45 Cabo Angling Achievement

Source: Duncan McIntosh, Jr., Sea Magazine

The well-built Cabo 45 Express is one cool sportfisher — from one hot place

One of the year’s finest new sportfishers to be introduced at this year’s Miami Boat Show came out of Adelanto, a tiny California desert town on Interstate 15 leading to Las Vegas.

Adelanto doesn’t look like your typical boat building mecca. It’s almost as close to Death Valley as it is to the Pacific Ocean — a fact that has not deterred Cat Harbor Boats from producing some of the finest and most fishable boats to hit our seas.

Company founders Henry Mohrschladt and Michael Howarth are part of a growing fraternity of closet sailors. In the mid-1980s, they were busy cranking out sailboats under the Pacific Seacraft banner.

In 1988, they were recognized by Fortune magazine as producers of one of the 100 best-made products in America. And the attention to quality the duo brought to their boats in the 1980s is still very evident today in the line of 31 to 45 foot Cabo sportfishers.

It usually takes a builder a few tries before all of the details of a new model fall into line. Whether it be the joinerwork, the mounting of hardware, the matching of woodgrains or the installation of machinery and electronics, hull number six or number 16 always looks much better than hull number one. That wasn’t the case with the new Cabo.

I have never before looked into a hull number one in which all of the workmanship and finish achieved such near perfection.

Custom Look, Production Price

The 45 Express has the look and feel of a custom boat. With lines and bow flare reflecting the custom yards of the Carolinas and New Jersey, it is obvious that the Cabo 45 is built for punishing seas.

The modified-V hull has a distinctively flared bow for dry running. Its deep forefoot reduces pounding and its wide beam increases stability and gives the boat a spacious interior.

A number of powerplant options are available, including Caterpillar, MAN and Detroit Diesels from 550 to 800 hp. The boat I ran was equipped with twin 660 hp Caterpillar 3196s, which produced 33 knots of speed at 2,300 rpm.

A large engine room door in the cockpit provides full access to the ship’s power plants and the impeccable mechanical installations.

The helm station is located at the center line and is equipped with a custom-built command chair, which provides excellent visibility ahead and extraordinary comfort.

Below decks, the new 45 is comfortable and practical, with all of the amenities needed to provide absolute comfort for the owners, guests and crew.

For the fishing enthusiast, the Cabo 45 is all business. The fishing cockpit is huge, with 26 cubic feet of fishbox capacity, a 4 cubic foot bait freezer, a highly sophisticated live bait system, a rigging station, tackle storage galore and enclosed storage for a whopping 24 rods and reels.

The Cabo 45 isn’t cheap. But as one of the old cliches my grandfather passed on to me says, “ You get what you pay for.” A new 45 is priced slightly less than what you would pay for a new Jersey-style sportfisher that’s a couple of feet smaller.

While the Cabos are being built in a small California desert town, where some 125 employees are busy filling orders for boats shipped to points all over the world, one Caterpillar executive offered me this insight: There are only four other boat builders in the world that are buying more Cats for marine use than Cat Harbor Boats.