Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2015 i Yachting Monthly

A British solo circumnavigator and author has been rescued from his yacht in the North Sea after his steering gear failed, leaving him drifting near an oil platform. Julian Mustoe, 82, aboard the 25ft Harrier of Down, was 100 miles from Lerwick and 85 miles from Bergen in Norway and had been making good progress despite 7m waves when the stainless steel head fitting on the boat’s rudder stock cracked in two, leaving him unable to steer. Mr Mustoe declined an airlift from a UK Coastguard helicopter, but later accepted a tow from the Norwegian Coastguard. He was aboard the Coastguard cutter during the tow when Harrier began taking on water and eventually sank in 300m of water. He said: ‘A 1kg lump of stainless steel splitting in half was…

Each wave hit the boat broadside with a loud slap and bashed her hull against the rocky sea wall. Her starboard bilge keel was smashed off, just a row of ragged teeth protruded where it once had been. Her mast shook to the beat of the breakers, its halyards rattling as the autumnal gale relentlessly battered the shore with pulverising force. Her leeward portholes had been punched in. As the sea rushed into the cabin, she rolled onto the rocks with a crunching sound and as it retreated, sucking out the contents, she rolled back into the element that was destroying her. Away went a half-filled jerrycan, propelled by tide and wind. She swivelled onto the rocks once more and again she swivelled back. This time the disembowelling seas dragged…

Laura had a month to prepare, and knew that the trip could be scrapped in bad weather. There are two options when rounding the Bill: the inshore passage, which requires passing 300m from the shore in 5-10m, avoiding rocks and fishing pots, or the long way round, three to seven miles offshore. Your choice depends on the sea state. The inshore passage requires precise visual pilotage, so it’s important to choose a date whose tides permit you to round the Bill in daylight. We rounded westwards on Thursday 23 April and, with the breeze in the southeast, the inshore passage was the preferred option. In light winds this can be attempted with the tidal stream running powerfully in the right direction, but I recommend arriving at slack water before a…

James Stevens analyses what went well, and what could have gone better As a maths undergraduate, Laura effortlessly calculated the tides for this passage, helpfully writing down her results for those of us with less mental agility, so we had no problems with the navigation plan. Her theory was excellent. The day started with a light easterly – a good direction for our rounding. Luckily the wind built a touch and went right, so it was ideal by the afternoon. Had we awoken to the sound of wind howling through the rigging, we would have to face the possibility of abandoning the trip. For a downwind passage and wind with tide, anything over a force 6 makes the inshore route marginal. A changing breeze Laura holds a Yachtmaster Coastal certificate…

Sextant By David Barrie, published by William Collins at £9.99 Now in paperback as well as hardback and e-book, this is the story of one of the most important and aesthetically pleasing navigational tools. It enabled, in conjunction with the marine chronometer, the exploration and charting of so much of the globe. It literally changed (our view of) the world. But the book is not just about an instrument; it contains accounts of the author’s experiences of celestial navigation on yachts (with Colin McMullen as his mentor), Captain Cook’s voyages in the Pacific, the Beagle, Slocum’s Spray, Shackleton’s Endurance, and Matthew Flinders. It’s a readable, eloquent and fascinating book, but ultimately a sad one as it has, in the end, to acknowledge the ‘dumbing down’ of navigation that has been…

The first we saw of it was a yellow horseshoe buoy flying across the spume, then the pitching hull of a winged yacht, her port-side guardrail ripped clean off, her pushpit a dangling tangle of pipework and her toerail in splinters. ‘That’s Bruce’s boat,’ said our skipper, Martin Thomas, as the otherwise immaculate Mabel, a 42ft Kim Holmandesigned wooden sloop built in 1966 by Moody’s, retired before she had crossed the start line of the Classic Channel Race from Dartmouth to Paimpol. The Bruce in question is Bruce Thorogood, the widely respected chairman of the Classic Regatta Anglo-Breton (CRAB), whose unenviable responsibility it was to start the race in a Force 7. But a near gale was not enough to postpone an eight-day schedule of regattas, porthopping and cruising, planned…

It had been a long, uncomfortable trip from Newlyn but now the Irish coast was in sight with the Hook lighthouse showing clearly. This raised hopes of getting in to Dunmore East in daylight but it was not to be. Soon, the breeze that had been non-existent all day, started to come in from down the Waterford Estuary. Darkness arrived and the light from the Hook swept round while I motored on towards the red, blinking light at Dunmore East harbour. It was a slow slog so I was pleased when I passed this and saw the ghostly outline of yachts on moorings and moored to a vacant buoy. I slept well and long, content that I had reached one of my favourite ports. In the afternoon I relaxed, soaking…

Duncan Wells is principal of Westview Sailing, author of Stress-free Sailing and creator of LiveSavers (livesavers.co.uk)…

Between 2010 to 2014 the RNLI responded to 665 man overboard (MOB) calls, rescuing 353 people, 85 of whom would otherwise have died. In Ireland, MOB incidents made up 42% of all deaths at sea from 1985 to 1987. US Coast Guard (USCG) figures suggest that 30% of all boating fatalities are MOB-related. Trawling the Internet, I found 99 MOB incidents involving sailing yachts. Some MOBs were wearing lifejackets, some harnesses, some both, some neither. Of these, 48 were fatalities, slightly higher than the Irish and USCG figures. But here’s the surprise: of the 24 who were wearing harnesses and clipped on, 17 died. In other words, 71% of those who fell overboard while clipped on and wearing a harness died, as opposed to 41% for those who fell overboard…

Keen to find out if an electronic flare could match the equivalent pyrotechnic device, Duncan Kent put the latest LED model to the test I’m as keen as the next man to get rid of the pyrotechnics on board, so when Ocean Signal offered me the opportunity to try out one of its latest electronic flares I jumped at the chance. Let’s make it clear right from the start – the rescueME EDF1 electronic distress flare is a hand-held visual distress alerting device, not a parachute flare. So, in my book that really just makes it a fancy homing signal – the sort of modern equivalent of a burning barrel of tar on the foredeck, only much safer! The EDF1 looks and feels like a regular torch, only it has…

It’s always interesting to sail boats from the 1970s, seeing how yacht design has evolved in 40 odd years, how hull shape and interior volume has come on, what remains and what has been lost. Few design houses have stood the test of time, are so well known or are as prolific as Van de Stadt. They were famous for such wellknown designs as the Trintella, Pionier, Excaliber, Invicta, Wing, Seal, Etap and many more cruising and racing yachts. Producing over 400 designs since 1933, and some 25,000 Van de Stadt-designed yachts were launched. We joined retired GP Guy Dickinson for a sail aboard his 1972 Legend 34, Quetzal. The Legend 34 was produced from 1969, with the majority built by the Tyler Boat Company in Tunbridge. Performance A seaworthy…

Tides Planner App £free Data £2.99pa RATING 9/10 This is one of the most fully-featured iPad tidal apps currently available and comes with the ability to download tide data for 8,000 worldwide ports, including 800+ in the UK. The app is free to download and use with one day’s worth of tides. For a full calendar year of tidal data you need to buy an in-app extension for £2.99. Furthermore, whilst it comes with a basic, zoomable world map showing tidal stream arrows (coloured and sized according to rate). Paying a further £4.49 per annum, you can have a full UKwide tidal atlas in UKHO format. Ports can be chosen by clicking on a location pin on the chart, or from an alphabetical list and, once selected or viewed, they…

Allures 52 The lifting keel Allures 52 has a round-bilged aluminium hull and a GRP deck. The saloon is offset to starboard with seating for eight, and aft of it is the face-me face-you chart table, raised to take advantage of those big coachroof windows. The saloon isn’t raised, but it does have vertical hull windows. To port is a linear galley that offers all the modcons a world-girdling cook requires. Up forward, there are two optional layouts: one with an island berth in the forecabin and an en suite heads aft; the other with a double berth to starboard and the heads forward. Both versions have twin aft cabins. I’m sure Allures would convert one of these into the excellent ‘technical area’ seen on all of its other models…

If you have a news story to share, contact News Editor Theo Stocker EMAIL theo.stocker@timeinc.com TEL 020 3148 4873 British sailors could be put in danger, experts say, because they cannot access the best weather data available. The UK Met Office provides highly detailed weather data over land, free of charge, but the charts it publishes online stop at the coast. While it does supply the Shipping and Inshore Waters forecasts for mariners, it does not publish the output from either its global model or high-resolution local data for sea areas. In contrast, Météo France has started publishing global and high-resolution local computer weather information for free. France becomes only the third country to offer its global forecast data via GRIB files (small, quick to-download ‘gridded binary’ files containing raw…

‘No backup’ for GPS The US Navy fears that the GPS system could be hacked. It has admitted that there are ‘cyber vulnerabilities’ and that there is ‘no backup’. As a result, it has now resumed teaching celestial navigation to officers for the first time in 20 years. Freedom of sea at risk Aggressive territorial expansion into the ocean by nations such as Russia and China presents one of the greatest threats to the security of our seas, said Rear Admiral Chris Parry at the Britain and the Sea conference. Contessa 26 anniversary The Contessa 26 Association has compiled a book to mark the first 50 years of this Folkboat-derived design, which is highly esteemed as a pocket ocean cruiser. Lively Lady refit Sir Alec Rose’s iconic Lively Lady is…

Some gloomy health charity informs us that one in three of us will face dementia. The figures were picked up, crunched, explained and debunked on the magnificent BBC Radio 4 statistics programme More or Less. But well short of dementia, it seems inevitable that as we sail triumphantly through middle age, even without serious seniormoment forgetfulness, we tend to forget words. Names. We enter the age of the thingummy, the whatsername, the you-know who-I-mean. I do the concise crossword against the clock every day, to force myself into more rapid retrieval of words like echelon and viscera and Lithuania. Experts assure us that it isn’t a matter of mental decline but more that the brain, ever more overcrowded yet ever efficient, simply stores away unused information somewhere in the back…

Practical advice for all sailors Tom Cunliffe has sailed tens of thousands of miles all over the world and has been a Yachtmaster Examiner since 1978 Slapper stopper When I came on deck at 0800 to hoist my colours on a visitors’ mooring recently, the tide was running out against a stiff breeze, bringing in a bit of a lop. This doesn’t trouble my yacht, which has a long counter, but the chap on the up-tide buoy looked as if he’d been awake since High Water. His wide stern was slapping against the slop in a manner calculated to ruin the slumbers of anyone trying to sleep aft. Down-tide, on a similar yacht, all was peace. Then I noticed what the owner had done. The old trick of slinging a…

EMAIL yachtingmonthly@timeinc.com POST Any Questions, Yachting Monthly, Blue Fin Building, 110 Southwark Street, London SE1 0SU Please send us your questions in less than 200 words WIN CHILGROVE GIN The question of the month wins a bottle of Chilgrove Gin (UK residents only). This super-premium gin, handcrafted by keen sailors in the Sussex Downs, blends the finest botanicals with a neutral grape spirit. www.chilgrovespirits.com QUESTION OF THE MONTH Why can’t I receive Navtex? Q Cruising in northern Scotland last summer, my family and I were unable to receive any complete Navtex forecasts. On most days we received no information at all. When sailing from Stornoway to Lerwick we could only get the BBC Radio 4 shipping forecast. We don’t think there is a problem with our receiver as we receive Navtex…

It’s a big decision to buy a yacht – one that could change your life forever. I made this decision, but within months my dreams ended in disaster. I emigrated to Hong Kong in 2007 with very little sailing experience, but the water and the playground of 250 islands near the city enticed me into taking a sailing course and looking for a yacht. Eventually I found Sundancer, a beautiful CT-41. Built in Taiwan in 1982, she was strongly built and oozed character. It was a challenge to find a berth in Hong Kong, but eventually I found a swinging mooring and I was lucky enough to sail Sundancer most weekends for the next four months. But then disaster struck. A fairly common strength 3 typhoon suddenly built into the…

Amarine insurance loophole has left a Yachting Monthly reader with £2,000 worth of lost cover, the negation of his no-claims bonus and has thrown into sharp relief a major insurance anomaly that affects thousands of yacht owners throughout the UK. Michael Horwood, 65, a yacht surveyor, describes the loophole as a ‘claims department wheeze’ and is calling for a change to the way policies are set out. In October 2014, his 26ft Ecume de Mer, Sirene of Yealm, was ‘quietly minding her own business’ on her mooring in Devon’s River Exe when she was hit by a drifting Westerly Tempest 31. Mr Horwood, who lives in nearby Topsham, said: ‘ It was a windy night, but not exceptionally so. When I checked it had been blowing a steady 24 knots…

Last summer I had the chance to sail in the Mediterranean with my friend Chris Higham who was living aboard his Morgan 44 and hoping to cruise around the world. I was invited to sail with him the 500 miles from Murcia to Gibraltar, where he planned to leave Moonraker and return to the UK for the winter. Sailing towards Gibraltar along the coast of Spain, the sea begins to change west of Cartagena. The warm, clear, wonderfully deep blue colour for which the Mediterranean is famous begins to cool and become murky as the tidal current through the Strait of Gibraltar stirs up the seabed, creating a distinctly English Channel look. On the surface at Gibraltar it seems that the tide is always heading eastwards without ever turning. Indeed…

What would you do in the event of a fire on board? Greg Goulding finds out first hand Most fire safety courses (such as the week-long STCW-95) are aimed at professional crew of commercial vessels, but leisure sailors are largely forgotten. So when we heard of a half-day course that demonstrates the dangers and difficulty of a fire on board, I was keen to give it a go. The course starts with the basics: knowledge of fire extinguishers and which to use when. We got our hands on what seemed to be the best all-rounder, powder. But a short blast outside and everyone spluttered from the residue. It’s doubtful a crew could breathe inside a boat if one is set off. The number of attendees on the course is kept…

On the whole, marine diesel heaters provide a very safe means of heating a yacht, but the desire to save money can often lead to dangerous installations. When surveying craft at pre-purchase or for owner condition reports for insurance, I find inappropriate and cheap fittings are used to cut corners. Problems most often occur when a second-hand unit has been installed or, worse still, a diesel truck heater kit! Truck heaters, I can’t stress enough, should never be used on board. Although cheap, they differ significantly: from operating voltage to the fittings supplied. This year I saw a horrendous installation (see above). By luck the owner had never used it, a saving grace for him, his family and his insurance underwriter. In the hope of passing on some important safety…

UK Tides App £free/ads Data £free RATING 5/10 A useful and free Android-only app giving seven days of predictions at 700 British ports. Locations are selected either by proximity to you with mobile or GPS location enabled, or by selection from a list. The display shows alphanumeric height details, sun/moon data and a tidal curve with current timeline. Swiping the screen toggles through the seven-day period and ports can be saved in a favourites menu for rapid selection. As a quick reference app this tells you all you need to know in a clear, easily accessible format, provided you don’t mind the annoying ad bar at the top. Difference to UKHO: LW 0min/0.0m HW 0min/0.0m My Tide Times App £free/ads-£1.49/No ads Data £free RATING 3/10 It’s available in two versions:…

EMAIL yachtingmonthly@timeinc.com POST The Editor, Yachting Monthly, Blue Fin Building, 110 Southwark Street, London SE1 0SU Please send us your letters in less than 200 words Most letters are edited for brevity. You can read more correspondence, online, at www.yachtingmonthly.com/letters WIN A BOTTLE OF RUM The letter of the month wins a bottle of Pusser’s Rum, produced to Admiralty specification and served daily to every sailor in the Royal Navy for more than 300 years (UK residents only) www.pussers.com Enough to make a chap see red I have been following the shenanigans of the Belgian red diesel policy. In June I trucked Charisma, a Golden Hind 31, home from Antwerp and she is now being restored to her former glory. The old girl has crossed the Atlantic six times and…

When I was a nipper, the footwear favoured by fashionable British sailors was blue canvas pumps. Upmarket versions had non-slip rubber soles for grip. The rest of us made do with rope bottoms, which disintegrated in weeks and conferred no holding power at all. During the late 1960s, leather deck shoes with cut rubber soles arrived in the UK from America where, according to The Gentleman’s Gazette, the design had been pioneered by Mr Sperry in 1935. The advantages were obvious and by 1980 everyone wore them. Quality varied, of course, but the revolution stuck. Passing trends may dictate whether yours are white, pink or traditional brown, but the essential features can’t be improved so nobody has seriously tried. Fashion in the sailing world is an interesting subject. Some items,…

James Stevens, author of the Yachtmaster Handbook, spent 10 of his 23 years at the RYA as Training Manager and Yachtmaster Chief Examiner There’s a lot to consider when rounding a headland. Waves bend around the point. The wind bends too, and can increase in strength as it’s squeezed by the headland. There’s also a good chance that shoals off the point will create overfalls. Planning is key so YM asked Laura McLachlan, a newly qualified Yachtmaster Coastal, to skipper a Hallberg-Rassy 34, Tamora, for the first time around a major headland: Portland Bill. Portland Bill is the gateway to the pleasures of sailing in the West Country for the Solent sailor, but rounding it can be intimidating for the inexperienced skipper. As instructors at the old National Sailing Centre…

How did it go? First time skipper Laura McLachlan talks us through the passage Since there was the potential for things to get quite rough, even in moderate winds, it was important to prepare the boat and crew appropriately. I made sure everything was stowed down below so that it wouldn’t end up flying around the saloon or cabins if we were rolling around at sea. I made sure all on board were fitted with lifejackets and harness lines, and that the jackstays were ready to use. I briefed the crew and double checked that everyone’s lifejacket fitted properly and that everyone was happy using lifejackets, tethers and jackstays since everyone was to wear their lifejacket when on deck at sea, and depending on the conditions we might need to…

‘How would you end this game of chicken?’ One of the easiest rules to comply with is the one for following a narrow channel – keep to the right hand side. Easy, that is, until another boat approaches from dead ahead. stubbornly hugging the left hand side. We met this problem on two occasions last summer. The first was a relatively simple encounter with a passenger boat that was, for no apparent reason, keeping firmly to the port side in the Odet river. Fortunately we were in a section where the banks are steep-to so we had no difficulty keeping really close to the starboard side and just before passing close down our port side he waved cheerfully, reversed course and steamed off towards Benodet, from whence he came. He…

On a quiet day at Pin Mill in 1938, Arthur Ransome, author and sailor, was feeling very pleased with the world. He had visited King’s boat yard to find that Commander George Martin’s gaff cutter Griffin had already been hauled out of the shed and was being readied for her launch. This meant his new dream-boat Selina King, ordered to replace his Nancy Blackett, would start her build at last. Oak slabs from Orwell Park and pitch pine long enough to stretch from stem to stern were ready for use. ‘Don’t want butts if we can help it,’ said Harry King, the yard owner. ‘Every join’s a weakness, stands to reason.’ Later that evening, after a fine meal of chops and beer at the Butt and Oyster, Ransome had rather…

You could sail along the north coast of Devon after passing Bull Point and not even notice the entrance to Watermouth Bay, it is so well hidden. It looks like a small indentation into the cliffs and the only real way to identify it is the low, round stone tower located on Widmouth Head just to the east side of the entrance. Only when you actually enter the small bay do you realise that around the bend to the east lies the small harbour of Watermouth. Harbour is perhaps a generous term because much of this cove dries out and the only semblance of a harbour is a low, rough stone pier jutting out from the west side which is covered at High Water. Unless you want to dry out,…

I’m desperately hunting for a Christmas present for my skipper. He already owns three nautical joke mugs, his port and starboard socks are rarely seen on the correct feet and thus unreliable as an aid to navigation, and he doesn’t need a framed set of knots to remind him how to tie the boat up. Just as I decide on a personally embossed tube of window sealant, my eye falls upon the copy of Posh Yachts International sent to us last week by some deluded broker. I flick idly through it – and my troubles are over; I shall buy him a ‘scent solution’. What does your boat smell of? Have you ever noticed that all new yachts on display at a boat show have that lovely aroma of freshly…

There’s always a good read hidden on a sailor’s shelves. Tell us your favourite. EMAIL theo.stocker@timeinc.com The capsize must have occurred soon after first light, or around 0200. Hour after hour I bailed, mechanically, like an automaton. The glass was beginning to rise, I noted dully, so the cold front must have passed, switching the storm winds to the south-west. This presumption was confirmed when ragged tears began to appear in the driving cloud wrack. Bursts of sunlight momentarily illumined the scene that, even in my then state, I appreciated was of awesome grandeur. The screaming wind had not let up in the slightest. The tormented sea was a sheet of white water that looked like snow. At least I have seen the sun again before I die, I thought.…

Standard Horizon has introduced an entirely new range radios. Duncan Kent installed and tested the smallest model Having bought an aged, stripped-out ‘compact’ cruiser, I needed to find a set of instruments that fitted her limited console space and my tight budget. The GX1700E is the latest incarnation of Standard Horizon’s compact and more basic VHF, the GX1600E, only now it also boasts a built-in 66-channel WAAS GPS receiver and a larger, clearer LCD display, as well as being fully compliant with the obligatory Class-D GMDSS and DSC standards. Being just 110mm from the screen to the back of the mounting bracket, this radio fitted the bill perfectly. It had to be mounted so that the fist mic was within grabbing distance of the helmsman (most of my sailing in…

This test has unsettled me. For the last few years, the Winner 9 has been the leader in her class. No other yacht around her size could offer her excellent combination of performance, price, build quality and customisation. Now Hanse has launched its 315, I’m not certain which boat is best. The hull of the 315 is reminiscent of Hanse’s sportier brand, Dehler, and she sails very well. But is she now top of the class? I’m not sure I know myself. Performance A force 4-5 easterly whistled through Hamble Point Marina as we set off with full mainsail and self-tacking jib. She handled the conditions well, her grip in the water was excellent. Only when the mainsail was left sheeted as a gust hit would the toerail submerge and…

Sills, bars, locks and tidal gates; our fair island is surrounded by them all. Years ago there was no way to ‘cheat’, tide tables had to be pored over, secondary port calculations completed and the last possible time to enter a tidal harbour was worked out using Reeds Nautical Almanac – commonly referred to as The Yachtsman’s Bible. Most British yachts still carry one of these weighty tomes in their navigation portfolio for the plethora of vital navigational data they provide. How we tested them There’s a huge choice of tide apps available for well under a fiver – all a lot cheaper than navigation apps we tested June 2105 – so we downloaded a large selection, in both Apple and Android devices, and put them through their paces. We…

To get down to those listed here, our testers actually downloaded and tried some 25 apps on Apple and Android platforms. We found some fully-featured apps, which we felt deserved to be selected for the top four, then we chose 8 of the best from the remaining 21 we tried in the budget category. Any half-decent tide height prediction app should be able to present today’s data on your home port in standard tabloid format and all the apps tested do in some format or other, except for AnyTide, strangely, which offers a curve only. Moon and sun phases, or at least some indication of spring/neap tides, are a useful bonus. Although I mentally use the ‘Twelfths Rule’ (see right) when scanning through tide tables, it’s very handy if I…

WIN The confession of the month wins a floating Standard Horizon handheld VHF radio worth £140 PLUS an original Bill Caldwell cartoon STANDARD HORIZON POST Confessions, Yachting Monthly, Blue Fin Building, 110 Southwark Street, London SE1 0SU EMAIL yachtingmonthly@timeinc.com Please send us your confessions in less than 200 words A collision for breakfast CONFESSION OF THE MONTH By Robert Wyatt My wife and I were on Argosea, our bilge-keeled Westerly Discus, on the Swale in Kent, having watched the barge match the day before. We love seeing the old working barges and beautiful yachts. Having anchored at Harty Ferry, we decided to head towards Whitstable as we thought it would be an ideal day for a mid-season scrub on the flat shingle beach. At 0700 on Sunday, there was little sign…