Hobie Getaway
Exciting yet user-friendly beachcat

Driving over the Rickenbacker Causeway I could see Biscayne Bay was in a lively, inviting mood. This friendly body of water is the place where small boat sailors in South Florida play, and the parking lots along the north shore—the so-called Hobie Beach—were already filling up as people scrambled to strip out of their work clothes and launch sailboards and beach cats. Sure, it was a weekday, but work and play are easily blurred in Miami, as tourists and locals alike head for the water. It was a perfect setting to test sail the new Getaway by Hobie.

The details
Laying claim to our own spot on the beach, photographer Walter Cooper and I met Josh Schwartz from the Water-Play company, a Hobie dealer with stores in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale, and quickly slid the 390-pound Getaway off the trailer and onto the sand. The big sister of the ever-popular Hobie Wave, the Getaway is the “social boat” of Hobie’s rotomolded catamaran line, and is substantially heavier and beamier in every way. Designed by Greg Ketterman, the 16-foot, 7-inch Getaway has significantly more hull volume than the 13-foot Wave and accommodates a handful of adults. With a carrying capacity of 900 pounds, the Getaway gives the term “party boat” a new perspective.

Polyethylene rotomolded hulls are tough and light, and stand up well to life on the beach. Rotomolded boats came of age with the proliferation of brightly colored kayaks in the 1990s, and the material makes sense for small sailboats as well, especially multihulls. Securing fasteners into the plastic hulls was an early problem with rotomolded boats, but manufacturers have solved the problem by using threaded metal sleeves molded in place. As a result, the Hobie Getaway has the feeling of a robust, well-built cat. I like the molded-in keels, since they not only give the boat directional stability, but protect the hull sections as the boat is dragged in and out of the water.

One of the prerequisites of a beach cat is easy setup, and although stepping the mast the first time might seem a bit daunting, after that it’s a snap as the standing rigging easily clips into place with the mast pivoting into position on a roller bearing. The 25-foot mast is black anodized aluminum, and although there is no boom, the main and roller-furling jib carry 180 square feet of sail providing plenty of horsepower, as I was about to find out.

Josh and I soon hopped aboard and cleared the beach. Instant acceleration. Wow! I struggled with the steering for a few moments, until Josh pointed out that the kick-up rudders were not locked in place. Thanks.

Under way
Josh grew up sailing small boats and windsurfing on Biscayne Bay, and his enthusiasm for the Getaway was impossible to hide once we had the rudders locked down and were rocketing along on a reach, kicking up sheets of spray. Occasionally, a series of waves would pound the underside of the mesh trampoline and slow us down, but once clear of the turbulence, we accelerated like a hungry cheetah. It was easy to find the groove; the boat talks to you with its smooth motion.

A pair of wing seats that get your weight outboard come as an option, and although they add about $800 to the $5,595 base price, they are worth every penny. Padded, comfortable platforms, the wing seats are really a civilized trapeze, and as I hiked out on the port-side wing seat, the performance improvement was immediately noticeable.

Hobie consistently blends simplicity and performance—the hallmark of good design—and sailing the Getaway is really quite simple, with the driver handling the mainsheet while the crew tends the self-tacking jib. The asymmetric full-batten mainsail holds it shape on and off the wind, and the flat-cut jib adds oomph under way and makes it easier to come about. And the performance? Again, it’s impressive.

Tacking a small cat requires practice, and it took me a few tries to bring the boat through the wind without resorting to a jibe. But once I mastered the process, the Getaway did quite well. Reaching toward the beach, the wind was steady at 20 knots. Although I couldn’t help glancing up at the plastic “Hobie Bob” (the mast float that supposedly prevents turtling after a capsize) as we surfed a 4-foot wave, the boat kept its feet. (Of course, in shallow Biscayne Bay the mast would become impaled in the sand before we could have turtled anyway.) After several more tacks, it was time to call it a day, and we headed back to the beach for good, where the kick-up rudders performed as advertised, and kicked up as we skidded up onto the sand.

Hobie has created an exciting, user-friendly boat in the Getaway. From the maintenance-free rotomolded hulls with built-in coolers and storage compartments to the simple sail control systems, the Getaway offers great sailing for novices and experienced sailors. Don’t be surprised to find Getaways pulled up on beachfronts around the country and in the Caribbean, and if you have the chance to sail one, don’t pass it up.