Daily Sailing News from North American Sailor

NASailor Update

Hill — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 02:22:21 +0000

Since our launch 18 months ago, we’ve had some fantastic support from this community and made great strides in growing the site to tens of thousands of visitors per month. Some of our best content – boat reviews, the best boat series, and more – generate tremendous interest even today.

But life moves forward; our new family and the rise of other professional opportunities are taking up more and more time. So, effective this week, we will no longer be regularly updating this site. We will still occasionally place new content here, but it will be more of a blog-style format, and will be done only when time permits.

Thanks for your support throughout this process. We’ll see you out on the water!

Crash Of The Week: Offshore In Serious Conditions

Hill — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 02:55:15 +0000

While not technically a crash, this video shows some pretty serious conditions, and the proper way to handle them. Conditions look like 50 knots to me, with sharp, occasionally breaking waves. What looks like the yawl is highly reefed and working downwind with the wave on their quarter. Note the wave state, with the sea shifting from discrete waves, to constant, white, streaky foam. Indicative of approaching and crossing the forty to fifty-knot wind threshold.

Introducing The Triloboat

Hill — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 02:46:58 +0000

Triloboat – a new conception of sailboat. Built at home, and essentially a flat barge (plenty of form stability), these guys are cruising Alaska with them. Is this the next wave of home-built sailboats? Shallow in draught, with two junk rigs and leeboards, these remind me of the old Dutch sailboats.

One boat owner notes:

Luna has no engine. We either sail, scull with a yuloh (1.5 knots at an all-day pace), pole ourselves in shallows or warp. Some days we make 80 miles, some we make 5 or less. We try not to have a schedule, and so find the time to poke around interesting looking ‘holes-in-thewalls’… secluded bays, shallow river deltas, narrow passageways through reefs… If we like a place, we stay a while.
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The junk sails are identical (ergo exchangeable), and the rig may be used in cat yawl or schooner mode. With the foresail sheeted in and the main set free, we can sail a tortuous path (as in, ‘up the river’) without touching the sheets (beating as cat yawl into the wind, running and reaching under the main). Handy getting into or out of tight spots. Twin leeboards (technically, they’re ‘off-centerboards’) are kept from winging out on the windward side, so there’s no need to tend them between tacks. With no jibs, ditto for the three sails. Sails and boards are handled from the cockpit. To reef, simply lower the haulyards as desired, sheet in, sail on. Low tech, low cost, low stress.

Cruising With Your Family: A 14-Year Hiatus And Return

Hill — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 01:59:29 +0000

This family of four left the rat-race of Washington, DC to live on a 40-foot cruising boat in Mexico. We found this heartwarming blog from S/V Del Viento via the Cruising World site. And you understand why – it accurately describes their decision-making process to pack it up, sell their house, and move onto their Fuji 40 for five years. Inspiring, and reminds me of the fun which we had during our cruising period. Warning: this may encourage you to walk away from it all as well.

In our twenties, we traded our boat for a house and our freedom for careers. In our thirties, we slumbered through the American dream. In our forties, we woke and traded our house for a boat and our careers for freedom. And here we are.
The Crew:
Michael (also goes by Mike and Miguel) is 42-years-old. He is an English major who wound up working in IT. He is eager to begin writing full time and sees this trip as a means to that end (among ends). He is eager to spend most of his time with Windy and the girls. He will miss real good hot showers, easy Internet access, and the facility of a land-based kitchen. He hates potatoes and loves bitter ales and strong porters.
Windy just turned 40-years-old. She is a geography major who spent 10 years making maps for National Geographic and will soon be using charts as our navigator. She is eager to have her family all in the same boat. She will miss the cats, real good hot showers, easy Internet access, and her DC homeschooling cooperative. She loves potatoes and prefers red wine.
Eleanor is 7-years-old. She is pleased to have seen the boat before we bought it, and before her mom and sister. She is looking forward to moving aboard, but will miss her animals, her friends, a large Christmas tree, a fire in the fireplace, and traditions like making cookies for neighbors. She loves pasta and horchata.
Frances is 5-years-old. She said, “Yeah, same as Eleanor.” She will undoubtly assume the role of our ship’s little ray of sunshine. She loves orange juice and is eager to learn Spanish.
We did this before, pre-kids. I (Michael) lived aboard my Newport 27 in Ventura, California in the early to mid-1990s. When I finished school and decided to go cruising, I hired 25-year-old Windy Travis to be my crew. I’ll never understand why she consented to join me.
I was interviewing crew reluctantly, knowing I needed help managing my tender boat with the unreliable autopilot. I secretly hoped I wouldn’t find crew and could justify sailing off alone, joining the fraternity of singlehanders.
I wasn’t rude or mean when we met, but I sought to dispel any pleasure-cruise notions Windy may have picked up from magazine covers. I made it clear during a cold, wet, rough daysail that the whole trip would be like this, no different. Del Viento had no dodger. We were close-hauled and the wind blew ice-cold spray over the coaming. I was adept at dodging much of it, she was not. She was chilled, wet, and smiling when I announced she was welcome to join me. She said yes immediately.
Really?
My trip quickly became our trip. We sailed from Ventura to Key West, via the Panama Canal. We visited Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Columbia, and Cuba. We had more fun and adventure during our seven-month trip than either of us could have possibly imagined.
Afterward, we finished school, we married, we bought a house, we got some pets, and we had kids. That was a 14-year break break from cruising during which we headed down the expected path. We’re now chucking it all to live differently, again, but this time with two additional crew (and a dodger). We don’t have any illusions that this trip will be a repeat. We are different, our boat is different, and our crew and considerations are different. And this time we are in it together from the planning stages–and we are open, eager, and excited to see exactly what is in store for us, and to document it here.

Design Review: Aquila 45 – A Pure-Bred Race Boat

Hill — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 02:00:39 +0000

Purebred animals many times are graceful creatures. Built to go achieve a certain goal, they often sacrifice a complete, well-rounded nature in pursuit of that goal. In many ways, the Reichel / Pugh designed Aquila 45 raceboat reflect similar goals. Her design is unambiguous: she is meant to go fast especially downhill, with a sail area to displacement ratio of over 35, Length to beam over 3.17, and a 10-foot draft. We saw her in Annapolis this past year, and she’s a fierce looking creature. Priced at $495k, the entry to this level of performance is just the beginning for a program these types of boats deserve and demand.

Naval designer Bob Perry has a review in Sail Magazine of this design.

This new Reichel/Pugh design is being built in China in a town called Foo Yang at a yard called Sino Eagle Leopard. One boat has been produced so far and they are targeting the racing market. I find this a very good-looking boat, and no doubt with that Reichel/Pugh pedigree it will be a very fast boat and a lot of fun to race.

The hull has been designed to rate well under a variety of rules including IRC. The D/L is 92.98 and the L/B is 3.17. There is a lot of beam aft as you will find in almost all modern high-performance boats. The sheer is not a dead straight line but it is very close to straight. I see about 3 inches of spring total. Maybe less. Overhang is minimal and I don’t have a waterline length but I estimate it at 40 feet 8 inches. Draft is 10 feet 2 inches with a long bulb on a short-chord, high-tensile steel fin with about a 13% thickness ratio. The rudder is a tapered blade with a squared off tip set well under the hull. There are no hollows in the entry and contrary to popular trends there is no chine aft. The section at the stern is arclike with a just a bit of flatness at the centerline.
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This would undoubtedly be an exciting boat to race. You’d have your hands full with that big rig, but if you are bored with 1.34 times the square root of the DWL this just might be the ride for you.

Two Men Rescued From Raceboat Off California

Hill — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 03:24:17 +0000

Two sailors are safe after heavy weather damaged the 68-foot Geraldton Western Australia raceboat, and injured the crew members. The vessel is competing in the Clipper Round The World Race. The wave came over the stern, knocking the crewman into the wheel, and sheering the pedestal. Conditions were gusting from 40 to 60 knots, with large waves. That’s the adventure they pay for, right?

CNN has more coverage:

After bad weather hindered earlier emergency efforts, two seriously injured sailors were safely on a boat off California’s coast Sunday evening — preparing to fly to San Francisco after their 67-foot racing yacht was damaged a day earlier by high seas, a Coast Guard official said.
Four members of the Geraldton Western Australia’s crew were injured Saturday in stormy weather as they sailed from China to San Francisco for a leg of what’s called the Clipper Round the World Race, race organizers said. The rest of the crew was described as “uninjured but shaken.”
Inclement conditions had hindered initial attempts to send a helicopter to the site, located about 270 miles west of San Francisco.
But by early Sunday evening, a rescue swimmer was in the water near the boat. Eventually, two of those hurt — identified by Coast Guard Fireman Jordan Akiyama as a 50-year-old woman and 67-year-old man — had been transferred to a small boat.

Read the rest of the article here.

Crash of the Week: Ocean Sailing

Hill — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 03:23:51 +0000

While not technically a crash, this is a great video of some of the incredible conditions aboard these submarines – I mean VOR sailboats. Amazing how much water they take over the boat. If you haven’t seen the Telefonica near-knockdown, definitely check that out too (see further down the page). Those guys are earning their paycheck on this leg.

J/70 Test Sail: First Report

Hill — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 03:20:41 +0000

The folks over at Sailing Anarchy have this report from an (obviously unbiased) Jboat dealer. He had a chance to take out the new J/70 in California. Still, if these numbers are accurate, it should be a fun ride.

I sailed on both boats last Thursday, invited along with the sailmakers and hardware guys to help evaluate sail sizes, rigging and set up for input to class rules. Pix herewith in no particular order.
Observations:
Wind was 10-12 then quickly built to 16 with a max of 18. I based the wind speed on the consensus of four professional sailors that were on board at the time. The boat cruises along nicely downwind in that breeze – between 12 and 14 knots of boat speed. I based that on my GPS which was in my pocket.
The boat feels very balanced with good bite on the helm. We were approaching the top end of the sails at 18 but both sets of upwind sails were made oversized and a little fuller than the boat wants, especially the jibs in my opinion. Once the sails get sorted, the boat will go upwind in 20+ very happily.

Downwind the boat was very easy to sail, the rudder is plenty big and the balance is right. At one point in time sailing up wind we just bore off with sails still in, not something you can do on a lot of boats these days. Al J. nailed the rig height, it will not change. Also got the keel weight correct, the boat is light and stiff.
The boat feels plenty stiff when you get on it at the dock, the sail controls are all in their normal positions forward of the helmsman, everything is easy to pull on. There is no hatch for the engine, it goes below deck. The new little electric motor, the Torqeedo, might be the best bet.
The lifelines are low. It is my understanding that you will be able to have legs out upwind under developing class rules. Sailing upwind heeled over, you could sit quite comfortably up on the high side. You won’t gastro-impale hike like you do on a M-24 – they planned it that way. Legs are in downwind, plenty of room in the cockpit.
We sailed with three on one boat and four on the other, the goal is to be similar in crew weight to an Etchells, three big or four small, your choice. Good times!

Rogue Wave Takes Down Telefonica

Hill — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 02:14:00 +0000

All I can say is wow. Technically not a rogue wave – but it sure looks like one. Two big wave hits, both captured on camera. In my mind, this is what a rogue wave experience is all about – one minute you’re sailing along with rough but manageable conditions, the next the boat is knocked down and you’re hanging on for dear life.

The Beautiful Sea

Hill — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 02:03:33 +0000

NASA has put together this truly beautiful compilation of time-lapse video over a two-year period. Built off a simulation engine, it demonstrates an exaggerated flow of the world’s oceans. Beautiful. I love the currents shown crossing the Indian Ocean – you can visually see the old trade routes quite clearly.

The Scientific Visualization Studio at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center created this beautiful animation called Perpetual Ocean which visualizes the ocean’s surface currents over a 30-month period between June 2005 and December 2007.

The animation was created using NASA and JPL’s high-resolution model of the global oceans, which is normally used for running simulations and predicting changes in the currents. But this time the results were exaggerated to produce this short film that looks like it sprang from a Vincent Van Gogh canvas. Once again Mother Nature, you’ve bested our most talented artists.