OK, I'll stick my head up on this, since I participated in the meetings where much of this stuff happened.

NAHCA did not exist as a separate entity from Hobie Cat Co. until 1988. Wick Smith was elected chairman at the first "real" meeting at the 16 Nationals that year in Corpus Christi.

At the 1991 NAHCA AGM in San Diego, paid membership to the NAHCA was voted in, since financial support from Hobie Cat was waning.

The membership numbers originally reported to Sailing World included Hobie Fleet memberships, not just NAHCA Memberships. Paid NAHCA / HCA memberships have never been more than 2,000, and have stayed in the vicinity of 1,000 for many years now.

Other topic: Kingston - The last time I went was 2003.
The race management was so poor that I wrote a letter to the head of the Canadian Yachting Assoc. The signal boat was a sailboat with a malfunctioning engine. There were no chase boats. The mark "boat" was a gigantic aluminum barge driven by a guy who was drunk when he wasn't stoned.

Bob (rhodysail) was there - he should remember how f'ed up the racing was.

The launching area is a marina, for crying out loud! They trail a floating line to help you pull yourself in to the ramp:


Problem is that the rope doesn't go all the way to the base of the ramp, so usually sombody (Fluffy in this case) goes swimming:


(That's Dan Borg and Karen-Ann Xavier in the boat behind us, fending off the big boats parked in slips just out of view to the right)

Pat (pbisesi) is right - Kingston was overpriced for what you got (nothing), the launching area was inhospitable to beach cats and at least in 2003, the race management was substandard.

Port Burwell is much nicer:



For a $40 entry fee, each team got a nice soft cooler, real trophies (not Mount Gay hats / t-shirts which is what CORK gives - totally inappropriate for junior sailors), continental breakfast every morning and a chips/salsa/margarita party after sailing on Saturday.