Spotlight on Instructor Jeff Merrill
By Peter Swanson
April 9, 2018
Today we acknowledge one of the key players in the TrawlerFest universe. Jeff Merrill (above left) is a CPYB yacht broker, trawler specialist and polished public speaker. You will find two of his seminars on the menu at TrawlerFest in Bremerton, “Dial-In Your Trawler” and “Offshore Essentials,” which represent a distillation of wisdom from tens of thousands of miles underway.
Additionally, Merrill serves as moderator for a freewheeling Q&A seminar “Cruisers Roundtable,” which features a panel of offshore experts, including power cruising pioneer Bruce Kessler.
Lastly, he is a reliable talent scout who finds speakers from the cruising public. Folks such as retired veterinarians Valery and Stan Creighton (above right) give aspirational talks that provide proof-of-concept to couples trying to decide whether to drop out and just go. The Creighton’s Bremerton seminar, for example, is called “How We Went from Knowing Almost Nothing to World Cruising.”
“Dial-In Your Trawler” provides a boatload of simple tricks to better monitor and maintain the ship’s systems. Merrill as almost two-hours of tips such as reference marks for needles on analog gauges, a dry-erase board in the engine room, anchor chain marking techniques.
“Offshore Essentials” is a longer course, four hours covering the basics of weather forecasting, route planning, watch standing, engine room checks, pilothouse navigation and electronics operations. Anyone interested in transiting between sea ports requiring overnight passages will learn essential preparations and best practices.
Here is a link to the original posting on www.PassageMaker.com :
https://www.passagemaker.com/event-news/jeff-merrill-trawlerfest-bremerton-2018
