Tiwal 3 review – Melissa from Kansas City, MO

My name is Melissa, and we live in Kansas City Missouri.

Which Tiwal model do you have?

We have the Tiwal 3.
And we bought it in July.

Where do you sail?

We’re in the middle of the country. We don’t really have ocean access close but we have a lake that’s about 20 miles north of us that we go to all the time, and we have a teardrop camper
So for several years, we’re just on the side seeing all the people on the sailboats, so now we get to go out into the water so it’s very nice.
And then we’ve also taken it down to Beaver lake in Arkansas, which is a really beautiful lake. It’s in northern Arkansas

Single-handed or double-handed?

Usually it’s just me and one other person just because of the weight limit. When my husband and I get on there together, it goes a little slower, so it’ll just be me and my husband or me and one of our kids, or my niece or nephew.

How is it going so far?

It’s going great!
We just got it in July, and I think we’ve already used it probably 6 times.
And one of the things I realized was, in my mind, I associated the time that I could sail with the time that we would normally swim here in the Midwest.
But I noticed a lot of the other sailors would get wetsuits and they could go out later, because there were a lot of warm days in October. So my husband got me a wetsuit for my birthday. So starting in the Spring I’ll be able to go out earlier than we normally would go out, you know, just to swim or something… that’ll be nice.
The thing that made me actually want to buy the boat, was I realized when I went on the sailing lesson, because in the Midwest it gets very hot during the Summer, and the boat that we did the sailing lesson on, you’re pretty much out of the water most of the time.
And I felt like “Why would I get out on the water like that and not even be in the water a little bit?”. This is a perfect thing because you can kind of be out of the water if you’re careful, but if you want to, kind of, be in the water and get wet… you can be.
You can be more careful in how you sail it and stay more dry, or you can just like get completely wet and have fun with it. So, I thought it was a perfect combination!

Which characteristics surprised you?

I think probably how once you spend the time and put it together that first time, it’s really easy to put together after that. That’s probably the thing I was a little worried about it, being tedious to put together each time, but it really isn’t.

What’s your best memory with your Tiwal?

Well, my nicest memory was when we were sailing on Beaver Lake, and my usband actually was doing the sailing, and I was able just to lay there in the sun it was a really beautiful day.
But I think, the funniest memory was the first day we put it together. We spent about an hour and a half, we couldn’t get good cell phone reception and there’s a really great video on how to put the boat together…
I wanted to definitely get out in the water and it was a very very windy day, so we didn’t even have the rigging on the sail properly on the boat. But I decided to take it out anyway, and my sister and I got stuck out in the middle. There were all these people with sailing experience yelling at us like what we should do or not do…
And we didn’t even know what the words, like… what is the rudder? So, we finally made it back in, I actually had to swim and pull it because I didn’t have the sail on properly… That was the funniest thing, and that was the first day.

Where would you dream to sail your Tiwal?

Well I think I saw an interview whenever I was looking at the boats. Someone actually took it with them to the Caribbean, or somewhere on a plane -if you divide the boat up into three different packages, it’ll fit within the weight limit.
So I think taking it on the ocean, but of course I want to actually get more experience sailing it on lakes first and higher winds, before I’d ever try to take it on waves.