Sailing Uma vs. VO65 Sisi

Sailing Uma x Austrian Ocean Racing

36 vs. 65 ft.

When one of YouTube's biggest sailing channels stepped aboard Sisi for a 600-mile delivery.

Kika and Dan from Sailing Uma have spent years circumnavigating the globe on their 36ft yacht. They know the ocean. They know what it's like to live on a boat. But a VO65 is a different world entirely — no autopilot, no privacy, no wood, freeze-dried food, and a carbon fibre toilet that swivels. When they joined Sisi's delivery crew for the passage from Genova to Malta ahead of the Rolex Middle Sea Race, they documented everything — the sail changes, the watch systems, the bioluminescence at 2am, and the rope in the propeller at midnight. Two videos. Raw, honest, and exactly what life on board looks like when the cameras aren't trying to sell you anything.

Part 1: Welcome Aboard

Moving onto a 65ft carbon fibre spaceship — and learning to sleep inside a drum.

The first video is the arrival: boarding in Genova, unpacking into bunks the size of shelves, touring a boat stripped down to the essentials — canting keel, freeze-dried food, 40 litres of fresh water, and a briefing that includes the line "sleep with your feet facing forward, because if we hit something, your feet hit the bulkhead instead of your head." Then the main goes up — a three-hour, multi-person process — and the first night watch begins. Three hours on, six hours off, hand-steering through the darkness off the north tip of Corsica. By morning, Kika and Dan are already adapting to the rhythm of a boat that doesn't stop moving and never lets you forget it.

Part 2: Finding the Rhythm

The moment you realise.

600 miles, nine crew, and the moment you realise you don't need to be a pro to do this.

The second video is where the passage finds its groove. Flat sails, perfect wind, the boat doing what it was built to do. The crew interviews tell the real story — a birthday gift from a fiancée, a sailor from Barcelona, a Czech who always dreamed of trying it, and all of them surprised by how accessible the experience is. Then the midnight drama: a lazy sheet wraps around the propeller, the engine stalls, and the crew works through it in the dark. By the time Malta appears on the horizon after four days and 600 nautical miles, Dan puts it simply: you don't need to be a professional racer to do this. You just need to want to.

Don't buy the couch

Thank you Kika & Dan

A huge thank you to Kika and Dan from Sailing Uma for joining us aboard Sisi and sharing the experience with their community. Their honesty, curiosity, and willingness to sleep in a carbon fibre drum for four days brought our world to an audience that might never have found it otherwise. Fair winds, you two.

Visit Sailing Uma on YouTube

Sailing Uma vs. VO65 Sisi

36 vs. 65 ft.

Moving onto a 65ft carbon fibre spaceship — and learning to sleep inside a drum.

The moment you realise.

Thank you Kika & Dan

Don't buy the couch.