Last August concluded a new edition—the fifth—of the Mörling Cup for sailing dornas. The Cup comprised five regattas held over the summer months in the ports of Portonovo, A Illa de Arousa, Cambados, O Grove, and finally Combarro, where the fifth edition wrapped up with the prize-giving ceremony for the winning boats.
As in previous editions, the dorna named Pereka—owned by José Dorado and Alberto Vicente —emerged victorious once again, becoming a five-time champion and the undisputed queen of this Cup. The competition has been held since 2022, taking up the mantle of the former Galician Cup for Dornas, disappeared at the end of the last century.
Organized by Culturmar, the Mörling Cup carries on the tradition of the old dorna regattas, where sailors demonstrated their skill in handling these vessels, as well as the continuous evolution of hull design, maintenance, and the perfect adaptation of sails for navigating the Galician rías.
The dorna is one of the most iconic of the more than twenty types of traditional Galician
boats, and it remains a prominent feature today, particularly in the Rías Baixas region. It is a lightweight, easy-to- handle boat used for artisanal fishing within the rías. Built from wood since time immemorial by Galician master boatbuilders, it utilizes the calime or tingladillo technique—a method of overlapping planks that links this type of vessel to the construction techniques of some Nordic boats.
The Cup is named to pay a well-deserved tribute to Staffan Mörling, a Swedish anthropologist who, from the 1960s onwards, became interested in the immense typological diversity of the wooden boats found in Galicia. He compiled a comprehensive catalog of these traditional wooden vessels—which he himself called “the boats of the poor”—documenting the coastal areas where each type was found and providing detailed descriptions of specific models.
He recorded these findings in several works that, over time, proved foundational to the
movement to safeguard Galicia’s maritime and riverine heritage; this movement has been organized since 1993 under the Galician Federation for Maritime and Riverine Culture (Culturmar), which today comprises close to fifty federated associations spread across the Galician coast and runs an extensive program of activities to promote this cultural and heritage wealth.
Congratulations to Pereka on winning its fifth trophy in this 5th Mörling Cup; congratulations also to the other participating dornas and their crews (nearly 50 boats and 100 sailors), and to the associations that organized each of the regattas.
We look forward to the 2027 edition, where we hope to once again enjoy the beauty of dornas sailing across our seas.
