A passel of pocket cruisers put on a show
Issue 85 : Jul/Aug 2012
The C&C Mega 30 project boat in our backyard doesn’t fit the true definition of a pocket cruiser, but she will be trailerable once we get her launched. As such, she will be able to take us places our C&C 30 can only dream of going. Most readers know the C&C Mega 30 Jerry and I purchased in 2003 has yet to touch the water during our ownership. I believe (as I write this in March) that Sunflower will be launched sometime this summer. But these words will appear in July and, when people remind us about them in September, we may have to eat them. If so, please be gentle with us.
Even though Sunflower is still hugging her trailer and Jerry and I are nothing more than wannabes, we attended a pocket cruisers’ event in Lake Havasu City, Arizona, in February. What has become known as the Havasu Pocket Cruisers Convention (HPCC) pretty much blew us away. This gathering of trailerable boats and their sailors began five years ago when Sean Mulligan invited a few sailing pals to come on down to his lake during the winter. A dozen or so did. Over the years that followed, the size of the gathering doubled and doubled and doubled. By this year, the fifth, the HPCC has grown to a full-fledged event that overwhelms the uninitiated with more than 400 sailors in attendance, about half of whom arrive with their boats in tow.
Over the course of a week, there were races and keynote speakers, cruising activities and seminars, cocktails and trade shows, poker runs and a book exchange, the annual north/south grudge match, awards presentations and the parade of sail, a boat being built from scratch and donated to the Sea Scouts, and an informal boat show at the city dock.
My favorite activities were the boat show and the parade of sail. Both were big tourist attractions for the town, bringing many more to the waterfront than our 400 sailors and their vast collection of boats.
It started first thing Saturday morning with the boat show. The whole fleet (too many for one marina) showed up in one place right at the water’s edge smack-dab in the middle of the popular walking path for locals and tourists. The sailors strung their rigging with pennants and burgees and flags of all types, and greeted everyone who came by, fellow sailors and tourists, like long-lost friends.
Since 1968, Lake Havasu City has been the home of the London Bridge brought there (yes, from Great Britain piece by piece) by Robert McCulloch, developer of the McCulloch chainsaws and a passionate promoter of this Arizona town. The bridge made a wonderfully photogenic backdrop for the parade of small sailboats that followed the boat show Saturday afternoon.
Just about every kind of trailerable sailboat was represented. Purists might quibble about whether all met the definition of pocket cruisers, since a few were clearly daysailers (lacking any shelter or cruising amenities at all). Nevertheless, any boat that arrived on a trailer was welcome, and having them all in one place offered a great way to get a feel for the wide range of boats in this field. For those who may want to start out with a small boat, and also for those who are ready to downsize to a smaller boat, this gathering of pocket cruisers is a great place to make comparisons, see rigs and accommodations, and learn from the owners of specific models.
This is where the dreamers come in. I suspect that many of the tourists who strolled on the city’s waterfront that day — and, even more so, those who stopped to chat with some of the sailors there — may very well have discovered a new dream that day. All sailors already know the siren song of the sea. The dream takes many forms as it attracts people to small lakes and large oceans. Whatever shape the dream may take, I suspect that a few people said to themselves that day, “These things seem to be affordable. I bet I could learn to sail. I think it would be fun to own a sailboat.”
Some of them will follow through on that dream. To them, we say, “Welcome aboard!”
Thank you to Sailrite Enterprises, Inc., for providing free access to back issues of Good Old Boat through intellectual property rights. Sailrite.com
