Kaimiloa 2

A Fifth Catamaran in Build!

Some people sail around the world in multihulls, others build them. Even if in the meantime they have completed around sixty caravans ranging in size from thirteen to thirty-three feet (4 to 10 m), Nelly and Dominique are currently completing the construction of their fifth multihull, an Echo 5.5. Here’s the inside story on these serial builders.

1 / 1

Published on 11/04/2025

By Gilles Ruffet

Issue: 201

Published: May. / Jun. 2025

Discover this issue

Who: Nelly and Dominique
Where: Vendée, France
Multihulls: Tiki 21, Hitia 14, Melanesia, Tiki 38, Echo 5.5

It was 1986: in Loisirs Nautiques, a magazine that has now ceased to exist, we learned of a gathering of Wharram-designed Polynesian pirogues. We fell in love with these easy-to-build catamarans with V-shaped hulls and crossbeams tied with lashings. A little later, after reading a lot about the subject and meeting other builders, we decided to go for it. At the time, it wasn’t easy to source epoxy resin, and there was no Internet for ordering supplies and exchanging ideas with other builders. Even sourcing plywood was complicated. Our multihull was the first Tiki 21 built in France. We painted it white. In 1987, James Wharram came to exhibit a Tiki 21 at the La Rochelle boat show, and it was red. What a beautiful boat! Back home, we repainted ours... red! We kept it for five years before selling it. Then we embarked on a more modest construction, a Hitia 14, a sports catamaran, a perfect beach boat for two children, but a little light for two adults. This light boat was better suited to sailing on (very) protected waters rather than the open sea. On a lake, it worked quite well. Then, in the 1990s, we set about building a Melanesian outrigger canoe, again a Wharram design - a Melanesia. It’s hard to get much simpler than this, as the cut-outs are made on two sheets of plywood. Then came Kaimiloa. Why did we choose that name? We chose it as a tribute to the first cruising catamaran in history, the one built by Eric de Bisschop in Hawaii almost a century ago, with which the seafaring adventurer sailed to Europe via the Cape of Good Hope. The Tiki 38 is a much bigger catamaran and was therefore a quite demanding build. It took four years of part-time work. The children were a great help. After hesitating about renting a building, we finally decided to construct the boat behind our house, knowing that a crane would be needed to lift the two hulls out. In order to visualize the feasibility of the crane operation, we used the children’s Playmobil crane, with Legos as the building. The simulation turned out to be accurate... We kept this catamaran for six years, until 2006, before selling it to an English couple, who themselves later sold it to a Uruguayan, who entrusted it to some Argentinians before a young Canadian woman bought it. In the meantime, our multihull went from yellow, like Bisschop’s boat, to white, then blue. For our part, we discovered a small catamaran that was easy to build, again in epoxy plywood: the Echo 5.5, designed by the German architect Berndt Kolher. The Wharram saga was over! This small catamaran, measuring 5.5 meters by 2.5 (18 feet by 8), which makes it easy to transport, is due to make her maiden voyage this summer. She too will be called Kaimiloa, the second boat to bear the name. For the record, next April, we’ll be sailing in the archipelago of the San Blas Islands, in Panama, aboard... Kaimiloa Mk1. Indeed, Annabelle, who is now the owner of our former Tiki 38, is chartering her in this archipelago inhabited by the Kuna Indians. We’ll tell you all about this adventure in a future Postcard!