An Old Salt's Sea Change

Crossing the 20 miles of Chesapeake Bay between Annapolis and St. Michaels takes an hour in a powerboat. On a sailboat, if there's wind -- a big if in summer -- it's five hours. At least.

Jim Barthold, general manager of the Annapolis Sailboat and Powerboat shows, which together draw 50,000 visitors every October, insists that sailboats are still a viable part of the industry: "It is growing, [just] not by leaps and bounds." The sailboat show adds two or three new models every year, he says, but in the next breath he admits, "America has always been in love with being able to jump in, turn the key, have the motor rev and off they go."

At the start of the '90s, powerboats accounted for two-thirds of boating sales, while sailboats held the rest, says Peterson, who is also director of sales and marketing for Hunter Marine, which makes sailboats.

Today, new powerboat sales have exploded, making up 90 percent of the market. In 2004, new powerboat sales added up to $11.9 billion, while new sailboats clocked in at $603 million. "Sailing is a very niche market," notes Ellen Hopkins, spokeswoman for the National Marine Manufacturers Association, which tracks the numbers.

"Sailing needs to get more aggressive in recruiting new people," says Scot West, executive director of Sail America.

Some longtime sailboat manufacturers have disappeared. Others have cut way back on sailboats and moved heavily into power. Dealers are shifting, too. The Annapolis Sailyard, for example, sold only boats with sails for 20 years; four years ago, it added powerboats -- which now outsell new sails 3 to 1.

"What shocked me," notes longtime sailor Howard Hobbs, vice commodore of the C&C Sailing Club Chesapeake Bay, was learning that at the Hinckley Co. -- "famous Maine sailboat builders," Hobbs says -- powerboats now make up 93 percent of production. Sailboats have dwindled to 7 percent of its business.

"Shocked," he says. Even though he frequently attends his sailing club functions in his Shamrock 26 powerboat.

The rope is finally cut away, and Burgess's powercat is cruising up the Severn toward downtown Annapolis.

"Sixteen knots," he says, preening as he works the throttle at the large steering wheel, 12 feet above the water. "Three times what you'd be going in a sailboat."

Upriver, a few dozen sailboats circle, spinnakers raised, graceful polka dots of red, lime, yellow and purple. Just beyond them, the sun is a deep orange-pink falling behind the Naval Academy's copper domes.

"The thing I don't like," Burgess confesses, is how, in a sailboat, the captain steers from the stern of the boat and "you can talk to everybody, and they can talk to you." But on his new power catamaran, he's up high and people congregate behind him, or down below, in the bow.

"You feel a little bit like a bus driver," he says.

He turns up Annapolis's Ego Alley, the inlet where boaters show off. Sure enough, as Burgess passes the dockside restaurants and bars, heads swivel admiringly.

Burgess's sailboat, Happy Days, is for sale. He and Mary Sue have named the new boat It Is Well.

As for all of their sailing paraphernalia -- the sculptures, the maps, the pictures, the nautical flags -- he muses, "I don't know.

"We'll keep the pictures," he finally decides. "We're gonna keep those to remind us of what we really like."