16 Aug
Ocean NavigatorGood Reads, Home Page Hero, Ocean Voyaging,
The Fastnet Race, from Cowes, England, then out the English Channel to Fastnet Rock off Ireland and finally back east to end off Cherbourg, France, is one of the premier ocean races. The race course alone makes the Fastnet a notable event, but large in the history of the race is the infamous 1979 running. That race was hit by a Force 10 gale and ultimately 19 racers were lost. Happily, this was a one-time event and the race has not had a recurrence of the '79 tragedy. This latest running was won by the British yacht Sunrise. Here is…
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02 Jul
Ocean NavigatorOcean Voyaging, Uncategorized, ,
When considering the purchase of a new boat, especially a new design that hasn't yet been built, you can't get enough input. You want to see the boat, exterior and belowdecks, from every angle. And when this aspect is considered, modern-day buyers are experiencing a golden age because of computer modeling and presentation. You can see a new design in great detail as if it is an actual physical boat. There's something about seeing that way, and with the ability to spin it around with some presentations, that makes it so much more real. A good example of this is…
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28 May
Ocean NavigatorOcean Voyaging, , , , , ,
Below is a recent email from Max Fletcher and Lynnie Bruce, CCA voyagers who sail aboard Juanona, a Nordic 40. Together they have sailed from Maine to the Azores, the UK and northern Europe. For the past two years they have been exploring Scandinavia aboard Juanona. This message is an insight into their thought process as a they prepared to cross the Atlantic. Their blog is at juanona.blogspot.com. Sailing is an activity that has always required flexibility and adaptability, and that is especially true during a global pandemic. Juanona was stuck in Galicia, Spain, and it wasn’t until late March…
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24 May
Ocean NavigatorOcean Voyaging
While not every ocean voyager also is avidly into fishing from his or her boat, many voyagers do harvest fish from the sea and so the issue of fishing and overfishing is one that naturally concerns them. And even for those voyagers that don’t, as lovers of the ocean environment, they also have an interest in seeing it remain robust. So, this post “Overfishing, Conservation, Sustainability, and Farmed Fish” by Coty Perry, who runs the website YourBassGuy.com, on the issue of overfishing and some of its causes and possible solutions is worth a read by anyone interested in the health…
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03 May
Ocean NavigatorOcean Voyaging, Offshore Sailing, , ,
Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from J.R. Williams’ upcoming book on his sailing adventures, Tales of A Blue Water Cruiser. In the first few days of January 1999, I was busy getting my 59-foot steel ketch Havaiki ready for my first passage from Honolulu to Papeete in Tahiti. I discovered that the boat was close to being dismasted as it sat at the dock! We found one of the drawbacks of wooden masts. Even after fixing that issue, we still almost lost the mast while en route to Tahiti. Both times I was lucky indeed. The Good Lord…
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03 May
Ocean NavigatorOcean Voyaging, Offshore Sailing, , ,
Our boat Havaiki was a 35-ton steel ketch. She was 48 feet on deck and 59 feet overall with the bowsprit and a six-foot draft. The boat was designed by Myron Spaulding of Sausalito, a well-known and respected yacht designer, and was built by Samuel Kerr Robinson of Sebastopol, Calif. Robinson was originally from Scotland and owned a body/fender shop in the San Francisco Bay area. He wanted a boat with a shallow keel and masts on tabernacles so they could be lowered and the boat could get under bridges. He had originally planned to navigate the channels in Europe…
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03 May
Ocean NavigatorMarine Technology, Ocean Voyaging, Offshore Sailing, , , , , , ,
If you are planning an offshore cruise under sail, you need access to as much vessel data as possible in one single place. A multifunction chartplotter display is the nerve center of the modern offshore cruising vessel, bringing together chart navigation, radio communication and a variety of other inputs onto one screen to inform you of the overall performance of the craft while underway and at anchor. Before committing yourself to a particular model of chartplotter, you need to consider several factors: vessel size, deck layout, planned location of monitor installation and of course, your own specific needs and tastes.…
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03 May
Ocean NavigatorMarine Technology, Ocean Voyaging, Offshore Sailing, , , , , , ,
Earlier this year, I finally upgraded from lead acid batteries to lithium iron phosphate (LiFePo4) batteries on my Valiant 40, Brick House. I’d researched for at least a year and South Africa, with its great tech base and good exchange rate, was the place to do it. [gtx_gallery] Lithium batteries favor the inclusion of a battery management system (BMS) in most applications on boats. The BMS ensures that the battery is not over or undercharged, and that it doesn’t overheat, freeze, or have to deal with oversized currents. Most people understand that a lithium battery BMS is the brains of…
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22 Apr
Ocean NavigatorOcean Voyaging, Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , ,
David Burch of Starpath Navigation examines the March 23, 2021 grounding of the 1,300-foot container ship Ever Given at 0700 local time at kilometer-marker 151 in the Suez Canal. Burch performs this reenactment with AIS data and an ENC chart of the canal using the free, donation-supported navigation and weather routing program from France called qtVlm, available at www.meltemus.com/index.php/en​. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQzomgjdtI0
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