Some of you may remember that we at Boats Ibiza ran a prize draw, back in May this year with the help of our friends at Jet2.com. The prize? A luxury yacht charter, complete with overnight stay on the pride of our fleet, Italian designed, iconic 89′ Arno Leopard, Disco Volante. Plus UK-IBZ return flights, airport transfers and a private chef onboard. Including x 7 guests of the winner’s choice.

Yup. For real!

The winner’s name was picked out of the hat by resident Sa Trinxa DJ, Franco Moiraghi, one bright, sunny, Salinas afternoon in June. The name on the paper was the very lucky Martin Saiz!

I could bang on forever about what a fantastic time we had last weekend, when Martin finally arrived in Ibiza with his family on Sept 30th, courtesy of those wonderful folk at Jet2.com, to claim his prize. But how much nicer to let him tell you in his own words, right, ladies & gents?

We’re proud to cut and paste Martin’s heartfelt comments made on TripAdvisor below. Dreams do come true 🙂

«Living the dream indeed, even if only for 24 hours!

Hi, my name is Martin and I had the biggest stroke of luck by winning a competition run by Boats Ibiza in association with Jet2.com for 8 people, all flights, transfers and stay aboard Disco Volante, plus a cruise to Formentera, with a chef to prepare our meals and unlimited drinks on offer.

My first problem was selecting who to take. Needless to say I had lots of volunteers! In the end I brought my wife, Chantale, our son, Damien and his wife, Hannah and their son, our first grandson, Etienne. Our youngest daughter Jenna came along as did her sister in law Kirsten who brought her boyfriend Henry.

We arrived at Ibiza airport and we’re met by our lovely host Jane C. We weren’t in the minibus long before she was sharing some of what lay ahead of us. In the port we headed to the Disco Volante, moored and at the ready were the crew headed by Captain John.

We were all welcomed aboard and given the safety speech in preparation for what was to be 24 hours of non-stop pampering. We were informed that what happens on the yacht stays on the yacht, ha ha!

We were shown our rooms for our overnight stay. As the competition winner my wife and I had the master suite. Suitably impressed we headed back to the top deck and proceeded to be offered the first of countless drinks, a very nice cava. On our trip to Formentera we were joined by Hector with his drone, who was to capture the occasion for us. As we relaxed on the sun loungers the yacht sped through the water at 24 knots.

On arrival at Formentera we dropped anchor and spent a few hours eating sushi and snacks plus swimming in the still warm waters, trying to avoid the small jellyfish. There was much to occupy us, we learnt about the yacht and some of the stories aboard, got better acquainted with the crew, who all entertained us and waited on us at every moment. It was hard to believe that anyone had ever been so royally treated as were the whole day, nothing was too much trouble.

Returning to port we moored up again and, as supper would be served a couple of hours later, we had time to play the tourists in the surrounding small streets lined with boutiques, there were even arts and crafts stalls.

Having worked up an appetite we arrived at a beautifully prepared dinner table, more drinks at the ready. We spent a very enjoyable couple of hours eating a superbly prepared supper (hats off to the chef, Jac and helpers, who also provided the two vegetarians in our party with a great meal) and chatting and chilling and watching others checking us out as they walked by our yacht. I’d been in their shoes many times before, envious of the privileged aboard yachts such as this.

The day seemed to last forever and I remember thinking that I could get used to this, somehow putting to the back of my mind that it was going to end the next day and it would be back to work the day after that!

After supper the speakers were really tested with some great music and, as the drinks flowed, some singing and dancing broke out as we became more and more at home in our luxury home from home.

John, the Captain, gave us a tour of the boat, down we went to the galley and into the engine room. Had something gone wrong in there we’d have taken years to figure it out but the crew had to know how to fix everything. It was extraordinary learning about what running a large yacht like this entails.

And still the drinks flowed, wine, beer, every kind of spirits it seemed.

Half past midnight saw me retire to the master suite, it had been a long day. The youngsters stayed up until about 3am, they weren’t quite as awake as us the next morning! We walked into town and had a couple of coffees and pastries before returning to pack and saying our goodbyes ready to leave for our flight.

Again, as professional as she had been throughout our trip, our host Jane organised our transfer back to the airport where we said our goodbyes.

We were flying back to reality, but not without many special memories.

From that moment in May, when Boats Ibiza announced me as the winner of the competition in a live draw on Facebook, I can honestly say that the company is both professional and efficient, providing a personal and memorable service to its clientele. We not only travelled with a one year baby, but two of our original party couldn’t make the trip after my daughter’s mother in law broke her ankle on her first day in France shortly before this trip. Jane liaised with Jet.com to allow us to make two late substitutions.

What could have been a real hassle proved no real problem at all for her. And, I mustn’t forget to mention Jet2.com. We’d never flown with Jet2 prior to this trip but we would recommend them to everyone. The flights there and back were brilliant, and the seats had very generous leg room and all the ground crew and the flight crew were so helpful and cheerful with it. They certainly put a few of their competitors in the shade.

We sincerely thank Boats Ibiza and Jet2.com for running the competition in the first place but I would suggest that whoever wishes to experience the same wonderful adventure that we enjoyed should check them out, for they have something special here that customers will remember long after they leave.»

Here’s a lil’ video we made on the day 🙂

What more can we add? Other than to offer huge thanks to Jet2.com for kindly providing the flights to get Martin and his family from the UK to Ibiza and back again.

More thanks to our amazing, resourceful, unflappable, brilliant chef Jac Forte from Chef Express Ibiza who cooked up a truly mouthwatering feast. Think opening shots of Gazpacho followed by locally sourced starters of melted provolone cheese with perfectly pan-fried and salted Padron peppers. Then a wonderfully presented main of chorizo-stuffed chicken served with Mediterranean vegetable stacks and creamy mashed potato for the carnivores. Light-as-feather puff pastry mushroom tartlets for the veggies. And the dessert. OMG. The most incredible, decadent fig, walnut and honeycomb cheesecake that this blogger has ever had the pleasure to groan in delight over!

And of course, massive thanks going out to Disco Volante’s expert Captain John & his fantastic crew, Martha, Victoria and Michael. As Martin himself commented, «nothing was too much trouble.» They made the trip perfect in every way.

Last, but certainly not least, HUGE thanks to everyone who entered. To all of you that took the trouble to share our post and tag the friends you’d invite if you won.

So heads up ladies and gents. We’re going to run a similar competition next spring! So if you haven’t done so already, we warmly invite you to sign up to our VIP list below. The folk on this list get to hear about all our fantastic competitions, prize draws and special offers first.

Martin is on our VIP list.

Maybe you’ll be the lucky winner next year? Go ahead, sign up now! 😉

Disco Volante is available for private charter in Ibiza between May-Oct every year. More info here.

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