Vlog 334: Happy Trails

The annual IWA Trailboat Festival 2024 was held on the Ashby Canal at Moira in Leicestershire, a gathering of compact, lightweight canal boats that can be towed on a trailer behind a suitable car or van. These included Wilderness Beavers, an aluminium Sea Otter and even a (rather rare) Caraboat!

The fibreglass Wilderness Beaver boats are a marvel of compact packaging. Designed by Ian Graham for the shallow Monmouth & Brecon canal in south Wales, the standard model is 23 feet long yet fits in four berths, a washroom including shower, a galley, a decent-sized rear deck and even a tiny space for sitting at the bow. There’s a two-berth, 17-feet-long edition called the Cub which Ian himself brought along to the show (and which I think is the cutest of all) but the company only ever made 9 of them so they are very hard to get hold of.

Being relatively lightweight (the 23-footer comes in a shade over two tonnes) there are a reasonable number of vehicles that could tow the boat on a light trailer and it’s the proud boast of many a Beaver owner that they have taken it overseas and sailed the European waterways.

Aluminium Sea Otter boats are more like traditional, albeit short, narrowboats. The firm unfortunately went out of business several years ago as the use of aluminium made the boats considerably more expensive than a steel equivalent, notwithstanding the long-term advantages of no rust. Plenty of the boats survive today and they still command a price premium. There are arguments against aluminium mainly that there is less expertise in its welding compared with steel, and that it is a softer metal though this does not seem to have reduced the number of such boats on the waterways so it can’t be that bad.

Meanwhile the Caraboat and similar Caracruiser which are essentially fibreglass caravans (“travel trailers” for my American readers and viewers) that float, are very rare as not many were made. One type uses a conventional separate trailer when being towed, the other has the frame and wheels as part of the structure such that the entire assembly gets dunked underwater. It has no pretentions of being a speedboat so that’s OK.

Previous Wilderness Beaver video can be seen by clicking here.