Good Old Boat Show By MichaelDENERAU, FIJI

The 2017 United States Sailboat Show in Annapolis, Maryland was a good, exhausting, productive, and fun time. Things are definitely different when viewed from behind a booth. For starters, I was there all five days and never even stepped foot on a boat, not a one! I had no time for such luxury. I hardly walked the show at all. Get this: over five days, I consumed only two Painkillers.

But it's all good, I was there to work, to spread the word about Good Old Boat, The Sailing Magazine for the Rest of Us. Who are the rest of us? Like I told a thousand show-goers, "If you own and maintain a fiberglass sailboat, this is the magazine for you." On the first two days of the show we set records for signing up new subscribers. What a pleasure to have met at least a hundred regular readers during the show. (And what a pleasure to have met about a dozen readers of this blog!)
For those who've never been, this is the mother of all boat shows. Everyone is there. Some of my favorite moments were meeting long-time friends face-to-face for the first time.

Here's a (partial) photo essay (there were lots of great moments that happened without my camera at hand, lots of other heroes I met):

I took this about midnight, the night before the show was set to start,
from across the bay.

Inside the show at night, everything buttoned up and ready for the opening.

Our booth looking sharp...this was long before we ran out of the
2,500 magazines we gave away. That's Karla behind the counter
and Chuck in the captain's chair.

This is Carolyn Shearlock, tireless promoter of all things
galley. Have you been to theboatgalley.com lately?

Mark Pillsbury (center) is Editor of Cruising World magazine.
Jeremy "Mac" McGeary (right) is a master wordsmith who
graces the Good Old Boat masthead and who started work at
Cruising World shortly after the sextant was invented. He
has an endless supply of good stories. After this photo was
taken, I sat back and listened to Jeremy and Mark
remind each other of different anecdotes regarding a
stuffed purple monkey--I think I've got that right.

Her shirt should read "#BrittanyStrong." This is the Windtraveler writer
herself, here at the show just weeks after Irma turned her life upside down,
here to raise money to help her island community. She's a dynamo.
Buy your own shirt or donate here.

Ah, Tim Murphy, another master wordsmith who has long made
others' words great on the page. Lucky for me, Tim is the editor of
Voyaging With Kids. 

Wendy Hinman is a fellow freelancer and boating author.
Everyone has heard of Tightwads on the Loose. Her new
title is Sea Trials. 

I swear, every time I run into Lin Pardey, she seeks my
advice on sailing. I think here she'd just asked me about
heavy weather sailing and I'm explaining the best
approaches. I think someday she is going to be
quite the sailor.

My good friend Jen Brett. She bought some of my early
stories when she worked at Blue Water Sailing years ago.
She is now the Senior Editor at Cruising World and
still a pleasure to work with.

Behan! Imagine writing a book with someone and corresponding
for years, and then meeting in person for the first time--this is
what that looks like. Such a pleasure. Her Totem is a short distance
from circumnavigating.

I was Wendy Mitman Clarke's biggest fan when she was writing
a column for Cruising World years ago. We've met before, but
since then she and her talented daughter contributed to
Voyaging With Kids and it was a real pleasure to
catch up in person. I'm reading her latest now:
Still Water Bending.

Jimmy Cornell has done a lot, but I appreciate most his
World Cruising Routes, love it. Better still, he's a fan of
Good Old Boat!

My second family; we email each other daily. From left to right:

the word guy Jeremy "Mac" McGeary, me, the money gal Karla
Sandness, the artsy gal Nancy Koucky, and the ad man Chuck
Koucky. Together we put out the magazine we all want to read,

and have fun doing so.