside to this hatchway, we get to the central space of the sun deck and we have a grill here, refrigeration, ice maker, sink, and then lots of storage on the starboard side. Moving farther back, we have a nice hot tub with bar seating with a great view aft. From photographing whales forward to looking at a beach off your stern, it really provides great contrast.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Foredeck

You know that you’re on a serious expedition yacht when you see this Portuguese bridge. The best way to get from port to starboard to navigate this vessel and to see where you’re headed is from this bridge. Opposite the wing station to starboard is another full set of controls on the port side. If the sun deck above is fully occupied, here’s another excellent seat to see what’s going on. This is the perspective of the captain from the wheelhouse looking forward and is the best view of the house.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Cockpit

From the settee, there is a few short steps down to the foredeck. On the foredeck of a Nordhavn, you have got plenty of space for a 19 foot custom tender, 3,500 pound crane, and chalks for a 17 foot tender, where we have storage lockers currently. When you hear that a Nordhavn, what you think of is expedition and this bow deck area facilitates that. It’s cool looking. It’s robust, but it’s also quite functional. This yacht is constructed of GRP, which is a thick hand laid fiberglass all the way down to the waterline. The benefits to GRP, you do not have rust or corrosive activity. You don’t have to worry about dissimilar metals. Whatever you want to fix or mount to a GRP hull will stay and will not deteriorate.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Salon

Part of the charm of this aluminum tender is that she is imperfect. She’s used to get into coves over rocks on beaches, can see the wear. The beauty of having a fully glass GRP hull is that it doesn’t have to be faired. It doesn’t have to be painted. There are no blisters or corrosion, and every time you look at her, you’ve got that Mercedes finish.

The stern is made up of two distinct areas. You’ve got a big Euro style transom cockpit aft, and then we have a main seating area up a few steps from the cockpit. The main deck aft really separates this yacht from the smaller Nordhavns. It starts with a large table now set up as club seating, but it does have a leaf that fits between. It seats your entire guests back here, sink, grill, refrigeration, ice maker all back here, something you’d see on a super yacht. For situations or instances when you’re in bad weather or cold climates, this entire back deck has the ability to zip in Eisenglass panels making this another indoor space.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Dining Accommodation

Stepping in from the back deck, we enter the salon. This room is the space that differentiates itself from the Nordhavn 86. It’s just huge volume, beautifully appointed with lots of seating for guests and company. What’s also beautiful about this space is all the light that’s led in by these very large windows all the way around in addition to the accent lighting above. As beautiful as this room is, it is still rugged. It’s not often that you find in the main salon, a cedar line closet with foul weather gear. From the hardwood teak that’s used in the accent, fabrics, the wood credenza, and the stone that separates the dining from the salon, this yacht really has a rugged feel, yet it’s elegant and beautiful. Before we talk about where you eat your formal meals, let’s take a look at the starboard side of the yacht.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Galley

We’ve got a stairwell that leads up to the master in the wheelhouse. We’ll talk about that in just a minute. You’ve got this really cool Dutch door that leads to the entry of the yacht, as well as a screen that pops out from here and other doors allows you to open the yacht up, but keep the bugs out.

A yacht that’s designed to go 10,000 miles is going to have plenty of storage space for crystal flatware China. In addition, we’ve got this large table that can seat eight to 10, but where the yacht really starts to express itself, the 96, is this additional space between the kitchen area and the serving area. You’ve got bar sink, espresso machine and wine cooler. Of course, everybody likes to hang out in the kitchen, but this area adds a little bit of additional space for plating and serving.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Master Stateroom

The next thing I have to show you is this wall that separates the dining from the galley. Other than just being a cool feature, it adds versatility to the 96 Nordhavn. You know when you’re in an excellent restaurant or a Michelin star restaurant and the chef wants to show you what he’s preparing and what you’re eating, you can see it. He can plate it, bring it around, serve it to you, and even pair it with a bottle of wine from this cooler. Here in the galley itself, we have high quality appliances from a Miele dishwasher to a Miele induction range, Miele convection oven with hood.

To the port side of the yacht, off the side deck is the crew access to the galley for bringing groceries and other supplies in. When you’re bringing things inside, you can easily stove them in the dual pantry, the refrigerator, we’ve got the bottle storage for the bar just forward to the sink in the pantry area and two additional sliding subzero refrigerators, and all of this is right next to the day head on the main deck.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Owner's Suite

If you’ve stuck with me this long, this is where it’s really gonna pay off. The guest accommodations. Just a few steps down from the day head, we enter the first of two master suites. As you step into this room, you can see that this truly is the master. With large windows and overhead skylights, you have plenty of room, larger beam and a dual sink en suite off the master. This is certainly a more comfortable spot to be in a master, you are down lower and in the center of the ship. From the waterline up, you can see that these windows are massive. They allow a lot of light in and really give this room distinctive character.

From here, we’re gonna jump up to the owner’s deck and take a look at master number two. From the top of the starboard side staircase, we now enter from the wheelhouse into master number two. Although this room isn’t quite as big, it is spectacular and it leaves an immediate impression. The magic of this room is that it’s not just a bedroom, but it’s an actual owner’s deck. From the bed looking back, we’ve got a beautiful private balcony for the owners, to starboard a cedar line closet and to port the entrance to the suite.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Pilot House

An area that needs a little bit of extra attention is the owner’s private balcony. Is there any better way to start your morning with a cup of tea and cruising down a coastline? There’s a molded hard top that covers the area. To port into starboard, you have the side decks and the stairs that lead down to the main deck.

Leaving the master, we’re headed towards the wheelhouse. We have a day head, and now we enter the well-lit pilot house. Here’s what makes the wheelhouse of the 96 Nordhavn really outstanding. You literally have all of the electronics here necessary to cross a big ocean with a backup. We’ve got two Feruno radar screens, two chart plotting screens, backup water pumps, bow and stern thrusters, a lot of navigational gear that’s redundant. She is powered by the Caterpillar C-18s, which is a lower horsepower engine, but more efficient. So with the C-18s and 10,000 gallons of fuel burning 10 gallons aside, plus a generator, five gallons, she’s got 25 gallons per hour or 5,000 nautical mile range with a reserve. In addition to the Caterpillar C-18 main power systems, we have two Caterpillar generators. Either one can run the entire ship, plus a night generator. We have a fuel polisher as well as a sewage treatment plant.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Engine Room

I am standing here on the other side of the engine room door. Access to this area is gained to the stairwell. On the port side to my right is a laundry area, Miele professional washers and dryers, plus the folding area and stepping forward brings us into the crew area. To my left is a captain’s cabin. To my right is an over under double crew bunk cabin, each of which has an en suite. This is the crew common area or mess where they can relax, watch TV and eat. There’s a sink, coffee maker, microwave. This room leads into the lazarette, where we have the Atlas power converter, pumped room, and standby night generator.

Our final stop today takes us below decks to take a look at the three remaining guest cabins. First, we have a queen state room on the port side when you face aft. This cabin has plenty of storage for two with the same high-end finishes seen in the master. All of the state rooms on board are complete with en suites. Over on the other side to starboard is state room number four, which has twin births.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Guest Stateroom

Connecting these state rooms is a lower deck foyer, which features a third set of washer dryer units and storage all around. Cabin number five is forward in the lower companion way. They call this the fisherman’s cabin. I also want to point out the watertight door on the forward side of the cabin, giving you access to the heart of the yacht’s water making system. In here, there’s a pair of water heaters, water maker membranes, and a spot zero filtration system.

Tyson: What I enjoy most is the ability and capability of this boat. She’s a very sea worthy boat. I’ve been on many other different vessels and she’s been outstanding. I love the way that she handles the open ocean. Very easy to maintain with minimal crew, which is great. I love the open plan and being able to carry water toys and give the best experience possible.

96' Nordhavn 2017 LACEY KAY Guest Stateroom

Kurt: Before the owner allowed me to list this yacht, he ordered a survey to be performed on the boat to see anything that the crew might need to do to prepare her for the market. This Nordhavn has been picked through and is ready to take you and your family to a far off location as soon as tomorrow. If you have any questions about this incredible yacht and would like more information or to see her for yourself, feel free to reach out to me anytime.


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