Innholdsfortegnelse for September 2015 i Cruising World

People & Food We were a crew of four aboard Far Bay, a Southern Wind Farr 72, delivering the boat south to Jamaica from Savannah, Georgia. Frothing waves towered out of the darkness over the stern. Cuba rose up sharply to the west, its mountains and coast eerily absent of telltale pinpricks of light signaling towns. The smell of damp earth and wood fires, carried on the trade winds from Haiti, filled the cockpit. As we yawed and surfed toward Port Antonio, the only brightness came from the navigation lights as they bounced red and green off white horses at the bow. We arrived in Porti, as the locals call Port Antonio, 24 hours after our sleigh ride through the islands. Thumping dance music drowned out the chirping of tree…

Crash. A wave slammed into Gannet, my ultralight Moore 24, and swept the deck from bow to stern. Now that I had removed some debris that was inadvertently blocking drain channels on either side of the companionway hatch, less water came below, and most of that through the aft end of the hatch, where, to provide ventilation, I had not inserted the slat. Two waves later, the little sloop became airborne. I had known that 20 to 25 knots from ahead would turn Gannet into a submarine. I had not realized that she would also become a glider. Short flights. Crash landings. Gannet’s interior magnifies sound. It was like being inside a drum beaten by a madman. I did not see how she could survive. How any boat could. I…

NEWS AND NOTES ON SAILING-VACATION OPPORTUNITIES Parents Tina and Peter Dreffin crew Freebird, a 42-foot Grainger catamaran that can take five guests in two cabins and one child-size berth. Sons and captains Adam and Warren Dreffin and their crews run Rubicon, a St. Francis 44-foot catamaran, and Swish, a 50-foot Voyage catamaran, respectively. Rubicon accommodates five guests in three cabins; Swish takes seven guests in four cabins. The Dreffin family formerly lived together on Scud, the 44-foot St. Francis catamaran they circumnavigated aboard over a decade ago. For details, contact Bahamas Cat Charters (bahamascatcharters.com). For bookings, contact Select Yachts (selectyachts.com). Cool Off from City Heat Here There’s still time to check out the two New York-area campuses of Steve and Doris Colgate’s Off shore Sailing School, which are open for…

News and notes from the cruising community Once upon a time, as all good stories start, we came across an issue of Cruising World, and the seed for our dream was planted. My husband, Jim, and I immediately knew that our days as powerboaters were numbered. We wanted to go cruising under sail. Within the next couple of years, we took sailing lessons, found a sailboat and made it ours. Fast-forward 10 years. The itch to go cruising had grown exponentially, and we found ourselves in Chicago at the Strictly Sail show. Over cocktails, I threw out a plan that had us retiring and going cruising in five years, at age 50. We put it down on paper and somehow the pieces started to fall in place. The first major…

Rhode Islander Donna Lange is headed off on her second solo circumnavigation aboard her Southern Cross 28, Inspired Insanity. This time around, she plans to do the voyage nonstop, using celestial navigation. She will start and finish in Bristol, Rhode Island, and use the Roaring 40s to sail around Antarctica. If successful, Lange will be the first American woman to sail solo nonstop around the world. “It will be an emotional and spiritual journey, just as much as it is for the sport of sailing,” says Lange, who hopes to focus on self-reliance and seamanship, while also bringing awareness to environmental and safety issues. On her last circumnavigation, sailed in 2005-2007, Lange had “too much communication,” which she says took away from the experience. Preparing for a solo voyage, however,…

U.S. law regarding travel to Cuba is in flux. An excellent place to begin research into restrictions is the U.S. Department of the Treasury “Cuba Sanctions” web page, found by entering that search term at treasury.gov. The website offers links to many frequently asked questions and is regularly updated. There is also a link where you can sign up for email updates on the sanctions. Regulations can also be found in the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations, 31 CFR Part 515, Cuban Assets Control Regulations. We made our trip “almost” legally. Although we were traveling under President Obama’s new general license, under which there are 12 permitted categories for visitors (see 31 CFR Part 515), travel to Cuba by boat requires a U.S. Department of Commerce export permit for a…

If you sail long enough, you’ll likely leave your boat in a foreign country either to travel or to sit out a storm season. Most of us prefer palm trees to parkas, so chances are it will be in the tropics. Surprisingly, however, when leaving your vessel stowed securely in a known storm area, a tropical cyclone is probably not the greatest threat. An unprepared boat stored in a hot, humid climate can be a breeding ground for two other forces, small but mighty, that can quickly overcome an unattended vessel: Quiet and extremely invasive, mold and insects can often wreak more havoc than a storm. My partner, Steve, and I have left our Newport 41, Kate, on the hard in Fiji four times during the South Pacific cyclone season.…

You’re forgiven if you’ve never heard of an Azuree. Built in Turkey, the line of performance cruising sailboats is gaining traction in Europe, but made its North American debut just this past February at the Miami International Boat Show. At first glance, I liked the clean, modern look of the Azuree 46, and put it on my mental list of boats I’d like to sail someday. That someday happened on a gorgeous July day in Newport, Rhode Island, and it was worth the wait. The Azuree 46 is built by Sirena Marine, which also produces the Euphoria line of yachts (another brand that I’m sure you’ll be hearing more about). The lineup includes the Azuree 33, launched in 2010, the 33C — which has the same hull as the 33,…

Before all was said and done, one sailor — the driven, likely insane Brit Donald Crowhurst — lost his mind and committed suicide. Moitessier, famously, dropped out of the race to sail to Tahiti to “save his soul.” Only Knox-Johnston, aboard his stout, homebuilt teak 32-footer, Suhaili, actually finished the contest, after a grueling 312-day odyssey, a trip he wrote about eloquently in a subsequent bestseller, A World of My Own. In winning the Golden Globe, “RKJ” became the first man to circumnavigate alone without stopping — a record-setting triumph many previously believed was unattainable. He was hailed as a national hero, received a knighthood and embarked on a long career as an elite international yachtsman. Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet, Knox-Johnston’s great feat left an indelible…

CRUISINGWORLD.COM ON TO ARGENTINA The Litzow family, aboard Galactic, has made it to Tierra del Fuego — in the middle of the Southern hemisphere winter. And they are loving it: “After we left the Straits of Magellan, we cut down Canal Cochrane, took the briefest look at the open Pacific, and ducked back into the protection of the canales — Canal Ocasión and Canal Brecknock — the road to the Beagle Channel,” writes Mike Litzow in his blog. “Now we were in Fireland — Tierra del Fuego. And it was our own Tierra del Fuego. There were some centolla fishing boats around, and every morning we came up on the Patagonia cruisers net and emailed our position to the armada. But we seemed to be carrying our own envelope of…

The inaugural Race to Alaska (R2AK) was a great big roll of the dice. From conception over a beer at the Port Townsend Wooden Boat Festival in 2013, until the race began on June 4, 2015, no one knew what to expect — and that was a huge part of the appeal. The concept was simple: sail, paddle, pedal or row, with no support or motors, 750 miles from Port Townsend, Washington, to Ketchikan, Alaska. Cross the finish line first, win $10,000. Second place gets a set of steak knives. And, finally, if you asked the race committee a question that required them to call a lawyer, you’d be disqualified. While the requirements were minimal — make two waypoints along the route, and carry a SPOT tracker and a VHF…

Have you ever taken a vacation that simply changed everything? Lynn and Dick Jachney did. It was February 1967, and the couple needed a break from another New England winter. So they delivered their kids — Kyle and Anne, ages 3 and 1 — into the care of Dick’s mother and flew south for a 10-day sailing vacation. Lynn was a schoolteacher at the time; Dick was an RCA salesman with a bit of law school under his belt. In their case, the everything that changed didn’t stop with their own lives. It quickly grew to encompass the entire yacht-charter business — and then, a little later, the market for top-quality world-voyaging sailboats. Cruising World: For its 30th anniversary issue in 2004, CW published a brief history of sailboat chartering.…

A question that comes to mind when I get to sail a new boat is this: If it were my vessel, how would I use it? Each sailboat is different, after all, and built to suit a purpose. Sometimes the answer isn’t readily apparent, but when I pointed the bow of the new Dehler 46 just off the wind in about 12 knots of breeze, and my host for the day sheeted in the sails, I had no doubt in my mind what I’d do with the latest performance cruiser from Germany: I’d grab a few pals or my wife and another couple and go sailing. Up the coast, an island adventure, around the buoys — it would all be fun, and the 46 is roomy and versatile enough to…