| IMO | 8603509 |
|---|---|
| Gross tonnage | 5,307 GT |
| Length | 134.1 m |
| Beam | 15.83 m |
| Passenger capacity (double) | 148 |
| Passenger capacity (max) | 159 |
| Service speed | 15.0 knots |
| Builder | Ateliers et Chantiers du Havre |
| Hull number | 272 |
| Launched | 1988 |
| Maiden voyage | 1988 |
| Operator | Windstar Cruises |
| Status | Active |
Overview
Wind Spirit is a motor sailing yacht in cruise service for Windstar Cruises, built in France and entered into service in 1988. At just 5,307 GT and carrying, in her article's figures, 148 passengers, she is smaller by an order of magnitude than most ships in this directory — and she is propelled, in part, by sail.
She is one of an unusual class of only three vessels — Wind Star, Wind Spirit and Wind Song — designed as modern cruise ships but carrying an elaborate system of computer-controlled sails on four masts. That hybrid idea, a luxury cruise product under sail power managed by computer rather than by a large sail-handling crew, is the entire point of the ship, and it has sustained her in service with her original operator for well over three decades.
Key specifications
The dataset records her at 5,307 GT, 134.02 m in length, 15.83 m in beam, 15.0 knots and hull number 272, built by Ateliers et Chantiers du Havre. Tonnage, length and beam agree closely with her own article, which gives 5,307 GT, 134 m and 15.8 m, a draught of only 4.1 m, a capacity of 148 passengers and a crew of 90.
Two dataset figures need context. The dataset gives 1988 as the launched year; her article records a launch on 13 July 1987, with the ship acquired on 24 March 1988 and commissioned in April 1988. On speed, her article gives 11 knots — the figure under power — while the dataset's 15.0 knots corresponds to performance under sail, which other sources put at up to about 15.8 knots. On a sailing cruise ship, "speed" is genuinely two different numbers, and the build notes flag the point rather than collapsing them into one.
The dataset gives no class; the three-ship group is dealt with under sister ships below.
Design and construction
Wind Spirit was built at Le Havre by Ateliers et Chantiers du Havre — Société Nouvelle des Ateliers et Chantiers du Havre in fleet listings — as the third of Windstar's founding trio, following Wind Star (1986) and Wind Song (1987).
The design is a cruise ship wrapped around a sailing rig. Four masts carry sails that are set, trimmed and furled by a computer-controlled system, allowing a small crew to operate a rig that on a traditional vessel would need many hands. Auxiliary diesel power — 3,150 kW installed in her article's figures — provides propulsion when there is no wind, in confined waters and to a schedule. The shallow draught of about 4.1 m, remarkable for a sea-going cruise vessel, lets her use small harbours and anchorages closed to conventional cruise ships.
Windstar itself had been founded in 1984 as Windstar Sail Cruises, explicitly as an alternative to the ever-larger modern liners then flooding the Caribbean. Wind Spirit, commissioned in April 1988, completed the original three-ship statement of that idea. In the same period the young company passed into Holland America Line ownership — a 50 per cent stake in 1987 and the balance in 1988 — and thence, with Holland America, into the Carnival group, without the ship's name, operator brand or concept changing.
Naming, launch and maiden voyage
Her name is part of a matched set — Wind Star, Wind Song, Wind Spirit — all evoking wind and sail rather than places or people, and all signalling the product before a passenger steps aboard.
She was launched on 13 July 1987, acquired by Windstar on 24 March 1988 and commissioned in April 1988; the dataset records both launch and maiden voyage at year level as 1988, of which the maiden-voyage year is the reliable one. No christening account is given in her own article, and none is invented here: for a 148-guest yacht, the entry into service, not a naming spectacle, is the documented event.
Career by operator
Wind Spirit has had one name and one operator throughout her life.
| Period | Name | Operator |
|---|---|---|
| 1988–present | Wind Spirit | Windstar Cruises |
That continuity is itself notable in a batch of ships that mostly changed hands. The ownership above the brand changed — Windstar passed from its founders to Holland America and into Carnival Corporation, and in later years beyond that group — but the ship's operating identity did not. Her whole career is a Windstar career, and her story is therefore told through the refits below rather than through a chain of operators.
Onboard character
Her character is that of a private yacht made commercial: teak decks, open deck space out of all proportion to her passenger count, and a crew of about 90 for under 150 guests. The defining experience, as designed, is sailing itself — being on deck under a computer-managed press of sail, with an open bridge policy in the Windstar tradition allowing guests to watch navigation at close quarters.
Public life on board was arranged on a yacht scale: lounges, a library, a small spa and a watersports platform at the stern from which guests could swim and use water-sports equipment when the ship was at anchor. Contemporary descriptions emphasise polished wood and marine styling rather than resort spectacle. All of this is recorded as the character of the ship as designed and long operated — a deliberate opposite to the large-ship model of her era, in which the vessel grew while the passenger's connection to the sea thinned. On Wind Spirit the sea, and the wind in the sails, remained the entertainment.
Major refits and incidents
No casualty, fire or grounding is recorded for Wind Spirit in the sources used for this guide — a contrast with her sister Wind Song, which was lost after an engine-room fire in 2002 and scuttled in 2003; that event belongs to the sister's record, not to this ship's, and is noted only in the class section below.
Refits, by contrast, are a continuing story. Windstar's multi-year, multimillion-dollar "Setting Sails" refurbishment of its three sailing yachts, carried out at Navantia's yard in Cádiz, Spain, reached Wind Spirit in a first phase in March–April 2025, covering public spaces, technology and soft furnishings; trade coverage of the programme also records new sails being ordered fleet-wide, with Wind Spirit among the ships to hoist replacement sails. A second phase, covering remaining staterooms and dining venues, was reported as scheduled for March 2027. The two-phase structure — public rooms first, accommodation later — is the documented pattern of the project across the class.
Earlier refurbishments are less fully documented in the sources used here, and no dates for them are asserted.
Sister ships and class
The class is three ships built at Le Havre to the same design: Wind Star (1986), the first ship of Windstar; Wind Song (1987); and Wind Spirit (1988). All three measured about 5,307 GT with four masts and computer-controlled sails.
Only two survive in service. Wind Song suffered an engine-room fire on 1 December 2002, was withdrawn, and was scuttled on 22 January 2003. Wind Star and Wind Spirit continue as the surviving pair. A larger relation, Wind Surf — originally built as Club Med 1, with five masts and roughly three times the tonnage — belongs to the same Windstar sailing family but is not a sister of this trio.
Fate and where she is now
Wind Spirit is in active service with Windstar Cruises, which is how the dataset records her: status active, fate "Operating". No sale, transfer or withdrawal has been announced in the sources used here. A ship of 1988 still trading under her original name and operator, and receiving phased refurbishment investment in the mid-2020s, is being maintained for a long further life by the standards of her generation — most conventional cruise ships of 1988 have long since left service.
Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cruise_ships, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_Spirit_(ship), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windstar_Cruises