Tradition around boat names

[Nicholson58]

How big is your transom?
You pay EACH for the lettering
Keep it short, easy. Use big letters.
You also plan to put the name on the boom? Bow?
Make it simple to say, understand and write down
Think about how many places on a customs and on immigration forms you will have to write it.
Think about how tiny that space on the form will be.
Don’t be cute. It sounds stupid and gives an instant bad fist impression.
Also, you will forever be explaining to foreigners who won’t get it.
Don’t use a script impossible to read even at close quarters.

Official CG rules, documented; any non offensive name, any city. You could use Ski Boot; Steamboat, Co.

We made a game of collecting too cute names of catamarans in the Caribbean. They were all US flagged. Sorry if I pegged anyone. This seems irresistible to Americans.

Feline Good
Cool Cat
Parallax Pair ‘o Lax (creepy graphics)
Prowler Cat
Meyow
Catzilla
Jan’s FeLion. (Dinghy). Litter Box
Aristocat
Fat Cat
Copy Cat
Double Vision
Tide Together
Cat Tails
Twinsanity
Allicat
Catch The Cat
Two Canoes
Cat Weasel
Toucan
Purrfect

Tri II Fly. (Trimaran)

Our name appears on the boom and bow. This is useful finding friends in an anchorage or for friends to find you.

[Ltfdrebbin]

Thanks for the great feeback. Excellent comments!
Following all of your advice, we have decided to name our Hunter 44ac "Hunter S.". oOf course, the boat is a Hunter, and our last name starts with S, and also Hunter S. Thompson has always been a favorite author to my wife and I.

[JoeRobertJr]

Originally Posted by Ltfdrebbin

Thanks for the great feeback. Excellent comments!
Following all of your advice, we have decided to name our Hunter 44ac "Hunter S.". oOf course, the boat is a Hunter, and our last name starts with S, and also Hunter S. Thompson has always been a favorite author to my wife and I.

Congratulations on settling on a name. It took my wife and I a few weeks to agree on a name for our current boat. I was wondering if you were going to dare to post what you decided. Not that my opinion matters at all, but Hunter S seems like a great name.

[Ltfdrebbin]

Originally Posted by JoeRobertJr

Congratulations on settling on a name. It took my wife and I a few weeks to agree on a name for our current boat. I was wondering if you were going to dare to post what you decided. Not that my opinion matters at all, but Hunter S seems like a great name.

If Hunter S. seems like a great name, then your opinion matters greatly, lol.

[LittleWing77]

Originally Posted by Ltfdrebbin

Thanks for the great feeback. Excellent comments!
Following all of your advice, we have decided to name our Hunter 44ac "Hunter S.". oOf course, the boat is a Hunter, and our last name starts with S, and also Hunter S. Thompson has always been a favorite author to my wife and I.

As much as I love Hunter Thompson, you do know that boats are shes (as in female), yes...?

[Joh.Ghurt]

Originally Posted by LittleWing77

As much as I love Hunter Thompson, you do know that boats are shes (as in female), yes...?

In English that's the case, but it doesn't matter whether the name is male or female. For example, CVN-76 is part of the US-Navy and she's called "Ronald Reagan".

If it's good enough for an aircraft carrier, it should be good enough for a simple sailing yacht too.

[YANDINA]

Its supposed to be bad luck to change a boat name but the name when we bought her was "Mulholland Drive" WTF?

As we were sanding it off and getting back to a clean smooth surface we went through 4 more names, sanding off a layer at a time to decode.

We had a local artist friend do our new name "Yandina". Which is an Australian aboriginal word meaning water hole - - we figured it was good, a boat is a hole in the water.

15 years later when we sold her the new owner asked us who did the nice name job so they could use him. He got set up at the dock on a dinghy ready to paint it and asked the new owner what name?

"Paradise"

He packed up his paints untied the dinghy and went back home without painting - - "I'm not going to be responsible for naming a boat Paradise".

(Local boat at our dock - - "She Got The House".)

[Bmorgan562]

So basically, name your boat whatever you desire. So many stupid names, ergo ignorant people, actually vice versa. Thinking so little of something so special apparently isn’t too easy to hide.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by Bmorgan562

...So many stupid names, ergo ignorant people, actually vice versa. Thinking so little of something so special apparently isn’t too easy to hide.

Yes, boats are important, boats are special. Honor the boat. Avoid cute, avoid puns, avoid sexual connotations, avoid profanity. Avoid names in foreign languages which need an explanation. Avoid clever.

Give it a name which adds dignity and class.

And make it easy to say and understand over the radio.

By the way, I have no problem with Mulholland Drive

[MVDarlin]

Be sure to have a pagan boat naming ceremony. It should include nudity, burning sage, vhampagne and tributes to Poseiden and Neptune.

[Bill_Giles]

Before you choose say the name out loud three times. Don’t make it too long or complicated or multi word. Look in the register of boats at ITU MARS. Google it.

My boat is Ambitious Alice so I broke two of my three rules! She is a granddaughter x.

[jezza1956]

My boat still carries her original name, as shown on the original yard invoice. She was built in Taiwan in 1981 for a man with a Hong Kong company who worked in the oil industry in one of the Gulf States of the Middle-East.

She is named Ibn Batuta, which meant nothing to me until I researched it and discovered that Ibn Batuta (spelling can vary) was a 14th century Moroccan traveller and an Islamic scholar in later life, who ventured as far as India, Sumatra and China before returning home to settle after 75000 miles! A kind of Islamic Marco Polo, if you like. He is often known as "The Great Traveller" which I think is a splendid name for a bluewater cruising yacht. Here is his entry in Encyclopaedia Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/biography...later-journeys

Retaining this name, and the boat having her own Facebook page, has led to meetings with a lady who sailed on her with the original owner in the Gulf, and a set of photos from back then, as well as a former owner, now living ashore in Turkey, as well as someone who worked on her with them when she was there, who also sent me photos.

[Pcpete]

When we were discussing a name for our current boat the first thing was to establish some rules.
No other documented vessel with the same name in the USCG registry
Easily understood on VHF
Easy for others to say
Have some family tradition (Swedish, Irish, Welch, French, German, Dutch, yup - we’re mutts)
Have a subtle message
Many of the candidates failed on the VHF requirement, the best candidate became “Glauben” paying homage to the Admirals French/German heritage and meeting the other requirements. It means “Believe”.
The message being the importance of believing without regard to any particular religions, but the importance of believing. Believing in yourself and that you can accomplish about anything. The list goes on, but the interpretation is up to the individual.

[Sunshine Coast]

If you're renaming the boat, you must ensure that you have a proper renaming ceremony to guard against bad luck.
Get a good bottle of champagne (not a cheap one). The senior female involved with the boat must stand on the bow, pop the champagne and say, "I hereby rename this boat whatever."
She then pours some into the water as a tribute to King Neptune, pours some on the anchor as an offering to the gods of occupational health and safety and then she and the rest of the people involved drink the remaining champagne.

My wife would rename our boat every other week if I let her.

[pendragon]

Here's an idea:
You could call the main boat MERCEDES and the dinghy BENZ