Trawlers in the Sea of Abaco

When you look at almost any photo of an anchorage in the Sea of Abaco, you can easily be deceived into thinking that the most predominant form of boat is not the trawler. This is because many of them are in disguise.

What do you see when you look at this picture of the Hope Town anchorage?

I see almost exclusively trawlers. Let me explain.

Let’s start with these boats.

These boats look trawlers, but they are not. Like a trawler, they are intended to move at slow speeds, have a huge amount of space on board and are designed to be very fuel efficient when compared to a high speed planning motoryacht. These vessels may be trawlers, but most of their sister ships are not.

The trawler like vessel on the right is intended for the deep blue sea. It draws about 6 feet. It can only enter or leave most of the harbours in this area at or near high tide. Many of them need electricity so that they can do simple things like cook without a generator. So, they go to a marina where there is ample electricity and then they stay there where they do not have to worry about tides, anchors, electricity etc and where life is both easy and comfortable. These boats, however, are not trawlers. They are floating condos. You won't find them in most anchorages.

Now don’t get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with having a condo in a beautiful climate right on the edge of the sea. But a condo is not a trawler. Trawlers move.

The trawler on the left is a coastal trawler. It draws much less – maybe 4 feet. But its twin propellers are relatively exposed. While in theory, it could enter or leave harbour at most tides, it doesn’t because the touch of a propeller to the ground spells thousands of $ in damages. Again, many of these become floating condos. You sometimes find them in harbours, but seldom in anchorages.

In the Sea of Abaco, most of the true trawlers are shallow draft and have single engines with propellers well protected by a keel. They move about a lot and also anchor out almost as often as sailboats.

A surprise to me was that there are many manufacturers of trawler yachts that I did not previously know about such as Catalina, Hunter, Whitby, Morgan, Tartan etc.

Many of these trawlers in disguise as something else. They are characterized by deep draft, narrow beam, pointy bows and tall steadying sails. An example would be a sister ship to the vessel to the right. These trawlers are very fuel efficient but, compared to a classical trawler, they have little space on board and they have the great disadvantage of having to being able to enter or to leave most harbours at or somewhere near high tide. This can really cramp your travel plans if high tide is not until mid afternoon and you want to be squared away well before happy hour (5:00 pm). Their tall steadying sails are apparently actually usefull for dampening out rolling action when crossing the Gulf Stream (motorsailing). Apparently, their sails can actually be used to propel the boat by themselves but this is rare since batteries usually need charging and water often needs to be made and both these normally require a running engine. They motor with the idea that once these needs are met, they will sail. But all trips in the Sea of Abaco are short – so the trip is over before water making and battery charging are complete.

There is an interesting variety of this type of trawler in disguise. This type has a shallow keel and a smaller steadying sail. The Morgan OI and most motorsailers are examples of these. They have the advantage of being able to get into and out of most harbours at almost any tide. They have much more room on board for their size than their deep draft pointy ended trawlers in disguise as sailboats and they are still very fuel efficient. I have never, however, seen one of these actually sail and maybe I never will.

Another interesting variety is the large catamaran. These boats can get into and out of most harbours at most tides, are extremely fuel efficient and have a huge amount of space on board. The ones that are chartered for a week or so at a time seem to sail all over the place. They often have large, fully battened mainsails. I am told that these can easily weigh 200 pounds and that raising one is like hoisting them is as much work as hoisting a person up the mast. Unless the boat is equipped with an electric halyard winch, raising one of these sails is just too much work to be bothered with, if the planned sail is short. All planned sails within the Sea of Abaco are short.

Smaller multihulls such as the Gemini 105 are different. Hoisting sails is much less work. Outboards do not provide much battery charging. They seldom have onboard water making capability. So, they seem to sail wherever they go. These boats are not trawlers.

Finally, there are also trawlers which are disguised as planning motoryachts. These are typically manufactured by corporations such as Chris Craft. Actually, there are two classes of these. All, in theory, are capable of planning.

• There are those that never plane. They move at trawler speeds. They have a huge amount of space, still get much worse fuel consumption than a normal trawler and usually wait for a significant tide to enter or to leave a harbour. Although their draft is low, their propellors are very exposed since they have no skeg and the consequence of error is so high (bent props, shafts, maybe struts and maybe transmission problems) that they like to have a big margin for error before committing to making any passage. Most of these seldom anchor out, preferring to move only from marina to marina and there are few harbours with marinas here. This is because they are so dependant on electricity to do things like cook and few people enjoy eating their meals raw. In fairness, some have auxiliary generators alleviating this problem. However, you still seldom see them in anchorages.
• There are those that do plane. However, these boats almost never move at all since fuel is so damn expensive. They also become floating condos at some marina.
  

So what does that leave?

It leaves:

• Condos in disguise as classical trawlers,
• Condos in disguise as high speed motoryachts,
• Trawlers disguised as monohull sailboats,
• Trawlers disguised as multhull sailboats,
• Trawlers disguised as motorsailers,
• Trawlers disguised as planning motoryachts,
• Classical trawlers disguised as themselves,
• Small cruising catamarans,
• Monohull hull sailboats that actually sail (rare),
• High speed sport fishing boats (usually only seen at a distance and for a short period) and
• Rubber dingies, small motorboats and very occasionally small sailboats.

Therefore, on the Sea of Abaco, almost all boats that you see just cruising, are trawlers.