Nine technical seminars at TrawlerFest-Stuart provide attendees with certificates of completion. Our insurance partners say that, depending on one’s insurer, these certificates can help lower your rates.
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It was an excellent run for TrawlerFest-Anacortes, the quaint town in northern Washington State that, for nearly a decade, hosted our regional, spring seminar series and in-water boat show. This year, we’ve decided to mix it up and move our northwest TrawlerFest 100 miles south-southwest…
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The concept of “green” powerboats can seem disingenuous if not troubling. Don’t get me wrong. I applaud the rise of fuel-efficient, electric vehicles of any sort, but the standard by which we label things “green,” especially in the boating industry, seems to be more about…
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For a quarter of a century, GPS (Global Positioning System) and other GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite Systems) have steadfastly provided excellent time and positioning information to mariners of vessels great and small, across oceans and ponds, in all seasons and in all weathers. We are…
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Folding bikes seem great for cruising boats. You can extend your sightseeing, fetch supplies, or simply get some rolling excercise. But I’ve wondered if a compactable electric bike could be even better and more fun. While that manly beast above is certainly unfit for stowing…
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Starting in January, The Moorings will begin offering powercat charters in Puerto Rico’s spectacular—and lesser known compared to some of her neighbors—Spanish Virgin Islands. The SVIs should be particularly appealing to U.S. residents, as Puerto Rico can be easily reached via direct-hop flights from many…
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Pardon my photography, but the point is that many detailed, up-to-date, and well-crafted official paper charts of Cuba do exist. Unfortunately, they’re not easy to own and the good work of the Cuban hydrographic service is also not yet fully available in any electronic…
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We were just a few hours out of London, in the notorious Dover Straits on my first trip to sea at the age of 16, when we collided with another ship in thick fog. It was only a glancing blow so we were able to…
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Pardon my photography, but the point is that many detailed, up-to-date, and well-crafted official paper charts of Cuba do exist. Unfortunately, they’re not easy to own and the good work of the Cuban hydrographic service is also not yet fully available in any electronic…
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As many of you who follow us on Facebook know, we kept close tabs on Jay Campbell and his boat, Largo, as they rode out Hurricane Matthew in Great Harbor Cay, Bahamas. When the noteworthy storm made landfall in Great Harbor Key, it registered as a…
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Pardon my photography, but the point is that many detailed, up-to-date, and well-crafted official paper charts of Cuba do exist. Unfortunately, they’re not easy to own and the good work of the Cuban hydrographic service is also not yet fully available in any electronic…
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As many of you who follow us on Facebook know, we kept close tabs on Jay Campbell and his boat, Largo, as they rode out Hurricane Matthew in Great Harbor Cay, Bahamas. When the noteworthy storm made landfall in Great Harbor Key, it registered as a…
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Quick Info on the Helmsman Trawlers 31 Sedan: LOA: 31’ 0” LWL: 28’ 0” BEAM: 10’ 6” DRAFT: 3’ 0” DISPL: 12,000 (dry) WATER: 100 gallons FUEL: 150 gallons SLOW CRUISE: 6 kn WOT: 13 kn RANGE @ SLOW CRUISE: 900 nm PRICE: STARTS AT…
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Hyundai has a long history of building marine engines for the Pacific Rim and Europe, and has recently introduced their marine line of Seasall engines to the United States. This new engine is designed to meet not just Tier III EPA requirements but future Tier…
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After a good run, you shut down the engine for the day and settle into a nice anchorage. The following morning, cup of coffee in hand, you press the start button and the engine won’t start. “How can that be,” you wonder. “It ran fine…
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Pardon my photography, but the point is that many detailed, up-to-date, and well-crafted official paper charts of Cuba do exist. Unfortunately, they’re not easy to own and the good work of the Cuban hydrographic service is also not yet fully available in any electronic…
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The new TrawlerFest location at Stuart is an opportunity to combine learning, boat browsing and a Florida vacation. All kinds of attractions lie within a short drive of the TrawlerFest location at the Hutchinson Island Marriott, but one is very special, and it’s just across…
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Let’s first note that McMurdo’s trailblazing SmartFind G8 AIS EPIRB still awaits FCC approval and probably won’t be for sale in the U.S. until spring (along with its more conventional E8 and G8 siblings). But McMurdo has definitely developed this useful combination of local and…
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It went unmentioned at our large family Thanksgiving feast last week, but I am thankful that solid-state radar became omnipresent in our marine electronics world this year. In fact Gizmo’s four test radomes now all share the solid-state virtues of near instant power up, low…
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Hey, those are all solid-state radomes showing on the 7-inch displays at Gizmo’s lower helm, and you’d see a fourth one running on the flybridge. Comparative testing is underway, but today I’m going to write about the rather amazing WilhelmSK app running on the iPad above. It…
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