It all started with losing my job. Like many people in recent years, I found myself unemployed, and the lack of activity made for restless hands. I figured since I couldn’t find work, I might as well build a boat.
Misty clouds clung to the evergreen-clad hillsides of San Juan Island, the largest and westernmost island in its namesake archipelago in the Pacific Northwest. Whip-like strands of kelp were shepherded by the currents of Haro Strait…
Misleading as its name may be, Bahamian mooring is an anchoring technique that can be used just about anywhere. If you’re looking to secure your boat in a jam-packed anchorage or in a tide-scoured waterway, a Bahamian moor can be very handy.
Henry “Hank” Strauss, still tack-sharp at 97, had to give up sailing solo a few years back but still regularly gets out on San Francisco Bay with friends. His lifetime in sailing spans the evolution of cruising under sail as we know it.
The best piece of boat-buying advice I received was this: buy the boat that suits your present needs, not the boat you dream you will need. We keep our big-boat desires in check by chartering in the Caribbean and New Zealand, but a trailer-sailer suits most of my needs.
As community sailing centers go, the Orange Coast College School of Sailing & Seamanship is quite a bit more than the ordinary. Now, however, it is time to begin a long goodbye to a centerpiece of the program, round-the-world race winner Alaska Eagle.
For years, you’ve watched raceboats strut around the buoys, their crews tweaking lines or pulling off well-choreographed maneuvers requiring hours of practice and polish. While cruising may be your raison d’être, you can’t help but notice that racers know how to really make a boat go, a useful skill for any sailor.
A new sailing friend asked me recently, “Do you ever buddy boat?” “Not really,” I started to say, but then changed my answer to, “Sure, often.” She could see the confusion her simple question had created and laughed. “Betsy, is everything about sailing and cruising always so complicated?” Let this article be my answer to my friend and to others who wonder the same.
When we arrived in Cartagena, Colombia, after a year of cruising, I knew we had work to do. While we had kept up with the necessary (read: constant) maintenance on our 45-year-old Bill Tripp yawl Papillon during our first year aboard, now it was finally time for some major upgrades.
For dreamers of all ages, the idea of cruising has an inescapable allure. But the question always remains: “When should I go? When can I realistically trade my current life for the freedom of cruising?”
The Cruising Club of America, an organization of about 1,300 offshore sailors, has been honoring remarkable ocean voyages and seamanship with an array of prestigious
The 2021 U.S. Para Sailing Championships will be hosted by The Clagett Regatta at Sail Newport, in Newport, R.I. on August, 24-29, 2021, according to
I am 90 years old, dwindling in mind and body and fear living too long. Twenty years have passed since I last weighed anchor. Still,
In spite of the fact I came to the sport of sailing alone and untutored, in a boat I acquired on my own, I never
This year the M32 celebrates its 10th birthday. Swedish Olympic bronze medalist Göran Marström and Kåre Ljung designed the M32 in 2011 as the latest
The past 12 months have been tragic, troubling and downright strange. If there’s been a silver lining to the situation, though, it’s been the way
Since the invention of rope, there has also been a need to belay or secure it. Every sailboat has rope on board so, unless you
In partnership with the Antigua and Barbuda Marine Association, Antigua Sailing Week is launching a mentorship program to encourage women and girls to join the
When a winter norther blows through the Bahamas, the northeast trades can reach gale force as they funnel through the Windward Passage between Cuba and
Just 24 hours before our scheduled charter in the Bahamas, the government clamped down again on visitors from the United States. Having endured two Covid-19
