Two More Anchor Selection Criteria
John forgot two important anchor selection criteria in the last article, so this one fixes that.
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The Absolute Best Anchor
John starts with testing from “SV Panope”, adds a large dollop of experience, and comes up with his own best anchor table.
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Choosing A Cruising Boat—Shade and Ventilation
A cruising boat without adequate shade and ventilation can make life a living hell once we head for the palm trees. Here’s how to choose a cruising boat that will be comfortable in hot places.
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When Electric Drive Works For a Cruising Sailboat
Lessons we can learn from Jimmy Cornell’s Elcano Challenge when considering electric drive for a cruising sailboat.
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Roller Furling Headsail Risks and Rewards
An interesting question from a member gets John thinking about how to handle headsail roller furling failures, and risk versus reward on a general basis.
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Choosing a Cruising Boat—Shelter
John takes a deep dive into the tradeoffs between open cockpits, dodgers, enclosures, raised salons and wheelhouses on offshore boats.
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Q&A—Sailboat Performance, When The Numbers Fail
A member asks an interesting question about why a boat that appears slower from the numbers is actually faster.
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Offshore Sailboat Winches, Selection and Positioning
These days the offshore sailing community seems to be fixated on rig automation, but a well-specified and installed set of winches will contribute far more to a successful passage than all that expensive failure-prone stuff.
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Best Offshore Boat Cockpit Cushions
Good cockpit cushions are a lot more important on an offshore boat than you might think.
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Buying a Boat—A Different Way To Think About Price
Phyllis and I have been thinking and talking a lot about which boat we will buy after Morgan’s Cloud sells. And a big part of that has been setting a specification and budget, but in a different way.
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Safety: We Can’t Do Or Even Learn About It All
These days it seems like hardly a month goes by without the announcement of a new and/or improved safety device, aggressively marketed as the latest thing that we all must buy, to the point that it’s getting impossible to keep up. Here is how John decides which of these new technologies to put energy into understanding and which to ignore.
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Cockpits—Part 2, Visibility and Ergonomics
There are few areas on any boat that are used for more diverse tasks than an offshore sailboat cockpit. Everything from lounging on a quiet day at anchor to handling a fast-moving emergency at sea with a bunch of sail up…in the black dark…in fog…with a ship bearing down on us.
Given that, picking a boat with a good cockpit layout is one of the most important parts of boat selection. Let’s look at what really matters.
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Cooking Options For Live-aboard Voyagers—Part 2, Liquid Fuel
In Part 1 I looked at induction electric cooking and concluded that for most cruiser usage profiles, particularly for us live-to-eat types, propane was still a better solution, and greener, too. So what about liquid fuels Alcohol, Kerosene and Diesel? Let’s take a look.
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Cooking Options For Live-aboard Voyagers—Part 1, Electric
Three months ago I did some experimenting with induction cooking and wrote about it. And that spawned four more articles as I investigated the changes to a cruising boat’s electrical system required to support high loads like those from electric cooking. So now we can properly answer the original question, is electric cooking practical on a yacht?
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Cockpits—Part 1, Safe and Seamanlike
These days there seems to be an endless fascination with yacht (both motor and sail) cockpit amenities, but we must never lose sight of a cockpit’s primary function: to be the command and control centre of a vehicle that operates in a potentially hostile environment.
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