“Wake up! Wake up! I think we’re dragging anchor!” Peg’s words pierced my sleep like a needle popping a balloon. In an instant I was standing in the cockpit, face to face with the bowsprit of a large Island Packet that had been anchored three football fields away the night before.
Any boat under way in a crosswind, whether it’s a rowboat crossing a lake or a powerful cruiser reaching along the coast, will be pushed sideways to some extent. The effect is called “leeway,” and even big ships are subject to it. Sometimes leeway is insignificant; often it is not.
Getting a sail cover on and off a mainsail is often harder than it should be. Once it’s off the sail, it can be hard to tell which end goes where, and when you spread it out to check, the wind will wrestle you for control of it.
If there’s one thing I hate more than varnishing it’s not having all the tools at hand to do the job right. Besides brushes, old cans of varnish, new cans of varnish and thinners, there is the sandpaper.
When Mark Edwards, a rigger from Auckland, New Zealand, molded the deck for his 50-footer Relapse, he deliberately included raised toerails that trap water on deck for most of the length of the boat: as in, all the way back to the fill-point for the water tanks.
When we talk about downwind sailing, the debate often seems to be about the relative merits of symmetrical versus asymmetrical spinnakers, or gybing a headsail to go goose-winged. It’s easy to forget there’s more than one way to pluck that particular goose.
Everyone knows the Answering Pennant (AP or “Cat in the Hat” flag) means racing has been postponed and that the “P” flag means a standard starting sequence. But what about the “M” flag, an “N” flag over an “A” flag, or an answering pennant flying above Pennant 2?
It’s not as easy as pressing a button, but once you learn to use a windvane you’ll never get stuck hand-steering again.
My wife, Penelope, and I recently enjoyed a wonderful cruise through the Florida Keys. Our boat, Alizee, a cutter-rigged Cabo Rico 36, was in excellent condition, with fresh bottom paint and recently inspected standing rigging.
Galley ovens often have hot spots. The short distance from the flame to the pan, a small heat shield, and the smaller volume of air inside the oven all contribute to food burning on the center bottom before its outer edges are cooked through.
Toward evening on a summer’s day, there’s nothing like a quick spin around the harbor.
Sail design has evolved over the centuries from square sails on tallships to triangular Bermuda rigs, back to the square-topped mains of today’s speedsters, and
The Canary Islands has been home to generations of sailors who have competed through the most demanding circuits.
44 and 41-footers are on the horizon for Fountaine Pajot.
As a midocean pit stop, Bermuda’s beauty, history, congeniality, and delectable fish sandwiches make it
a hard place for sailors to leave.
This convertible speedster performs across the wind spectrum.
Between the slow Marion-Bermuda, a wind hole in the middle of the Transpac course, and glacial Annapolis-Newport, this summer has served up some real drifters
The final installment of this year’s web series is out now.
For many years I hated drilling stainless steel. It’s hard, it requires expensive cobalt or carbide bits and it takes a long time to drill.
It’s hard to believe we’re already talking about the end of the summer issue!
