Nicholson 476, SOLENT LADY

Broker’s Comments

The Nicholson 476 is an evergreen classic that never fails to turn heads. With her trademark Pedrik good looks and unmistakable build quality from Camper & Nicholsons at their best, they are practical for couples and families to go far aboard, but also compact for local cruising.

SOLENT LADY has had a series of loving owners. She has a lovely Rondal furling sloop rig and her teak joinery below decks is in fantastic condition. She also benefits from a new teak deck in 2012. She has been carefully used and well serviced through life. The layout with a large en-suite owners’ stateroom aft and generous double guest cabin forward again en-suite, as well as a well-conceived galley and large main saloon, makes her comfortable at sea and in port. On deck, her large centre cockpit is well protected and she has wide side decks and an intelligent deck layout.

It is rare to find a yacht of this type on the brokerage market, which is in such original and fine condition; we think that she is a real find. She was in Europe at the time of Brexit, but was delivered back to the UK for her UK owners this summer and now has obtained returned goods relief in the UK. Therefore she is VAT paid in both Europe and the UK and a purchaser can decide on their preferred VAT location at closing. A European sale would need to transact in Europe. A survey of the underwater profile is available on request.

Sales Video

Owner’s Comments

When we were looking for a new yacht, we were planning a world trip and for this, we needed a larger yacht. We had heard and read about the build quality of the Camper & Nicholson series yachts and we were sold as soon as we saw SOLENT LADY – with her lovely lines and wonderful joinery. She also has lots of space for entertaining.

We have loved owning Nicholson 476, SOLENT LADY because of her size, the ease of handling, the comfort and the quality. Her facilities have enabled us to stay on board for long periods as a home from home with a large amount of storage capacity.

For example – SOLENT LADY has, in addition to a good size fridge, a really good deep freezer system where we can get the temperature down to minus 18 and keep our frozen food as we would at home. The yacht has two systems for the freezer, one engine driven the other battery so we have this luxury at anchor or in the marina.

The aft cabin has a king size comfortable central berth with easy access on both sides, and we have our own en-suite heads. Visitors can be accommodated in comfort and privacy in the forepeak, which has its own washbasin and en-suite heads. The saloon is spacious with an enormous dining table that has been great for entertaining. We have not needed to compromise on comfort, as one may have to do on smaller boats.

Throughout our ownership of SOLENT LADY she has been a much admired vessel which has been a great source of pride for us.

Before sailing off to Portugal with Rally Portugal, we sailed the south west coast of the UK. When we got to our destination in the Algarve we had intended to sail back to the UK as part of our summer holiday. However, we decided to stay in Portugal as SOLENT LADY made an excellent home down there. We planned to make Portugal the jumping off point for our world cruising, but in any event, we remained where we and SOLENT LADY were – as new grandchildren kept appearing which scotched our ocean crossing plans.

That said we have had a terrific time in the past years with SOLENT LADY – sailing her with just the two of us as a husband and wife team. The size has not been a problem especially with the luxury of hydraulic reefing and the power winch for anchoring.
We are cruising folk not racers, but we have found the sailing performance of SOLENT LADY very rewarding. We have had the yacht doing 9 knots under sail and that has been plenty for us. The genoa is a very powerful sail and we have found that a combination of reefed genoa and full staysail gives us ideal comfortable sailing.

When we bought SOLENT LADY, we knew that the teak deck needed renewing soon afterwards. Having the deck replaced was a major occasion and meant we were without SOLENT LADY for some months. However, it was worth the wait because she looked simply gorgeous when the work was complete. We have always kept up with the service of systems and machinery as is normal and she has been very reliable

We are sad to be selling SOLENT LADY, it is a big wrench, but we are now in our 80s and so slightly less agile than we used to be. We will miss her greatly.