Whether you actually want to own a car that drives like it’s 30 feet long or not, it’s still sad to see the good, old-fashioned land yacht replaced by a bunch of SUVs and crossovers. No one actually needs either vehicle, but there’s just something so charming about a big, luxurious sedan that will never seat more than four people. If I won’t see any corners, I want a mile of hood in front of me, two miles of trunk behind me, and a suspension so smooth, a record player wouldn’t skip if I drove down a dry creek bed.
Sadly, a big, heavy sedan using a 12.0-liter naturally aspirated V8 to make up for the three-speed slushbox between the engine and the rear wheels is destined to get terrible gas mileage, and nor would it get very far if you ever tried taking it up Hell’s Revenge, so the glory days of the land yacht are long gone. Can you still buy big, expensive luxury coupes and sedans in the U.S.? Sure. They just aren’t as common. Even if it looks like Genesis may take a run at building one soon.
Any amount of sporty is too sporty
Of course, if we’re going to talk land yatchs, we need some sort of definition. Is the Cadillac Celestiq a land yacht? Do land yachts have to be cars, or would the Escalade count? What about those extra-luxurious pickup trucks that occasionally cross into six-figure territory? If they do, how do they compare to all the ’60s and ’70s land yachts that we so closely associate with mobsters? Did the oil embargo kill the land yacht in your mind? Did the Europeans ever outdo the USA here? What about other countries?Â
That’s a lot of questions, but you’re going to have to puzzle through all of them. Because what I really want to know today is which land yacht you think sits at the very top of the list. The greatest land yacht of all time. Do any modern cars stand a chance, or have you been waiting for your favorite to make its comeback for the last 60 years? Regardless of which one you pick, it better be big, and I want to hear about it down in the comments.
