Sea No Evil: How to get Invited (back) on a Yacht

“I’d rather be in a Motel 6 in Secaucus, New Jersey, than on someone else’s program,” Bethenny Frankel said earlier this summer.

The reality star and self-made mogul was explaining her decision to rent a yacht for a trip to the South of France—a big step considering she’d long been a guest on boats belonging to other people. “I’ve always been the guest on the boat,” she said, citing previously “terrible” experiences. “You’re always a guest of someone and it’s their program.” Frankel, it seemed, had reached her limit—and she isn’t alone.

Sure, it sounds great to be invited for an island-hopping Caribbean odyssey or a cruise of the Adriatic on a 200-footer owned by a friendly billionaire, but the reality of boarding someone else’s boat is that there’s only one truly important passenger on board—and it isn’t you. A ship’s owner or the primary always sets the agenda and the schedule. “Their boat, their rules,” Frankel tells T&C. Tim Langmead, Managing Director at Fraser Yachts UK, agrees. “The owner comes first,” he says.

So, what is the etiquette of being invited along for a cruise? The first hurdle is getting on that guest list—and staying there. In some cases, an invite really is based on a genuine relationship. “My wife and I are close friends with our host and see her in New York regularly,” says one Manhattan-based interior designer, who has been part of a core group of guests of a seafaring host for several years, venturing to St. Barth and Mustique in the winter and Greece and Italy in the summer. “We are usually invited to save the date about six months in advance. We always say yes.”

Frankel, by contrast, has never had much advance notice to hit the water. She says she’s accepted around 10 “impromptu” invites to be “a guest on some of the world’s largest boats.” Her hosts have been “people who have changed the world as we know it,” and “most of the time I haven’t known them that well.”

Quickie invites aren’t unusual. “Sometimes someone bails, and you’re the next best thing. You can choose to take that as an insult—or an opportunity,” explains Evan Osnos, author of the recent book The Haves and Have Yachts: Dispatches on the Ultra Rich. He adds that being asked to fly to Nice on 24-hours notice is a power move. “Spontaneity is a luxury. Invitations often come last minute because the host assumes you, too, can drop everything.”

Don’t get too comfortable once onboard, though. Passengers should take heed that “you’re not really there strictly for recreation—you are there partly to be entertaining and interesting and energetic,” says Osnos. “If you’re coming from Hollywood, show up with stories nobody else has read in the papers. From Wall Street? Bring intel better than anything available on land.”

Next, there’s the quagmire of gift-giving. You likely can’t compete with the access of someone who owns a yacht, so consider something personal—and possibly custom. Langmead has seen guests give Rolexes, oversized coffee table books about trip destinations, and even a chrome lobster sculpture. During excursions for meals on land, Langmead suggests picking up the tab. “It often goes unnoticed at first,” he says, “but people do appreciate it.”

As for the rules onboard? Most are unspoken, but still very real. “An owner sets the tone or the vibe, rather than stringent rules,” says Langmead, though he notes that on chartered vessels, the captain starts the trip by going over safety protocols, “who does what, and what not to do.”

Some basics do apply everywhere: take off your shoes, participate in planned activities, and always respect the boat and the crew. (“The stewardesses are not part of the package,” warns Langmead.)

The captain and crew’s perspective, of course, birthed a reality TV juggernaut in Bravo’s Below Deck franchise, which amplifies bad guest behavior, plus crew hookups and infighting, to millions of viewers, in five different iterations.

“This one woman got so wasted…she started doing cartwheels in the salon,” recalls star Aesha Scott, a longtime Chief Stewardess on Below Deck Down Under and Below Deck Med. “And as she did a cartwheel, she [wet] herself midair.”

Scott’s pre-Bravo experiences as a stew on private vessels were more subdued. “Billionaires are businesspeople,” she says. “They’re used to maintaining a professional air. They keep to themselves. One woman wouldn’t even look at me—she just held out her hand for a drink. That’s easier, honestly.”

But Frankel, who signed NDAs for some of her voyages, observed plenty of hijinks aboard mega-yachts. “The greatest checkers move was someone sleeping with the captain when they were dating the owner,” she reveals. “It’s like Downton Abbey—upstairs/downstairs—but everyone spills the tea.”

Osnos spoke to one crewmember who complained of an incident that sounds like the best Below Deck episode ever: “Guests did so much cocaine they had no appetite for the amazing buffet the chef had laid out.”

On a less drug-fueled note, the NYC-based interior designer recalls one needy couple onboard whose “physical and health issues made it so that the staff was preoccupied with their mishigas.” Lo and behold, that couple have not been invited back.

What should you do? “Go with the flow,” urges the designer. “Be respectful and really imagine having the crew’s stress and job,” adds Frankel.

And, just like dining with the king or queen, don’t get up until they do. “You’re captive [during a meal] until the host decides to go take a siesta,” says Osnos. “You’re not going paddleboarding—you’re at the table.” And, of course, flattery is essential. “You’re expected to tell the host what an extraordinary boat they own. And God forbid you mention another boat that was a few feet longer.”

That ego-stroking must be done deftly, however. In other words, don’t gawk. “You’re supposed to be impressed and grateful—but not paralyzed by splendor and rendered mute,” Osnos cautions. “Most of the billionaires who own these boats tend to be a little socially awkward.”

As for the matter of tipping the crew, that practice is reserved only for guests on chartered vessels, not private boats. “It’s like going to a restaurant versus eating at someone’s house,” Langmead explains.

“I try to tip better than any of the other guests,” says the interior designer. Above all else, never yacht and tell. “Discretion is key,” Osnos says. “As Oprah said: What happens on the boat, stays on the boat.”

Frankel is ultimately glad she chose to be the captain of her own ship, so to speak. After opting to charter her own four-bedroom boat for a post-Cannes Lions cruise with her teenaged daughter, she already has plans to do it again. “The best part of a boat isn’t luxury or a flex,” she says. “The point is doing exactly what you want when you want and feeling the water beneath you. I’m a water sign. I want privacy, freedom, and the water. I’m oddly very simple in ways.”