The arrival of Scintilla Maris in West India Dock offers a bit of a mystery, it looks like a trawler but with plenty of modern equipment.
The story around Scintilla Maris is quite a fascinating one, built at the Dutch shipyard Maaskant in 1988 as a fishing vessel named Vertrouwen, the boat spent the first twenty years of its life in the North Sea trawling for flatfish.
After decommissioning in 2006, Vertrouwen spent over 10 years gathering dust at Damen Maaskant before the project to turn the boat into an expedition yacht began.
During an extensive four year rebuild at Damen Maaskant, the renamed Scintilla Maris was stripped down to bare steel, fully modernised and rebuilt. Maintaining her original exterior lines, the interior and technical spaces was transformed into a fully modernised expedition yacht.
In the last few years, the West India Dock has seen a few of these expedition yachts which suggests that a few owners have had probably enough of the Mediterranean or Caribbean and are looking for a bit more adventure. The boat is due to go to Svalbard, Greenland and coastal Norway this year.
Scintilla Maris is now a 45.6m (149.6ft) full-custom rebuilt expedition yacht with a thickened steel hull built to RINA classification. It has accommodation for 12 guests.
It is such a unique boat, Scintilla has been nominated for a 2024 World Superyacht Award.
Isle of Dogs Life 