Usually, a boat turns heads because of its undeniable beauty. But occasionally, as in the case of the Seapiper 37, it draws eyes because it’s just plain different.
There’s no denying there is a real buzz about the Seapiper 37—originally the Seapiper 35—especially among online communities. The buzz is in part due to the 2023 merger between the builder and Seattle Yachts, a boat dealer and brokerage firm with offices in the U.S. and Canada. For the first time the Seapiper will be built domestically, and the brand will benefit from a large broker network.
The Seapiper 37 has a fascinating origin story. Her concept began in the imagination of professional designer and CAD engineer Ritzo Muntinga, who started fleshing out his vision around 2010. “I’ve always liked self-contained systems for living in,” says Muntinga. “You know, things like log cabins. I am attracted to those for some reason.” He started noodling a design for a cruising boat with a mid-cockpit as a passion project. A central aspect of his design was a large sliding door that separates the center cockpit from the helm. When the door is open, the pilothouse and cockpit become one space where the skipper and passengers can mingle.
“The layout has something to do with my roots,” says Muntinga. “I’m originally from Holland and this is kind of like a mini version of a fishing trawler you see in the North Sea. The goal was to design a boat that’s efficient to run and exceptionally easy to maintain.”
Muntinga defied traditional boat debuts by uploading the Seapiper’s design details to his own website. “I filled my website with information about this boat, which obviously didn’t exist yet,” he said. “Every section of the boat had dedicated CAD renderings.”
Muntinga designed the Seapiper to be a trailerable, long-distance passagemaker at an affordable price point. The boat was first launched as the Seapiper 35, and it’s relatively heavy, with an approximate weight of 13,000 pounds (or a 17,000-pound displacement) and a narrow 8-foot, 6-inch beam. It had a plucky, “little ship” attitude, and when trailering it, Muntinga referred to the boat as a “highway needle.” All systems were designed with ease of access, low maintenance and easy repair for amateur skippers, even those in remote locations. “I wanted the systems to be high quality and easy to understand,” said Muntinga, “so that an experienced boater would need just five minutes to know where everything is and how to operate it.”
His strategy worked. Before long, Muntinga had four deposits from clients to build the first hulls. He started building the tooling in California where he lives, but couldn’t finish the boats there due to financial constraints. Thus, the first 14 hulls were built in China. But then the pandemic, followed by issues with supply chains, pushed Muntinga to search for a builder in the states. That led him to Seattle Yachts.
“Boats are part of the heritage here,” says Linn Jennings, who was brought on as director of manufacturing operations at Seattle Yachts’ Anacortes yard in 2023. “They are just part of the soul of Anacortes. And you know, I’m a boat guy. I like hanging out with the boat guys.”
Jennings has been in the volume boat production game his entire working life. When he first saw the Seapiper design, Jennings admitted he wasn’t sure what to think. “Honestly, my first impression was that it was kind of a Swiss army knife of boats, trying to do everything a little bit, but without a niche.” Eventually, though, he came around to appreciating the boat. “There’s a difference between seeing the boat in drawings and climbing around on it,” he says.
For Jennings, the Seapiper’s combination of trailerability and passagemaking potential could help open a world of cruising to those who hold down regular jobs. “The more I looked at it, the more I thought, that’s pretty cool. It doesn’t shut doors. You can be up in the Arctic this year, you can be in the tropics the next.”
The center cockpit design also won him over. Essentially, Muntinga just took a typical layout, split the cabin, slid back the wheelhouse and salon, and put the bulk of the cockpit and entertainment space between the accommodations. “The center cockpit took a little while for me to warm up to,” says Jennings. “But the more I thought about it, I realized every 37-footer out there has a forward cabin. The Seapiper just moves the bulk of the cockpit between the accommodations for a lot of legitimate reasons. It’s really a versatile little boat. It’d be the perfect couple’s boat. It’s long and narrow. It’s going to be fuel efficient and it’s going to be good in chop. It’s going to be stable, because it has that ballasted keel.”
Jennings brings decades of manufacturing expertise to his work on the Seapiper. During my visit to the factory in Anacortes, hull 15 and 16, of the first Seapiper 37s were in various stages of build on the factory floor. Seattle Yachts is becoming fully acquainted with its new acquisition and the build process is being refined. A handful of tweaks have been made since the first hull was produced, including water tank placement. Once perfected, Jennings anticipates a new Seapiper 37 can be built every two months.
The relatively long length and narrow beam speak to the boat’s efficiency. “She truly sips fuel,” says Muntinga. “The average fuel consumption is about a gallon per hour with a normal cruising speed of 6.5 to 7 knots.” He anticipates the efficiency will improve slightly now that the Seapiper 37s are built by Seattle Yachts with an infused resin layup rather than hand-laid fiberglass, to make the new hulls a bit lighter.
But while the “highway needle” profile is great for efficiency, a potential drawback could be tenderness and handling roll. “When you’re talking about boats in this size class, they’re all in the 10-foot beam range,” says Muntinga. “All of them will have a certain level of rolliness to them. Every single one. And that has to do with the overall size and weight. Seapiper is no different and is no worse than the competition in that class.”
He cited the Seapiper 37’s low center of gravity as a means to reduce roll. Another perk of a narrower beam is that stabilizer systems are more effective. A Seakeeper is optional for this build.
André Lay is a professional mariner and owner of Seapiper hull number 14, which he christened Cavendish. Technically, Cavendish is branded as the final Chinese-built Seapiper 35, which differs slightly from the current American-built 37. They are essentially the same boat, only the 37 has a swimstep that extends the LOA by two feet.
Lay’s original introduction to the boat was via Muntinga’s online renderings, which led to an in-person meeting and in-water tour of a completed boat in the spring of 2019. “The thing was in the water and I was already really excited about it,” says Lay. For him, the Seapiper represented an upgrade from an old wooden boat that he didn’t deem cruise-worthy. He had also completed two sailboat deliveries and knew what kind of adventuring he preferred after the high-seas experience. “I am down for going in the same direction for a long period of time,” he says.
Lay also learned that sailing, while fun, wasn’t his cup of tea. “If I didn’t want to have a stick in the center of the boat but I did want to go really far, the answer was a trawler,” he said. However, well-known trawlers with established pedigrees also have the commensurate price tag. “I’m a guy who works for his living, not a newly retired ophthalmologist who goes out and buys a brand-new Nordhavn.”
Lay’s primary motivation for purchasing Cavendish was his dream to circumnavigate North America via the Northwest Passage. “For reasons unknown, the North fascinates me,” he says. “I’ve been casually reading about the Northwest Passage and how with temperatures trending to increase, the sea ice retreats more and more. Now the passage is becoming navigable again without an icebreaker.”
Lay confided his Arctic dream to Muntinga, who deemed his concept “not too crazy.” Lay believed the Seapiper’s range, shallow draft, simple and reliable systems were all features of a boat worthy of the Jack London-style Call of the Wild. So, in October 2023, Lay departed his home waters of San Francisco Bay for Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, as a first leg of a North American circumnavigation. Ultimately, this journey will lead through the Caribbean and up the East Coast. He eventually hopes to get to Greenland.
When we spoke after his Mexico run in December, Lay reported a favorable experience. “Overall, the boat has performed admirably. I find a cruising rpm of 1600 to 1900 is pleasant as far as noise goes. That’s also kind of the primo spot for fuel consumption. I say it’s averaging 6 knots.”
His solo crossing from the bottom of Baja to Puerto Vallarta was around 500 nautical miles. “I was comfortable enough to sit out and do this multiday passage on my own and still get plenty of rest,” he said. “The boat was riding great, it wasn’t giving me any problems. I’ve got electronics at the helm, I’ve got the settee in the salon. Got alarms set for AIS targets and radar targets. It was great, there were no targets. I got plenty of rest, it was peaceful.”
A highlight was a pause “smack in the middle” of the blue-water transit. “I just put the boat in neutral, turned the life ring over, and popped in [the water] and just lay there. I rejoiced in the majesty of clear blue water and nothing around for hundreds of miles.” In other words, he experienced a slice of paradise.
“All in all, the boat did really well,” he said.
So, was there anywhere she didn’t do so well? “It doesn’t do well with following seas,” said Lay. “I think that’s pretty common for most any boat, but there were times with some pretty windy conditions. It was nighttime, it was blowing from behind. And man, like, you’re having to hand steer; it was very grueling to be hand steering all day and all night and the boat is just listing like crazy and things are flinging around. I know that can happen when you’re a small boat on a big ocean.”
The boat itself though, was fine. “The boat is nothing worse for wear. She kept on.”
Lay’s analysis highlights the pros and cons of the long, narrow hull form. “I’ll be the first to point out it’s a double-edged sword,” he said. “Part of the reason it’s even a remote possibility to do long passages from a monetary standpoint is the efficiency of the boat. One of the key ingredients of that is the narrow beam, so that’s one edge of the sword. Naturally, the other edge is that she will be more rolly and tender than a boat with a wider beam.”
The timeless saying that there is no perfect boat, only a series of compromises, comes to mind. Lay is an outspoken advocate for the Seakeeper system, which he opted for. “That thing is so freaking cool,” he said. “It almost should be a standard feature. I understand why it’s not because it’s a lot of money, but without that stabilizer I would be singing a different tune.”
Specifications
LOA: 37’2”
Beam: 8’6”
Draft: 2’11”
Displ.: 17,000 lbs.
Fuel: 200 gals.
Water: 102 gals.
This article was originally published in the July 2024 issue.
