Over the years, Kracum owned some small boats and chartered yachts with his family, but Alpha Waves is the first big boat he’s owned. Finding the right boat for his needs was a multilayered challenge. His personal interest was a boat with a killer beach club, but he had other, more pressing considerations. Laurie, his wife of 45 years, used to be his hunting and fishing companion. Nine years ago, Laurie was injured in a cycling accident that left her using a wheelchair, and she had to give up many of those pursuits. Finding charter boats that had elevators and other adaptive elements though, proved a challenge.
“I wanted to come up with something where Laurie felt like she was as good as anybody else or could do anything,” he says.
After considerable searching, he found Benetti willing to build him a nearly 134-foot Oasis 40M with features such as an elevator that connects all the guest decks, a wheelchair-friendly passerelle, widened passageways, flush thresholds and custom furniture measurements.
Alpha Waves has a complement of tenders that includes a towed 40-foot Invincible catamaran for offshore fishing, scuba and shuttling, and a 17-foot Dragonfly flats boat. The Dragonfly is equipped with a custom-designed, adjustable-height chair that will allow Laurie to join the permit chase—something she hasn’t been able to do since her accident.
“I love permit fishing,” she says. “I’m not as obsessed as he is, but it’ll be very exciting to get back out there.” Her personal tally before the cruise was seven.
Last we caught up with the couple, they planned to ship it to Australia for more permit fishing. The year after, it may be Indonesia.
“I’ve never been to Indonesia, but there are lots of islands, which have to have fish,” Kracum mused.
