We pursue a technical vein here at AAC. But sometimes it’s nice to take a break from anchors and electrons. To that end, John is trying his hand at fiction. 

Everyone loves to tout the benefits of their favourite anchor, John included, but this article is about much more: how to cut through all the claims to the criteria that really matter when selecting an anchor.

John happened upon a claim made by the manufacturer of the CrewWatcher smartphone-based person overboard alarm, that is, in his opinion, rubbish.

What went wrong and what we did about it.

Last week I wrote about our new subscription (membership) system. We have now finished all the preliminary work and tomorrow (Tuesday) is the big day.

When thinking about anchoring, it’s easy to just focus on gear, but good technique can contribute at least as much to getting securely anchored. These steps, based on 40 years of experience, make getting securely anchored easy and repeatable.

Over the next few weeks we will be moving to a new subscription (membership) system. Here’s why we are making the change, and how the cut over will happen.

Are the gear awards given by panels of marine journalists useful and worth your time?

A headsail that is not protected from sun damage when furled, will only last a season or so. So what’s the best way to protect the sail? John has some suggestions.

When the GFS GRIB data suggested that in twelve days there would be calm seas at Sable Island, Molly and family were inspired to organize a visit to this “remote, desolate and gorgeous place”.

In Part 1 of our series on Integrel, we dug into how it works, why it’s innovative, my worries about reliability, and why it is neither fault tolerant or easily repairable in the field.

We concluded that it was too expensive and complicated to be of use to cruisers who have reasonably modest daily power needs.

But what about those of us who want all the comforts of home and therefore use a lot of power in the run of a day, or even those with one foot in each camp?

Nigel Calder’s newest machine, that claims to revolutionize electrical systems on boats, has generated a huge amount of excitement. So is this thing a good product that we should buy? Let’s dig in and find out.

John looks at the question of whether to install a dedicated plotter or a computer for electronic navigation, and continues with a description of what he did install and how it has worked out.

Colin’s in-depth, real-world test and review of the SARCA Excel anchor, based on a season of use in a cruising ground that is notoriously difficult to anchor in.