Soundings is the news and feature publication for recreational boaters. Award-winning coverage of the people, issues, events -- and the fun -- of recreational boating. Check out our generous boats-for-sale section and our gunkholing destinations.
One of the best parts of working at Soundings is getting to know our contributors. These professionals are not only talented reporters, they’re people who are very comfortable and content around boats and write from a place of experience. In this issue, Wendy Mitman Clarke penned the story “True Blue,” a feature that celebrates the iconic Newport Bermuda Race, one of the oldest regularly scheduled ocean races in the world, and one of a limited number that take place almost entirely at sea. It’s an event that many recreational boaters dream of doing one day. It had been on Clarke’s bucket list too, until she did it. The event was founded 116 years ago by a sailor who wanted to prove that amateurs could safely race offshore. To this day,…
These boaters know where the cameras are. And therein lies the problem. Hundreds of thousands of people are tuning in on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and more to watch scenes recorded at Baker’s Haulover Inlet and the Miami River in South Florida, where hootin’ and hollerin’ boaters who might otherwise be flopping over frat-house railings are instead flying over bowrails and falling off foredecks. Video after video online shows hands raised high in the air with cold beverages, women dropping their bikini tops, and men bouncing so out of control that they soar right off their personal watercraft and into the drink. “Every time we have to tow a boat on the weekend, it is a war zone,” Capt. Eduardo Barreto, owner of Sea Tow Key Biscayne, says of the Miami…
Imagine a future where you and your partner are doing an ocean crossing, and you both get to sleep through the night at the same time. The boat is running on solar power, so there’s no chance of a clog in a fuel line. The boat also has collision-avoidance software that you can set to wake you if another vessel gets close, or that can simply adjust the boat’s course on its own, in tandem with your radar and AIS, while you remain happily in dreamland. At least some of that future vision will be reality in a matter of years—not decades, but years—according to Pieter-Jan Note, the co-founder of Project Mahi. In April, the 13-foot uncrewed surface vessel Mahi Two, which Note and his team designed, became what’s believed…
I’ve only experienced one real man-overboard event. Thankfully it was in fair weather in daylight. A guest on the bow stood up and lifted his binoculars to his eyes. He stumbled and fell backwards over the rail where the lifelines sloped down to the bowsprit. We instantly tossed him a couple of throw cushions. As the boat slid by him, he yelled up “I’m OK.” Oddly, he continued to hold the binoculars over his head, so we knew he wasn’t hurt or panicked. We calmly executed our practiced man-overboard procedure, while keeping him in sight and bringing the boat head-to-wind. We started the engine, dropped sails, and motored back while putting the boarding ladder out. In minutes we were within yards of him, putting the engine in neutral. Someone tossed…
The old sloop intrigued us. She had nice lines and the most outrageous paint scheme imaginable for a boat, with bold colors straight out of Haight-Ashbury. An artist, perhaps assisted by pharmaceuticals, had worked hard to buck yachting convention. The rest of the boat was less striking. Her seams were beginning to open as she had been left uncovered for some time. Her best days had been before we were born. The year was 1971. Between the two of us, my friend Dan Moreland and I had owned sailing dinghies, a wooden skiff and a waterski boat, which we ran in our home waters near Rowayton, Connecticut. The sense of freedom underway thrilled us. So did voyaging narratives, including Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World. We were chafing for…
A dual-console fishing boat is, at its core, a compromise. It must serve the serious angler, incorporating not only expected features like a live well, but also enough open, uncluttered space to fight a fish. At the same time, it needs to offer all the comforts and amenities of a family-friendly sportboat. The new Sailfish 316 Dual Console from Georgia-based builder Sailfish Boats achieves this without making it look like too much of a compromise. “The boat’s ambidextrous,” said Sailfish Boat President and CEO Rob Parmentier during the 316 Dual Console’s official launch at the 2022 Palm Beach International Boat Show. Standard fishing features on the 316 Dual Console (DC for short) start with the six rod holders arrayed across the back of the transom, a 30-gallon circulating live well…
