I have heared that cat sailing is decresing in some geographic areas. If so what areas is it decreasing and any reasons why? Also does anyone know of the geographic areas in which cats sailing in growing fairly rapidly?

Tom

[quote]I have heared that cat sailing is decresing in some geographic areas. If so what areas is it decreasing and any reasons why? Also does anyone know of the geographic areas in which cats sailing in growing fairly rapidly?[quote]

First of all everything is cyclical to some degree but I fear there is little hope for a comeback here. In our area (Southern California) the sport is all but non existent
due to the following reasons:

1: In most areas you are not allowed to store a recreational vehicle where it can be seen from the street. This means you will need to pay between $140 and $225 a month to store you boat in a mast down area some distance from the beach which opens at 8AM and closes at 6PM.

2: Time- It takes quite a while to drive from your house to where you boat is stored, sign out the boat, drive to one of three launch ramps in all of LA and Orange counties that allow sailboats and set up, get launched and sail for a few hours before you need to tear down and get back before 6PM. No beach storage is allowed overnight.

3: The water here is 54'F in the winter and 62-68 in the summer. Cold by most standards. There really are no lakes as this is a desert. What lakes there are do not allow water contact of any type and generally catamarans are not allowed on them as they are potable water sources.

Lastly the sprot of sailing is almost non existent here due to pressures from mass appeal events like:

Theme parks- There are 7 of them within 100 miles of here.
PWC and power boats- Turn a key and you are yachting
Extreme sports- Dirt Bikes, off road etc
Soccer, football, cheerleading, baseball etc etc along with professional sports teams.
Snow skiing and Snowboarding is an hour and a half a away.
and on and on.

I love the sport and still do it when I can. I will be buying a beachcat this spring to introduce my 11 year old to the sport and if she likes it we'll move up to something like a Reynolds 33.

It's a tough market out here and I hope this gives you a peek into why there is not a single Hobie Dealer or NACRA/Prindle/INTER dealer in Los Angeles...a city of some 17 million people.

Scary.

Mark Michaelsen
Luv dem beachcats

Oh, Mark, I didn't realize it was that bad in your area! What about yacht clubs that allow beach cats? And is the situation any better in San Diego? What about other parts of California?

Access to the water seems to be one of the biggest problems contributing to the decline of beach-cat sailing. Along with, as Mark said, local regulations that do not allow you to store your cat in your yard unless it is out of sight; and the high costs and inconvenience of storing it somewhere else.

Ironically and unfortunately, the places that have the most ideal sailing conditions are also the places where access to the water is increasingly closed off by resorts and condos or government regulations.

I just found out today that Gilbert's Resort here in the Keys, where we are holding this year's Tradewinds Regatta, will no longer be available for any sailing activity after June of 2005 because they are turning the whole place into private townhouses.

Nice warm water then.

Our little part of Texas (Houston/Galveston area) is holding it's own. Lots of public access to beachs, camping allowed at our favorite venue (the texas city dike) - and fires tolerated. Warm water and weather. Home owners associations are a pain in the butt though - 5 letters this year and I don't even keep the boat out side the house - just repairs/upgrades on the drive sometimes. Still, there is lots of land here so we are probably going to move out of the burbs and get a place to abandon as many boats as we like in the long grass!

We have restarted the local fleet and have a pretty good social scene. Life is good. Sorry to hear about the conditions in California. Leave the fruit and nuts behind and move to Texas!

was it your home owners association that wrote the letters?

That would irritate the everliving crap out of me.

Maugan, you have an education, a job, a boat and a woman, so next step will be a house. If you want to keep the boat, be sure to check for covenants and home owner association rules before you buy in a platted subdivision. We avoid those places. One development down here tells you what type and color of mailbox you have to use.

But even if you are not in a development or subdivision, there can be government regulations. For instance, in our county, I have heard there is a law that says no more than one boat is allowed per residence. We plead ignorance, because we have seven on our property. We probably should cover them with camouflage tarps.

Fortunately, everybody in the Keys has at least one boat, so they don't seem to enforce the law. The code enforcement people are too busy finding people with illegal living quarters on the ground floor of stilt houses.

Oh I'm fully aware of the convenants and their purpose. I live in a house now, and have had to drag the 17 up in the neighborhood a couple times to work on it, and I was just itching for someone to come say something to me. Nothing ever was, but thats probably because we have a good relationship with the neighbors.

Sorry for the thread divergence.

It's not really a thread divergence, because not being able to keep your boat on your property is almost as bad as not being able to keep your boat on a beach or not having access to the water. All these things hurt cat sailing.

A good sailing buddy of mine purchased a powerboat (gasp) and put it in his backyard. He knew he had a pretty strict neighborhood covenant. He has a 6' tall wood fence around his backyard but you could see about 6" of the bimini over the center console over the fence. He got a letter and offered to add 6" to the top of his fence where the boat wouldn't be visible anymore....nope - his fence is already at maximium neighborhood height! We ended up digging two 10" deep holes in his backyard for the trailer tires to sit in. I too will avoid neighborhoods with such rules.

I can't undertsand the problem of neighbors or passers by being able to see a boat on someones property.
I live in wales and there is no regulation (that I know of) that states that your boat must not visable to the public
Does anyone even know the reason why that regulation was even enforced?
Personally I think boats (especially beach cats) livens up an area.

Tom

Seems strange - you can own more firearms than a small country but you have to hide a boat in case it lowers the tone of the neighbourhood!

Doesn't that infringe your constitutional right to bear away?

The problem with boats parked in a driveway versus a cat with sails up on the beach is that the driveway version looks like crap. Beach cats and other boats on trailers are about as pretty as parking a semi or broken down,rusty old cars. That's the principle behind those rules. The same with a 30 foot blue tarp that you can see from your back yard. I know it woudn't bother me, but I can see how it could bother someone who paid for a nice view from their yard.

Unfortunately all those things make neighborhoods look shabby, and that ultimately affects the property values.

I am on my 4th catamaran in the course of about 20 years. TheMightyHobie18, H21SE, H20 and now the ARC21. I have seen myself change from a pleasure sailor that raced occasionally to a racer that rarely sails for pleasure. Maybe it is just the fact that I am growing older but I can tell you that the beach scene in Miami is nothing like what it used to be. We used to have 5 - 10 boats on the beach every weekend and no racing, it was screwing around in Biscayne Bay, hull flying contests, BBQ's and family. Now we get 5 - 15 boats once a month for the races and nothing in between. We show up, execute the race and then pack it up and go home. It seems that we have gotten away from the "Hobie" way of life in South Florida. Too much emphasis on racing. As I sit here, I realize that although I do enjoy racing, I enjoy participation and the social aspect of cat sailing more than the competition.
Anyway. I think I will try to find a small cat for my 17 year old and teach him and his girlfreind how to sail for pleasure.

Happy new Year,

Eric

Arbo, with that view, the neighbors could never complain!

David

Eric,
You can thank John McKnight for the fact that there is ANY catamaran racing going on in Miami right now. He has singlehandedly built the fleet back up from almost nothing.

If you and others want to do fun sailing in an organized way with the group, then ORGANIZE it. John has been doing this all by himself for several years and he has to build the fleet racing schedule around his flying schedule. Nobody offers to help him with the newsletter or putting on the races or anything. So now you want him to somehow come in off the water and provide beer and barbecue so you can have some camaraderie afterwards?

John organizes the racing because he wants to have people to race against. So, if you think there is too much emphasis on racing, why don't you take over the task of organizing fun-sailing days? Or why don't you organize a fun time for after the races? Things like that don't just happen in a void. It takes a catalyst and helpers.

As far as why there isn't more social aspect, that is a direct result of the fact that women are no longer involved, either sailing or on the beach.

The women left along with the Hobie 16's and the Hobie 18's. So, yes, the Hobie Way of Life is gone in some parts of the country because it was built around male-female teams and one-design racing.

San Diego is still free, free... free. Plenty of places to launch and beach a cat. Nice beach-lined bay (Mission Bay) and easy access to the ocean.

If you visit Mission Bay you would think that (other than Mission Bay Yacht Club sailing events) the sailing scene has really slowed down. That goes for all kinds of boats, boards, not just cats.

mary,
I have to agree with your points.
What you have described is the destruction of camaraderie.

It is partly caused by the whiners who complain about the lack of events and the way they are being staged.
They feel they are entitled to attend events without doing anything to support the sport.
They attend events and then insult the people who worked hard to stage an event
by complaining that it doesn't meet their standards.
This ruins the experience for the people who are trying to have a good time.

Another issue is the boats themselves.
Like you said, when the fleet consists of low tech beach boats with similar performance,
the skippers can relate to each other.
But today, the casual sailors on their inexpensive beach boats get looked down upon and
ridiculed by the hot dogs on their 20-21 foot rocket ships.
Who wants to sit around at the end of the day hearing some schmuck who has more money than skill,
brag about how fast his boat is?

The Hobie-centric edits from commandant ulibari are proving, as we all said they would,
to erode the ranks of Hobie fleets and alienate potential sailors.

So as long as ther are people out there who;
continually complain about how other people run their events, but never get off their lazy dead butt,
claim they design perfect boats and critisize the design of other boats,
take advantage of other peoples events, but are too elitist to invite others to their events,
work to exclude certain members of the sailing community from participating sinply because of the brand of their boat,
the sport will continue to decline!!!

We make the sport.
If it declines, it is our fault.

Move to Tybee... Great sailing, really warm water most of the year, good sea breeze, leave your boat on the beach if you want, in the front yard if you want, eveybody supports sailing here...

Chuck's the city Marshall in charge of code enforcement and he keeps Team Tybee's boat in his front yard along with the ground crew trailer... no problems

It's a great place to live and sail... the real big plus is that everyone gets along. On one side of you is a multi-millionaire and the other side is your surfing buddies who struggle to get by but were all friends.

Heck, Sandra Bullock brings her dog and reads to the elderly at the assisted living home here and nobody hassles her... except maybe "Maughan17" when he visits but that's another story

I lived in Huntington Beach, California growing up before moving to Hawaii and what Michael was saying is true about SoCal and especially the competition for our time and attention.

I saw an earlier post about someone wanting to do a lifestyle movie on the order of "Step into Liquid" about Cat Sailing. I think that is a great idea if someone can pull it off. Brian Karr's DVD was really cool and the Feldman's have some really great footage and interviews... it just needs to go to the next level that can somehow translate what cat sailing is all about to the non-sailor or even non catsailor the way surfing has successfully marketed the surfing lifestyle and vibe.

Keep sailing and surfing... stay wet in 2005!

Jim Stone
Tybee Island (Full-time now)