Two waiters per guest. £1,100 pots of caviar. My weekend on a Putin crony’s super-yacht
When TOM RAWSTORNE saw photos of a £50m boat seized in Gibraltar, it looked familiar. Then he realised why...
AS HOLIDAY snaps go, it will take some beating. Gently bobbing around on the Caribbean Sea, my wife and I pose side by side on the stern of the £50m superyacht Axioma. Beside us can be seen one of the ship’s two on-board swimming pools, the aquamarine water within visible through a viewing window. Behind us, smoked-glass doors lead to the middle of five teak decks, each of which offers the last word in luxury living – from bedroom suites with marbled bathrooms to cordon-bleu cookery and caviar galore, a 3D cinema and swim-in cocktail bar.
Later that day, as the sun sets, we will enjoy an exquisite multi-course meal on a gleaming mahogany table bedecked with flowers, shells, softly glowing candles, crystal glasses and gilt-edged china, attended by staff who outnumber us two to one.
Once we’ve finally had our fill of top-end food and wine – guests can get through as much as £150,000 worth in a week – we’ll retire to our cabin, though the word doesn’t do justice to the sprawling suite that dwarfs our bedroom back home. It’s like a five-star hotel on steroids.
Fast-forward six years, and scrolling through the news headlines the other day I spotted a photograph featuring a yacht that looked oddly familiar… This time, however, Axioma was tied up in port in Gibraltar, its decks deserted.
Sure, the pool was empty and the final ‘A’ appeared to have dropped off its nameplate, but given that it had just crossed the Atlantic, that was perhaps unsurprising.
What caught my eye was the story accompanying the picture – that the 224ft super-yacht had been seized by the authorities in Gibraltar. The reason? The luxury vessel is owned by Dmitry Pumpyansky. He had been sanctioned by the UK. In so doing, he joined other Russian oligarchs such as Roman Abramovich and Alisher Usmanov in having his assets frozen by the British Government.
Like them, Pumpyansky is a very rich man, his £2bn fortune built on the supply of oil and gas pipelines to Russia’s state-owned energy entity Gazprom. And like them, his assets also include not just property but a super-yacht.
But unlike Abramovich and Usmanov, a one-time Arsenal shareholder, until now I had never heard Pumpyansky’s name. Which some may find odd, given that in 2016 I spent a long weekend being waited on hand and foot aboard his gigantic gin palace.
TOGETHER with a small group of other journalists from the British and foreign press, my wife Charlotte and I had been invited on board by the company responsible for chartering, or renting out, the ship. It was an unmissable chance to get a fascinating insight into a world that is normally accessible to only a select few.
We were informed that Axioma’s owner was planning on selling the super-yacht. Not because he needed the cash, but to upgrade to an even larger and more expensive version. He was Russian, we were told, but that was as far as it went. As a man who valued his privacy, no further details regarding his identity were to be forthcoming. Naturally, I tried to confirm his identity. But got nowhere. Hardly surprising, given that it would later be revealed that the vessel was owned by a company registered in the British Virgin Islands whose ties to Pumpyansky emerged only following a huge leak of confidential papers from a Panama-based bank.
At the time, the only names my various searches linked the yacht to were Formula 1 driver Lewis
Hamilton and Kendall Jenner, half-sister of reality TV star Kim Kardashian. Both had previously chartered the vessel, the latter leaping from the top deck into the ocean below, a stunt captured by paparazzi, earning her millions of likes on social media and bringing the vessel international fame.
But even had Pumpyansky’s name popped up, the most I would have learnt was that a few years earlier he had been deemed sufficiently fit and proper to float his company on the London Stock Exchange. It is only in the past month that the mood has so dramatically swung against the superrich Russian elite.
What was abundantly clear from my stay on board Axioma six years ago was just how obscenely rich you have to be to own a superyacht. And what your average oligarch will demand in return. For starters, anyone wanting to charter the yacht would have to find £420,000 to cover the cost of a week’s stay.
Obviously, having already splashed out £50 m to buy it, Pumpyansky would not pay to go on his own vessel. But he would have to cover the £20,000-a-week fuel bill. And, like anyone else, he would also have to fund the cost of food and drink on top of that.
Known as the APA, or Advance Provisioning Allowance, that can add anything from £40,000 to £150,000 per week, depending on how expensive your tastes are.
Before going on board, individual guests are contacted and asked to tick a list of what they would like to eat and drink. And, trust me, it’s more Cristal champagne and rare Scotch than supermarket ownbrand prosecco.
During my stay, the then chef, who was on call 24/7, told me how he would source whatever guests wanted, often flying in £1,100 pots of Beluga caviar and slabs of Wagyu beef, a Japanese delicacy known for the tenderness given to the meat by its marbled fat. And oligarchs don’t just demand the most expensive food. Presentation is everything.
While we were on board, the evenings revolved around a grand dinner served at a beautiful round dining table set at the back of one of the decks. Each night, the table was made up with a different theme and centrepiece, the chief stewardess being responsible for the elaborate ‘table-scaping’. Attention to detail was extreme.
The 12 guests were attended by 24 young, good-looking and charming staff, who would always go the extra mile.
Their wages range from £2,500 a month for a deckhand to £20,000 a month for the captain of one of the bigger super-yachts. But on top of that are the tips they can earn.
At a minimum they might expect to receive £10,000 to divide among themselves for a week’s stay. Exceed expectations and the figure could be five times that.
So, as I was told by a stewardess, when a guest on Axioma decided he wanted his partner to be serenaded with a harp, the staff managed to not only ship on board a
The cost of a week’s stay on board Axioma? £420,000
harp and a harpist, but someone to tune the instrument in advance. If young guests have a birthday on board, she added, the crew will dress in superhero outfits and create a party to remember.
The service is not just attentive but super-discreet. These superyachts are built with a network of hidden staircases and corridors, meaning that guests don’t have to rub shoulders with the crew.
Using earpieces and walkietalkies, they are directed around the ship, popping up out of nowhere to offer towels, drinks, suncream or whatever you need before you even realise you need it. Pop out of your bedroom for a morning walk on the deck and by the time you return, the room will, miraculously, have been cleaned.
Everything is buffed and polished to perfection. The cleaning regime – known in the nautical world as ‘detailing’ – is taken to obsessive levels, with staff deploying cotton buds to remove dust from between crevices in the teak decks. Even the metal pipes in the engine room are super-shiny.
We stayed in the second-largest state room on the yacht, known as the VIP suite. It took up the full width of the yacht – 40ft – and was furnished with a bespoke sofa and chairs and a super-king-size bed.
There was also a marble bathroom, complete with bath, and a walk-in dressing room with electric door, huge TV and mini-bar. The blinds, lights and music system were all controlled via a bedside iPad.
The largest bedroom suite of all had its own sun terrace and belonged to the owner. It was kept ready for him at all times, we were told by the crew, its wardrobes filled with his clothes and personal belongings, allowing him to simply turn up and go.
As for entertainment, oligarchs clearly can’t get enough of gadgets. There were three jet-skis, and submersible battery-powered pods – like a propeller-driven bodyboard – that you hold on to and which then drag you around the ocean.
Other, bigger super-yachts even have space for mini-submarines.
Of course you might imagine that the privacy-loving owners of these pleasure palaces like to keep a low profile when on board. In reality, they flock together. Our trip took place in January, when all the big boys and their boats are in the Caribbean. When we arrived to board off the island of St Maarten, Roman Abramovich’s superyacht, Eclipse, was in the bay.
At 530ft, it is more than twice as long as Axioma – and cost more than 10 times more.
It is spread over nine decks, and one of its two pools can be used as a dancefloor by raising the granite pool floor to deck level at the touch of a button.
It also boasts a range of security devices, including a missile detection system, missile-launchers and bulletproof windows.
It even has a ‘laser shield’ antipaparazzi system, which uses infra-red sensors to detect the electronic light signals that digital cameras used to focus.
Any camera it picks up is then targeted with a focused beam of bright light that disrupts the potential photo, making any shots unusable.
Back on Axioma, and during our stay, the only photos being taken were of the guests – mementoes
Abramovich’s has a laser shield to disable paparazzi cameras
of a once-in-a-lifetime holiday.
Which brings us on to its very uncertain future.
According to a yacht-tracking website, Axioma arrived in Gibraltar following a 17-day crossing of the Atlantic. The Gibraltar government confirmed in a statement that Axioma had been seized in port after being granted permission to enter.
UK ministers were quick to praise the action, with foreign secretary Liz Truss tweeting: ‘Welcome Gibraltar’s seizure of Dmitry Pumpyansky’s super-yacht following UK sanctions.’
In fact, it is a bit more complicated than that.
It appears that the super-yacht was detained over a claim filed in the Supreme Court by an international bank that has a mortgage on the ship.
Nonetheless, the government said that should Axioma be sold by the court in order to meet the claims of legitimate creditors, any remaining proceeds would be seized under sanctions legislation.
Likewise, the vessel itself would be seized under the sanctions regime should it be released by the court.
Which means, in short, that Axioma isn’t about to set sail any time soon.
And that when it comes to summer holidays, its oligarch owner is going to have to make alternative arrangements.