The Offshore Voyaging Reference Site
Two of the more frequent requests we have been receiving lately are how to find crew or find a boat to crew on. So we decided to post what we know about this topic and then open it up for you to add to it.
If you want to know what it takes to restore a 30-year old sailboat and some tips on how to get going, we have a link for you. It will either convert you to the older-boat-restoration option or scare you witless (maybe both!).
Question: What do you use for time keeping at sea? If you use a wristwatch then which one?
If there’s one place that you really don’t want a valve to bust while in use, it’s in the black water system.
We received a question a while ago that got us both thinking: “Why did you start cruising, why do you keep cruising, and how long will you keep doing it?”
A review of the best sunscreen we have found for boating.
After spending much of the last four winters in Maine and Nova Scotia refitting Morgan’s Cloud, John and I agreed that a winter in the Bahamas would be just the ticket. So when the blazing fall colours and chilly temperatures of early October indicated that Penobscot Bay, Maine wasn’t going to remain the balmy summer […]
Question: We are hoping to draw on your experience with teak deck replacement on our steel sailboat…Despite our initial plan of just stemming the leaks for the short term until we sailed somewhere fun, they are just too bad and the deck has to go next spring/summer. While going through the process of finding someone […]
Our last extended cruise ended in the fall of 2003 when John and I hauled Morgan’s Cloud in Maine so that we could spend the winter at our house in Bermuda. We had a big decision to make: If we wanted to refit Morgan’s Cloud and keep on cruising, the house would have to be […]
Question: Three friends and I are outfitting my Skye 51′ for a five-year circumnavigation and we are replacing the old teak decks…I have heard many more pros than cons to Treadmaster and I would like to know your honest opinion on installation, upkeep, durability and general contentment with the product. Any input that you care […]
Question: I’m planning a five-year circumnavigation. While I grew up as a live aboard cruiser, two of my crew have limited sailing experience. We have cruised the Chesapeake Bay extensively together and both are becoming good seamen but neither has been on a blue water passage. Phyllis, I understand that you had little or no […]
Question: Why did you paint Morgan’s Cloud white? I thought she looked better painted dark blue.
Steiner is one of the few companies left (it seems) that is still building good quality equipment and then standing behind it. We have had the same pair of Steiner Commander RS2000 binoculars for over 20 years.
What about a circumnavigation of the Outer Bay of Fundy?
Though John and I always feel totally disconnected with our destination after flying somewhere, when sailing from place to place on Morgan’s Cloud we feel like active participants in the small bit of the world surrounding us.
Discomfort is a bad word in our society. Our houses, our cars and our public buildings shelter us so totally from the environment that we rarely feel cold or hot or wet or windblown and, unless it’s a hurricane or tsunami, the weather very seldom stops us from doing what we want when we want.
Approaching the lee shore of Nordaustlandet (the uninhabited—or so we thought—icecap-domed island separated from Spitsbergen by Hinlopen Strait) in a building gale in early August of 2002, was intimidating to say the least.
Question: We are thinking of buying a 70′, 55 ton, steel motorsailer which we want to fix up and cruise on for 4 months of the year. We would be starting out on the east coast of the US and are contemplating going via Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Greenland to Northern Europe. We would have […]
Eleven years ago I met John and started scaling the voyaging learning curve. Since I was starting from scratch, it often seemed to me that the learning curve was vertical.
I’m going to make a confession here: I think brightwork is beautiful. However, since I’m the one that ends up maintaining it—that’s because John insists I’m so much better at it than he is, which is a rotten trick and one I fall for regularly—I also believe it doesn’t belong on our boat.