Bali Catamarans 5.8

The Bali 5.8 is 57'11" (17.65 m) overall on a 29'8" (9.06 m) beam, drawing 4'10" (1.48 m), with a light displacement of 52,250 lbs (23.7 t) and 73,685 lbs (33.4 t) at maximum load. Usable deck area is 1,501 sq ft (139.5 m²). Bali builds her in three, four, five or six cabins with a head for each, and rates her CE approval A: 16 / B: 16 / C: 24 / D: 40. Olivier Poncin conceived her, Xavier Faÿ drew the hull and the Piaton-Bercault studio designed the interior.

The deck plan is organized around two things: the up-and-over aft door that merges saloon and cockpit, and a rooftop terrace carrying a lounge, a sunbathing area and the helm station under one wide hardtop. Tankage is 317 gal (1,200 L) of fuel and 349 gal of water, and the hardtop doubles as a large solar platform feeding the house bank.

Auxiliary power is twin diesels, 80 HP standard with 115 HP optional — the extra muscle over the standard pair in the shorter 5.2 is there to put 52,250 lbs (23.7 t) and 29'8" (9.06 m) of beam alongside a dock in a crosswind, which is precisely when you want it.

Maximum upwind sail area is 2,561 sq ft (238 m²), and the sail plan was dimensioned around the hull rather than inherited from a smaller boat. The hardtop over the rooftop terrace is also the solar platform, and its area is what makes long stays at anchor practical on a boat this size. She carries the same 317 gal (1,200 L) of fuel as the 53'10" 5.2 on a heavier hull, so get observed burn at your intended cruising rpm in writing at sea trial and work your own passage numbers off that figure.

The rooftop terrace is the room that sells the boat. A wide hardtop for shade, open sides for ventilation, a lounge, a sunbathing area and the helm station all in one modular space with the horizon in every direction — it works as a sailing station in the morning and a dinner terrace at night. Below it the saloon runs to picture windows on both sides and opens aft through the up-and-over door, so the main deck reads as one space rather than an inside and an outside.

Accommodation runs to six cabins and six heads, with every cabin en-suite even in the six-cabin arrangement, plus a single-berth skipper's cabin. The owner's master is the piece that has moved furthest: a walk-in dressing room, a desk with its own seating, and a redesigned bathroom with an oversized shower. Four-cabin owner's versions trade two doors for storage and a larger master, which is the version most private owners end up ordering.

The 5.8 tops Bali's numbered cruising boats beneath the 73'11" 7.0 and sits above the 53'10" 5.2, and the four extra feet buy a materially different boat: 1,501 sq ft (139.5 m²) of usable deck against the 5.2's 1,241, a hardtopped rooftop terrace in place of an open flybridge, and a master suite with a dressing room. Cross-brand she lands against the Lagoon 55 Millenium (60'4"), the Fountaine Pajot FP55 (55'9") and the FPY59S (61'7") — the fifty-to-sixty-foot class bought for long stays with a full house aboard, where Bali's argument is deck area and one continuous main deck rather than sail plan ambition.

Buy the 5.8 if you routinely have eight to twelve people aboard and have learned that what makes that work is having several places to be, not one big one. Take the four-cabin owner's version if the boat is mainly yours; the six-cabin layout is a charter specification and it costs you the storage a long season needs. Two decisions are worth the most thought: 29'8" (9.06 m) of beam is a marina question in the Mediterranean and should be answered before you order, and the 115 HP engines are the ones to tick on a hull this heavy. If you want most of the same idea in a shorter, cheaper slip, the 5.2 does it; if you need crew quarters with their own mess and a hull given over to the owner, the 7.0 is the step up.