Advice please- Mooring and/or ease of use

Weave the standing rigging and trap wires through the tramp lacing. Matt Miller does this in the H16 video and in his H21 SC video. It is a little harder to see in the H16 video, so here's the 21 SC video. The lacing trick is shown in the first 30 seconds. This should save you some time.

It sounds like mast up storage would be a good fit for you. If you go to https://www1.ussailing.org/wheretosail/wheretosail.aspx and click on Maine you can find a list of sailing centers in yacht clubs. Start contacting the ones close to you to see if they have mast up storage. It's a big list someone will have a storage.

Additionally there is a very active Hobie fleet in New England https://www.facebook.com/HobieFleet448 Officially they are based out of Rhode Island but in reality have members from all over New England. Reading your set up process, I can't help but think you could stream line a lot of that if you participated with a group of Hobie sailors and could start to see how others do it. There is a lot of sharing of ideas and frankly it's fun to sail with others.

I would hate to say that you are over preparing. You must be sailing on the ocean, in that case it makes sense. We normally sail on the great lakes and don't bring anything but a water bottle and a protein bar for each of us. I do have a VHF that clamps to the tramp and we wear our life jackets. I rarely bring a paddle unless it looks likely to be needed. Most of us leave all the shrouds connected and looped into the tramp, as well as the rudders on the boat and tied in the up position while trailering.

One other thing, if you set up the mast on the trailer while half backed down the ramp, I can see why it is so difficult. When on the trailer especially, I try to have the bows down slightly when raising the mast. It goes up quickly and gravity holds it in place for the most part while someone pins the forestay. Until I started doing this, I hated raising the mast. Most of us can pull into a beach area and be on the water in 30 minutes. That just comes with experience. By the way, the faster you raise the mast, the easier it is. Get it up on your shoulder, make sure the shrouds aren't wrapped around the back corner castings, then run it up. If you try to do it slowly you are fighting the wind, etc.

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Steve
2017 Hobie 16 "Cayman" sails 114795
1985 & 1973? Hobie 14 "Sea & Ski"

Lot's of good advice on this forum, and a few nay-sayers. Of course everyone else can hook up trailer, step the mast, rig the boat faster & better (sarcasm intended).

Trust in "SlowSL" encouragement and experience. Go for it. Moor it . If other boats are moored where you intend to do so the locals will advise on anchor-rope-float setup. Every setup is different and & especially dependent on what the seabed conditions are silt vs. sand vs. ? ; maximum high and low tides, expected swell and waves etc. Only thing I would add is periodic inspection of rigging since continual exposure to salt air. Best of Luck !

What I'd suggest is coming up with a clever, quick way to keep the shrouds tight while moored. Maybe something as simple as a small ratchet strap. You could put a clip onto the end of the trap shock cord so that the wires can be quickly unclipped, then pull the trap wires forward of the mast, connect your ratchet strap from the trap wires to the bridle wire shackle or hooked to the adjuster plate maybe?

We coil the standing rigging on the trampoline as well. The rest of the bungees keep the hauls/ropes secure to the mast and keep any extra jib sheet / main sheet tied down. I'm extremely paranoid about ropes and other dangley things coming lose and then wrapping up around a wheel while I'm travelling at high speed on a busy highway.

Thanks, I'll give this a shot

I appreciate the links; we do get a bit lonely out there and I'll look these up. We are members at the local social yacht club. They are very friendly and helpful, but they are a bit of a broken record about how we should switch to a monohull

Yes, we sail the ocean. Up here the water temp is around 55 degrees in the summer, and around 40 degrees in the spring/fall. We hear from a lot of concerned bystanders about how dangerous it is for us to go out in waters like that, but we take our risk mitigation very seriously and thoroughly. Doing so does take quite a bit more time and prep though. The VHF is sometimes critical, as the bay we sail in (penobscot bay) has giant shipping lanes through it. More than once I've sailed toward a landmark far away, and then the radio barks at me that such and such oil tanker is headed SW (their way of saying 'get out of my way'). Also we keep the VHF in case something we can't mitigate happens, like damaging both hulls and sinking the boat.

I agree about raising the mast quickly. I try to find a spot in the boat launch where it is slightly downhill and point the car/trailer that direction, but sometimes it just isn't possible. There are no beaches here unfortunately. We once sailed in a nearby lake that had a beach, and were shocked at how easy and fast it was to raise the mast. I think the solid surface and tilt make a big difference. Up on the trailer it feels like most of my energy/effort goes into the suspension rather than lifting the mast.

Thanks, I appreciate the understanding. One of the yacht club people did mention that somebody they know had moored an H16 once. Another club member gave me a phone number for a landowner nearby who might rent me a parking spot at the water's edge, so maybe I won't need to moor it after all.

Conclusion, for any future sailers wondering about this topic:

We rented a shoreside parking space at a kayak rental place and use the same launch ramp as the kayakers.

We went sailing for the first time this Saturday and had so much fun. Our travel time is now reduced to 45 minutes (to get to the boat)

Our prep time, arrival-to-sailing, was 30 minutes (we leave the mast up and we keep the sails etc with the boat).

Our stress level was zero (our boat's new spot is in a sheltered harbor so less wind but fewer big waves etc). All fun, no stress.

We constructed beach trax following some of the plans at the beach cats forum. Our beach is fine gravel so I think I'm going to add a second set of wheels (4 total) to spread the load out. Right now it is almost too difficult for us to pull up hill.

Raising the sails on land was so easy and painless. Some care needs to go into keeping the boat pointed into the wind once the main is up, but otherwise it was great to be standing on solid ground and have some extra leverage and positioning to raise the sails.

Summary: We learned to sail the H16 with a friend who kept his boat at the shore's edge and we always had a great time. We tried to do the trailer thing when we moved to a new state, and it took us many hours and was very stressful. We now rent a parking space for our H16 near shore and have releived that stress and reduced both our travel time and our prep time. Together, travel and prep are small enough time that we can sail after work. Very very happy with the new lifestyle.

That’s great!!! Glad you were able to find a good solution.

Excellent! I'm glad you found a good solution.

Yeah, when I first got my Getaway, I kept mast up on the trailer in a marina 5 minutes from my apartment. Now, it's in a storage shed, and I'm 90 minutes from my favorite lakes. So I went from about 15 minutes to the water to 150 minutes to the water... But I try not to let that discourage me.

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Yet another Bob!
"Firefly" - 2012 Hobie Getaway with wings and spinnaker
"Icebirds" - 1974 Skeeter iceboat
Too many canoes and kayaks

Mooring a durable flotation platform (urethane, etc) makes more sense, to “beach” boat on top of. There are too many ways for water to enter the hulls of Hobie 16, which will eventually slow or sink a pontoon. Even new ones take on some water, which can be drained on a trailer. Evaporation can concentrate salt water to affect performance too.