There are few things more interesting and useful to me than a tour of another experienced offshore voyager’s boat—there’s always something to learn.

So, in that spirit, here’s a video deck tour of our own Morgan’s Cloud.

View Full Screen

This is a high resolution video and so you will see more detail if you click the full screen box icon (like the one to the right) that appears in the bottom right corner when you hover over the video after it starts playing.

Questions and Comments

We have deliberately kept the commentary—and therefore the video—short on the theory that you will only be able to stand seven minutes of me prattling on. So if you see something that interests you that I did not explain, please leave a comment on this post, not YouTube.

Links to Articles Discussed

During the video I mention several articles that explain some of the gear I cover. Here are links to those articles:

• Why we have a SPADE best bower (primary anchor)
• Fortress kedge anchor
• Why we don’t often use two anchors
• The perfect anchor roller
• Snubbers
• The importance of chain brakes
• Why our windlass is the way it is
• Why we are rigged as a cutter
• Why we don’t want a short wide boat
• Why we keep the decks clear
• Why we handle halyards at the mast and don’t run them aft to the cockpit (with video)
• Why no clutch on the main halyard—old geezer hoisting the main in less than two minutes (with video)
• How we reef
• Why we moved the electronics on deck
• More on our radar
• More on forward scan sonar
• Our navigation system
• The cockpit enclosure we added since the video

We have also replaced the Northstar GPS that I mention with a B&G plotter to backup the computer-based navigation system.