Is it a trawler?

Cruising (?) boat on the Erie Canal.

as good as the rest of them...just keep it calm

So that's what FF is talking about when he says "roomaran".

it's only fitting that he explains...but if I had to guess....

Kudos to them if they are using it and on the water. Many nice boats in our marina never leave the dock. What is a trawler is another thread with a million opinions.

Gotta love the ingenuity!

Certainly not a trawler but those peeps are having fun. I bet they don't get caught up in singles vs twins, anchor type, or the latest chartplotter.
Someone needs to tell em their doing it all wrong.

Not enough teak to be a trawler

Another "Trawler" with a private stateroom and head in the rear.

Great Laker said:

Another "Trawler" with a private stateroom and head in the rear.

Click to expand...

Dang.. it even has Sat tv... I prefer to think at the tag along as a mother in law "suite" ... just one pull of the connecting pin away from happiness..

I cannot imagine the docking of a "semi" boat.

Only thing missing is a shooting tower/diving platform with slide.

HOLLYWOOD

Photoshop!!!

healhustler said:

Photoshop!!!

Click to expand...

My thoughts, also. How can you tell???

jwnall said:

My thoughts, also. How can you tell???

Click to expand...

I can't really tell, but I suppose it could be. I'm just taking my opportunity to yell "Photoshop" cuz everybody suspects me of doing the same, perhaps rightfully so.

I'm with you, LaBomba - it's on the water and being used. Having adventures and making memories. But are the windows slanted or .......

healhustler said:

Photoshop!!!

Click to expand...

I hope so, but fear it`s not.

Great Laker said:

Another "Trawler" with a private stateroom and head in the rear.

Click to expand...

A different take on trailer boating.

From time to time my imagination drifts toward a pontoon boat with ramped recesses in the deck to receive the wheels of an RV Trailer, so the RV chassis could settle low on the pontoon. One would moor the pontoon square with a solid bank, place a couple of pull-out ramps bridging onto the shore, and load or unload the RV. An Airstream would be nice.

A few decades ago a company in the California Delta rented pontoon boats that you parked your RV on. They strapped the frame rails and axels to the deck and off you went for a week of fun.

Great Laker said:

Another "Trawler" with a private stateroom and head in the rear.

Click to expand...

I think it's pretty cool. Great for cruising the calm waters of rivers or bayous. Easy to take care of means more time for relaxing and fishing. Like could be good on it.

My old boss and I used to talk about me towing a barge with a couple expensive RVs on it down the ICW every year....maybe the return or crane a couple yachts on it headed north after the RVs were done.

We both wondered....if so many sign up for those RV on a train trips to Mexico...how many would like a couple week trip with a water view?

In the downturn of the oil patch of the late 80's, an enterprising company with idle equipment decided to diversify. One of their large deck barges was refitted with generators and tankage (potable and blackwater). They started doing Mississippi river trips with RV' "campsites". The customers would drive their rig on, hook up and set up shop. I can't remember how many it took at a time, but they had a near mutiny at the conclusion of the multi day trip. The happy campers didn't want it to end! They had all become friends on the trip. If I recall, it might have been Compass marine. Those trips became quite popular. Astro turf and all

Maybe I need to revisit the idea with my old boss...

It would probably still do very well.[FONT=arial,helvetica] [FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1]June 27, 1999[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=+2]Barge RV park lets campers go with the flow[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=+1]Cruise at 5 mph on southern rivers[/SIZE][/FONT] [FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] By RACHEL ZOLL
The Associated Press [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. -- It's excitement at 5 mph, an adventure that falls somewhere between rafting with Huck Finn and cruising on The Love Boat. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Vacationers seeking outdoor adventure from the comfort of a motor home are parking their rigs aboard specially equipped barges and floating along waterways deep in Dixie. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Billed by R.V. River Charters Inc. as the ''World's Only Cruising Campground,'' the barges carry their loads of recreational vehicles through parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee, navigating swamps and bayous as well as major rivers such as the Mississippi and the Tennessee. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''You see the world from a totally different perspective from the deck of a barge,'' says Eddie Conrad, president of R.V. River Charters. ''It's just the relaxation of moving along the waterways.'' [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Party barge [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] There's almost an acre of concrete on two linked barges that have space for 26 rigs. Each RV has an electrical hook-up and there are sewage holding tanks. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Boxes of sod where pets can romp and space for picnic tables add a park-like ambience. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Need a break from the great outdoors? Head to ''The Party Barge,'' which carries an enclosed clubhouse where passengers can get away from it all while getting away from it all. A television and VCR, barbecue pits and washers and dryers are among the amenities. Two cooks prepare meals here to give the travelers a break from their kitchens. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Don't worry about rough waters. Not even the mighty Mississippi can roil this convoy, Mr. Conrad says. A towboat that powers the barges pushes them up the river so slowly travelers barely feel a ripple. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''You just glided,'' says Sharon Andrews, 54, of Quincy, Wash., who took a 15-day trip last year with her husband, Ralph, 56. ''You very rarely ever felt the movement at all.'' [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] The idea came from a group of RV owners who in 1988 asked Mr. Conrad, then a commercial barge and towing operator, to take them and their rigs round-trip from New Orleans to St. Louis. He agreed, loading portable toilets and more than 85 RVs on eight barges. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''It was weird,'' Mr. Conrad says. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] But it worked. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''We made it up and made it down without a problem, so we decided to go into business,'' he says. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Mr. Conrad redesigned three former petroleum-carrying barges, adding concrete decks, generators for electricity and holding tanks for water and waste. He then scouted ports for loading docks flat enough for the RVs to navigate. Now, the RVs are loaded onto the barges in three cities: New Orleans and Mobile and Guntersville, Ala. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] River Charters went into business Oct. 1, 1990, selling trips through RV clubs and travel agencies. The barges quickly became their own best advertisement. Drivers would stop on roadsides and bridges to watch the motor homes float by. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''The cars were coming by in streams to see us. People waved and hollered,'' Mrs. Andrews says. ''We were just fascinating to them.'' [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Mr. Conrad runs about 20 voyages during the spring and fall that last 7-15 days and cost between about $3,000 and $5,000 per couple, including most meals and off-barge attractions. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''We sell out quickly,'' says Greg Bruce, general manager for Creative World Travel Inc., a New Orleans-based agency for RV owners that charters the barges. ''Everybody's been to Mardi Gras. They've been to Branson (Missouri). What do they do next?'' [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Shore excursions [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] River Charters has been so successful that Mr. Conrad has branched out, now offering trips for travelers without RVs. He built ''hotels'' atop two barges to create a kind of cruise ship, including an exercise room, jogging track, game room and theater. The trips run up to 10 days. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] The cruises are a mix of viewing river wildlife, tours of historic sites ashore and sampling the nightlife and local cuisine in Memphis, New Orleans and other cities. Transportation is arranged to sites such as the plantation homes in Mississippi and the Tabasco factory in Louisiana. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Other places where the floating campground stops include Baton Rouge and Avery Island in Louisiana, Chattanooga and Pigeon Forge in Tennessee, Decatur and Florence in Alabama and Vicksburg and Natchez in Mississippi. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] On board there are craft swaps and scavenger hunts. Barge guides prepare meals of gumbo and red beans and rice. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''If you get bored it's your own fault,'' says Myrada Groth, 74, of Lake Wales, Fla., who has taken seven trips with her 77-year-old husband, John. ''Everything is taken care of for you. Once you're on the barge, you're free.'' [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] ''Rolling Down the River,'' a 15-day charter, is Mr. Conrad's longest. It's a 1,910-mile voyage that starts in Guntersville, Ala., and moves through the Tennessee, Ohio and Mississippi rivers, ending in New Orleans. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Jeff Beddow, spokesman for the Recreation Vehicle Industry Association in Reston, Va., says he knows of no other companies offering such river charters, but he anticipates seeing more creative RV trips because interest in the vehicles is growing. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] Last year, sales of RVs, motor homes and towable campers in the United States rose about 15 percent to 585,400, he says. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] IF YOU GO [/SIZE][/FONT]

[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1] i

Cruises: Barge cruises are scheduled in the spring and fall along the Mississippi, Tennessee, Ohio, Mobile, and Tombigbee rivers, and the Gulf Intracoastal and Tenn-Tom waterways. Also in the bayous and the Atchafalaya River Basin Swamp in Louisiana.

Cost: From about $3,000-$5,000 per couple, including most meals and trips to many attractions ashore. Trips can be custom-designed for RV clubs.

Docks: Recreational vehicles are loaded on the barges in New Orleans and Mobile and Guntersville, Ala.

Cities visited: New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Avery Island in Louisiana; Chattanooga, Memphis and Pigeon Forge (Dollywood) in Tennessee; Mobile, Guntersville, Decatur and Florence in Alabama; Vicksburg and Natchez in Mississippi.

Weather: Spring is rainy in the Southeast, and temperatures can range from the 50s and 60s to the high 70s. The fall is dry and cool, with temperatures reaching to the 70s during the day and dropping as low as the 40s at night.

Information: R.V. River Charters Inc., New Orleans: (504) 364-1608.


[/SIZE][/FONT][/SIZE][/FONT]

Further investigation shows that these tours had been shut down. Apparently the CG deemed them unsafe. Oh well, everyone outta da pool!

Sailor of Fortune said:

Further investigation shows that these tours had been shut down. Apparently the CG deemed them unsafe. Oh well, everyone outta da pool!

Click to expand...

Capt. Jack, you beat to it. I actually saw the barges some years ago when they came through and stopped in Chattanooga. There was an article in the local paper also. It has been several years since seeing it.

LNG ships are safe...even near populated areas...

yet a barge full of RVs is unsafe????

I'm amazed I ever felt part of that organization sometimes...

Geez, thats a shame they got shut down. It looks like some real fun for those folks. It doesn't seem risky to me.

Having lived in the land of bureaucrats...I know they fear what they don't understand and feel the urgent need for new legislation....

hollywood8118 said:

I cannot imagine the docking of a "semi" boat.

HOLLYWOOD

Click to expand...

Actually, the "trailer" is not on a single ball hitch, but two hitches, so it does pivot or swing to either side.

Very well designed and implemented.