Honu

We bought Honu in 2017. She was a four-cabin, four-head boat, which was the form factor we wanted, and we bought the biggest catamaran we could get rather than the newest, knowing we could make her nicer and update her over time. That's exactly what we did. Right away we tore into the starboard hull. The original layout had two cabins and two heads over there, and we rebuilt it into an owner's suite: one cabin, one head. We took the port hull and converted its two heads into a single head with a separate shower, a vanity, and a toilet. We effectively changed a charter-version catamaran into an owner's-version catamaran, with an owner's bathroom that is honestly nicer than what you find on many boats of even slightly larger sizes. While we were at it, we reinforced every bulkhead connection throughout the boat. Lagoon is infamous for gluing rather than properly glassing many of their bulkheads and stringers to the hull sides, so we've added proper glassing everywhere we've worked on the boat. We also added reinforcement inside the inner hulls, which do flex quite a bit underway and have caused problems for some owners. We addressed that with half-moon stringers, which you can see in the engine photos. For the interior, we did a full lithium conversion managed by Victron and redesigned the salon into a more squared seating area with a fold-out mechanism that makes it a daybed. We added a TV that pops up, removed the navigation station in favor of an electronics tower behind the seating, and redesigned the galley to have significantly more storage than the boat originally came with, including pull-out drawers and a single-basin sink. On the outside, we converted the soft-top Bimini to a hard-top and fitted 1,600 watts of solar, which in practice puts out around 80 amps of charging power. That pairs well with the induction stove we installed in the galley. There's no more propane on the boat, and eliminating it freed up a cockpit locker. We also put on a new anchor, bridle, and chain, and there's quite a bit of other new gear throughout. The stereotypical issue for this model is the salon subfloor rotting, and we did hit that. We tore up the subfloor and replaced it, and any rotten coring we found anywhere else on the boat has been replaced as well, so as far as we know there is no rotten coring remaining. We've also insulated the boat in many areas, since these boats did not come insulated from the factory, replaced many hatches, done a lot of engine work, added a 40-gallon-per-hour watermaker, and installed electric freshwater heads. As for cruising, we've taken Honu up and down the entire Eastern Seaboard effectively twice, done the Bahamas six times, and worked our way all the way down to Turks and Caicos, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and the USVI before Covid turned us around. The boat has been actively used for all eight years we've owned her, and we've lived aboard for most of those years. She is very well suited to life aboard. The remaining items on our to-do list are a proper marine diesel generator (we currently have a gas unit, which is not ideal), a cockpit enclosure, and a downwind sail. We do have newer sails for the jib and main from within the past few years, but no downwind sail yet. A solar arch would be a nice addition too, though with 1,600 watts already on the hard top we're in pretty good shape as it stands. Honu is just a demo vessel on this site and is not currently for sale.