The Offshore Voyaging Reference Site
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Another Day, Another Anchor Watch
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Read more: Another Day, Another Anchor WatchGreenland’s beauty still exhilarates despite the exhaustion and vigilance of dealing with marauding icebergs and insecure anchorages.
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Things Are Different Now
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Read more: Things Are Different NowGreenland, though very cosmopolitan in so many ways, is still the remote north, making compasses and electronic charting less reliable.
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Aasiaat, Greenland—Waiting For The Scientist
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Read more: Aasiaat, Greenland—Waiting For The ScientistArrival at Aasiaat, Greenland brings back memories of a winter visit in 2010…that trip utilized airplanes and skis, though home was still a sailboat.
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Nuuk, Greenland—We’re Here!
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Read more: Nuuk, Greenland—We’re Here!This is the first post describing our Arctic science trip on Morgan’s Cloud in 2011, starting with our arrival in Nuuk, Greenland, where we found a lot of changes from our first visit 16 years ago.
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A Winter In Charleston
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Read more: A Winter In CharlestonCharleston, South Carolina is a great place to spend the winter…so we went back for a second year.
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Serve Your Apprenticeship
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Read more: Serve Your ApprenticeshipPhyllis tells an all too common sad story and then moves on to tips to prevent it happening to you.
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Why Go North? For The People
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Read more: Why Go North? For The PeopleThough this is third in the series explaining why we keep going north, it’s not down the list in our hearts: the people we meet in the north are a big reason we keep going back.
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A Propane Tank Gotcha
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Read more: A Propane Tank GotchaThis is a small FYI post about a big pain in the butt! The gotcha started innocently enough with me blithely loading our propane tanks into the back of the car and driving to our local Canadian Tire to get them filled—as I had done with no problems in the past—prior to our heading south […]
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The Perfect Seaberth
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Read more: The Perfect SeaberthOne of the most important factors in making safe seamanlike passages is getting as much rest as possible. And one of the most important factors in getting enough rest is having a proper seaberth.
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A Big Adventurer In A Small Boat
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Read more: A Big Adventurer In A Small BoatOn our way to Svalbard (Spitsbergen) in Morgan’s Cloud in 2002, we stopped at Teltvika, a cove on the west side of Bjørnøya (Bear Island), a virtually uninhabited island which lies at the halfway mark on the 550 nautical mile passage from Norway. During our second evening at Teltvika, the fog came in pea soup […]
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Why Go North? For The Scenery
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Read more: Why Go North? For The SceneryThis one is almost too much of a cliché to mention but, since we are talking about why we go north, the scenery is definitely one of the big draws.
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Spinlock Lifejacket
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Read more: Spinlock LifejacketOne of the many things that attracted John and I to each other is that we are both gimped. John has one leg shorter than the other and a slight scoliosis and I have congenitally flat feet and knock-knees. John walks like a duck and I walk like a penguin. It is a match made […]
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Warm Hands, Please
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Read more: Warm Hands, PleaseA while ago I wrote about how we keep our feet warm when sailing in colder climes. In this post I will address the issue of keeping our hands warm, which aren’t, unfortunately, as easy to please.
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Chafe-Pro Review
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Read more: Chafe-Pro ReviewChafe-Pro provides an off-the-shelf solution for protecting vulnerable lines from chafe.
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Closed For The Season
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Read more: Closed For The SeasonDue to John’s and my penchant for sailing in the high latitudes, “Closed For The Season” signs have become somewhat of a theme for our cruises. In early spring we are on our way north and nothing is open yet, and by the time we turn south in the fall, it’s all over.
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Avon Dinghy, Take Two
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Read more: Avon Dinghy, Take TwoWe loved our old Avon dinghy, so much so that we kept it in active service for 20 years, even though it sprang a slow air leak about year 17. (Unless you’ve ever tried jumping 4 feet into the air—it’s about that distance from the dinghy tube to Morgan’s Cloud’s side-deck—off a squishy inner tube, […]
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Climate Change In Action
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Read more: Climate Change In ActionJohn and I have a longstanding interest in collecting books on historical and present-day exploration of the high latitudes, or “death and destruction on the ice” as we call it. But it looks like climate change could put an end to this genre more quickly than we thought: This summer, for the first time in […]
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Lunenburg, Nova Scotia—In Our Own Backyard
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Read more: Lunenburg, Nova Scotia—In Our Own BackyardLunenburg charms with its historic waterfront, dory races, and tasty restaurants. Oh, and it’s a UNESCO world heritage site to boot!
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Reefing On All Points of Sail
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Read more: Reefing On All Points of SailMorgan’s Cloud is the only boat I have ever sailed on (I only started sailing after meeting John) and so I generally assume that the way we do things on our boat is the way it is done. Which suits John just fine—he’s been able to brainwash, I mean, teach me how he likes to […]
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We Can’t Do It All
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Read more: We Can’t Do It AllPart of the engine installation project on Morgan’s Cloud was the fitting of new engine mounts—which meant welding, which meant sparks flew, which meant the paint in the engine room got speckled. (Morgan’s Cloud’s builder did a wonderful job of most things, but painting the bilge in the engine room was not one of his […]
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A Marine Voyager’s Dilemma in Northern Labrador
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Read more: A Marine Voyager’s Dilemma in Northern LabradorWe have sailed the coast of Labrador many times and appreciate its rugged scenery, beautiful light, and isolation. So when the government of Canada decided to make the northern part a federal park, we were thrilled. But now that we can’t visit the Torngat Mountains National Park, we aren’t so thrilled anymore.
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Save Our Lighthouses
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Read more: Save Our LighthousesI can’t imagine that there are many sailors out there who don’t share John’s and my fascination with lighthouses—walking around them, climbing them, photographing them, reading about what it was like to take care of them—we don’t seem to tire of it. However, in Canada, the USA and the UK, and I’m sure in other […]
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Quality Custom Linens
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Read more: Quality Custom LinensI don’t know about the rest of you, but figuring out how to get bedding to fit the odd size and shape of boat bunks has been an ongoing battle for me.
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Q&A: Warm Feet, Please
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Read more: Q&A: Warm Feet, PleaseQuestion: Four of us sailed my 36-ft Moody Halberdier from Buffalo, New York to Rimouski, Quebec in Oct./Nov. last year. The biggest problem was cold feet. Sailing boots with extra socks did not do the trick in -5°C weather. Rubber boots with liners were OK. I’m planning a trip to Northern Labrador next summer. Any […]
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Q&A: Port Bezels
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Read more: Q&A: Port BezelsQuestion: Could you post detailed photos to your website of the wooden bezels you fitted to your ports to accept Plexiglas covers? Did you do the same for your hatches? We are losing the battle against condensation in Florida’s current cold snap. Thanks!
