Publish Date: Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Coordinates: 38° 19.92′ N 76° 27.45′ W
Last weekend we participated in TrawlerFest in Solomons Island, Maryland. The TrawlerFest shows are a series of small boat shows around the country, focused on trawler-style vessels. Many of the boats in the show are owned by liveaboards like us, who pilot their boat to the show because it’s a great opportunity to meet other trawler cruisers. TrawlerFests also offers seminars to help people learn more about cruising on a trawler. TrawlerFests are sponsored and organized by PassageMaker Magazine, which has done a great job expanding the shows over the last couple years.
We attended our first TrawlerFest show in Long Beach, California in the year 2000, which was shortly after we became intrigued by living and cruising on a trawler. We have attended several TrawlerFests since then, always drooling over the boats as attendees rather than owners. This time, we were finally among the initiated because we own and live aboard our own trawler — it was very fun to close the loop!
The manufacturer of our boat, Nordhavn, asked if they could show our boat at TrawlerFest, which we were more than happy to do. They had a 47′ boat and our 43′ boat in the show, and they were both very popular with the crowd. The weather was pretty bad all weekend (wind and rain), but that didn’t seem to stop people from showing up. Our friend and Nordhavn representative, Ray, came up for the show from Stuart, Florida, and Nordhavn reps Dave and Ben came down for the show from Portsmouth, Rhode Island. We enjoyed getting to know Dave and Ben, and it was great to see Ray again.
The PassageMaker Magazine staff who put on the show were helpful, organized, and friendly, and they treated Ayla like a honored attendee. They even gave her an award at Saturday evening’s festivities for being “The Youngest TrawlerFest Attendee”. The band drafted Ayla into their act by having her up on stage to sing backup vocals: “Ride Sally, Ride!” It was all good fun!
My main takeaway from the show is that this is a thriving and growing community of cruisers. Everybody is interested in where you’ve been and where you’re going, and they’re all willing to lend a helping hand in the form of information or advice. The attendees are mostly serious about trying the liveaboard Trawler lifestyle someday (just like we were), so their questions are thoughtful and earnest. Because we are new owners, several people were very interested in how we “made the leap”, and it was satisfying to be able to give them some inspiration for their own dreams.