Boat names are often painful, but sometimes inspired. When our students learn how to sail or cruise a boat, they’re often torn between smiling and grimacing at what they see out there.
(Ed. note: be sure to at least view, if not read, to the end… but for the best experience, do it all in order.) So… what’s up with those boat names? Most people who’ve owned a boat have either named it or at least considered re-naming it (despite the superstition involved). If you’ve never owned a boat, you’ve still probably given at least casual though to naming one.
BoatUS compiles an annual list of the most common boat names. That lets one either choose something they theoretically can’t go wrong with, or avoid something overdone to death. Here’s the top 10 for 2022:
- Andiamo
- Osprey
- Serenity
- Encore
- Zephyr
- Second Wind
- Adventure
- Knot on Call
- Shenanigans
- Grace
I’ll note that Andiamo was also number 1 for 2021, and has made the top-ten list in half of the last dozen years. Of course, we know an Andiamo or three. One of them is an S2 8.6 that still lives at City Island and used to summer and winter with us when we had a small marina. Zephyr? We had one in the fleet, albeit briefly.
Graduates of our school, and Sailing Club members, finally got their own boat and kept it with us for one season in exchange for limited use by the school. Yup; that’s a thing we do in case you’re interested. Their circumstances changed, and so did the home for the boat. So it Goes, anyone? Also up there in popularity, but missing this year’s list? Aquaholic.
Best and worst names at the Sailing Center itself? Kilroy Was Here, complete with the face doodle as shown in the top pic, and, shown here, Second Wind (ouchie FAUCI!). We chose Kilroy and tolerated the Second without bothering to change it. At least the graphic was well done, and most students seeing it hadn’t seen countless others before. Not yet, anyway. One of our graduates got his first boat during the pandemic. Catalina 32. Very nice. “Second Wind.”
Decades ago, I started frostbite dinghy racing on a Dyer Dhow out of MFA (Mamaroneck Frostbiting Association). Temperature puns were common. My dad and I came up with what I thought were the two best Dyer names ever… Dyer Straits (me, sail #228), and Apocalypse Dhow (Dad, sail #501). Yup; boats have been gone forever but I still remember the sail numbers. “228; we have your finish.” That means you lost a long time ago; get your ass back to the line for the next start ASAP. “501; over early as usual!” Dad was overly partial to dip starts, but he certainly had the courage of his convictions, as they say.
But, this post wasn’t inspired by what we own or chose. It was about what we see out on the water, or in boatyards and marinas. So, we’ll occasionally post a good pic here in the Rants, as well as on Instagram and maybe FB. To kick things off, we’ll do one sailboat name of the punny variety, and a powerboat name of the hobo-ghetto, oh-no-you-did NOT-just-go-there-variety.
So, here’s a pretty good punny name well hung on the transom…
And, I’m closing this out with the worst name I’ve ever seen. No others going forward are even slightly likely to overtake this one, and I wouldn’t want to overtake this boat…
