Blue Water Sailing May 2018

ANNUAL GUIDE TO SAFETY AT SEA

BLUE WATER

SAILING

SAFETY AT SEA

MOB DRILLS PFD HARNESSES MEDICAL KITS SEA STORIES

WESTERN CARIBBEAN KUNA YALA JUSTICE ENGINELESS MOORING MAJOR REFIT BWS BOAT REVIEW

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{ CONTENTS }

MAY 2018

18

32 32 Tech Report

The 200,000-Mile Refit of Mahina Tiare

18 Classic Passage

Cruising Guide to the Caribbean

For a change of pace, spend a winter cruising from Florida to the Western Caribbean and back. Here’s how

by Bill Weigel

One of the most well-traveled cruising boats on the planet, Mahina Tiare sails to Sweden to a complete two-year refit of all her major systems, plus new teak decks

by John Neal

36 Safety at Sea

24 Living Aboard

36 Man Overboard

by BWS Staff

A Hard Night in the Caribbean

Engine trouble forced them to moor under sail...in the dark and 20 knots of wind

by Joanna Hutchinson

42 Personal Locator Beacons Save Lives

by BWS Staff

45 Personal Flotation Devices with Integrated Harnesses

by BWS Staff

48 On Board Medical Kits y George Day

b

28 28 Cruising Life

50

Antonio’s Forbidden Coconut

In the San Blas Islands, a group of cruisers encounter law and order Kuna Yala-style

by Patrick Childress

50 Blue Water Boats

Leopard 50: Luxury Afloat

DEPARTMENTS 6 8 14 54 4

Captain’s Log Blue Water Dispatches Biewenga Offshore Chandlery

59 63 64 66

The new Leopard 50 is destined to be one of the most popular mid-size family cruisers in the multihull market

by George Day Charter & Sailing Schools Brokerage Cover photo: Mahina Tiare crew member, Classifieds Peixi, working at sea Photo: Mahina Expeditions Broad Reaching-Andy Cross

BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

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{ CAPTAIN’SLOG }

BLUE WATER

Safe Sailing is No Accident SAILING

A

s we get into late spring and the change of the seasons, skippers everywhere are preparing for passages as they change their cruising grounds for the summer. Some will be heading home from Mexico and the Caribbean. Some will be heading across the Atlantic to Europe. Some will be heading to Hawaii or Alaska. While there is inherent risk in blue water sailing, there are established things all safe and prudent skippers keep in mind. Here’s my list.

Make sure the rig and sails are sound. If you are not experienced inspecting your mast, boom, rig and sails, then it makes good sense to hire a rigger to inspect the rig and a sailmaker to go over your sails.

Equip the boat with spares for all essential equipment from the lowliest bilge pump to the brains of the autopilot. Remember that if you can’t repair something essential out there, you will have to live without it. Redundancy is a sailor’s best friend.

Focus on safety. That means have all of the alphabet gear on board, running and registered. These include, EPIRBs, PLBs, PFDs, AIS, MOMs, RADAR, SSB or SATCOMs and VHFs as well as an inspected life raft, flares, Lifesling and jacklines.

Prepare the crew. If you sail as a couple, make sure both of you are up to speed on all of the skills you will need if you have to recover your partner from the water. And, make sure both of you can hand, reef and steer and use all of the communications equipment. Also, physical fitness counts for a lot. If you sail with a larger crew, sail your boat together and run through all of the essential boat handling maneuvers.

Be weather wise. Choose your season for passagemaking carefully. Know in advance the likely weather patterns you will face. Choose a weather window that gives you a good head start. Subscribe to a weather service for daily forecasts. Be cautious but know that you will have bad weather and be ready for it.

Have plans B and C. Things do go wrong and plans sometimes have to change. Make sure you have the charts and guides on board for any bail-out islands or harbors you may need to visit when your primary destination is no longer an option.

Eat well and have fun. Plan for any birthdays, anniversaries or special days that will take place during the offshore passage. Plan for a few special dinners to break up the routine and to have events to look forward to. Make sure there are plenty of good books and movies on board for crew down time.

Don’t be a sheep. Don’t get bogged down by the herd mentality and don’t wait for other skippers to make up their minds about weather windows, routes or landfalls. It is your boat, your passage, your decisions. Make them cautiously but confidently.

And, if the situation changes, change your plans.

And here’s our hope for you to have fair winds and following seas.

If you are prudent and prepare well, the chances of having a safe, fun and fast passage are greatly enhanced.

6

photo by Bill Kund

Volume 23, Number 4 Blue Water Sailing, LLC 747 Aquidneck Avenue, Suite 201 Middletown, Rhode Island 02842 - USA phone: 401.847.7612 • fax: 401.845.8580 web: www.bwsailing.com SUBSCRIBER HOTLINE 866-529-2921

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BLUE WATER SAILING • May

2018

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The Terrifically Terrible Tether

T

e hardest part about having an adventurous spirit is the inevitable aloneness that accompanies it.

I’m not just talking about the physical aloneness felt by a distance through-hiker or a solo sailor. I’m also talking about the mental aloneness ingrained in all of us who fall off the beaten path in search of a new horizon. We isolate ourselves with concerns of preparation, while our friends and family members attempt to engage us deeper into their lives. Even sitting around the Christmas tree, exchanging the year's gifts with loved ones, some of us are already imagining the next adventure to come. Our homes become mere meeting places where friends and family stop by to catch a glimpse before we set out again leaving them behind to indulge in normal 8

Taking the road less traveled by sailboat by Edward Hubbard earthly activities without us. Sometimes mothers cry, and sometimes friends seem to resent the fact that we are leaving, all while telling us things like “have fun out there” or, the majority favorite, “be safe”. In my recent years of travel no one has ever said “don’t forget your foul weather gear”.

As I’ve progressed as a sailor the goodbyes get harder, and as strange as it may sound, it gets more and more difficult to come back to the “real world”. When I return from a long trip on my sailboat I’m always excited to see my family and friends but within a few days my mind begins to prepare for a new goal, and I can’t wait to get back out on the water, pull my sails, and head for the horizon. To some this sounds playful or even selfish

but to those of us who have this incredible drive to defy the norm, to face the uncertain, to test ourselves, and to create new wakes, instead of following those made by the masses, we know that there is a force within us telling us “go” and that the power of that force is undeniable.

When I bought my first sailboat, a small Venture 22, I was quickly met by others with skepticism and fear. Even pulling the old boat home, shortly after purchasing it, I was asked by a total stranger at a gas station, “does that thang float?”

Many more questions would follow from that day forward along with advice from those who knew a “guy who owned a sailboat once”.

The dangers of a sailboat would pile up to terrifying heights as BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

Loosening the ties from land

other predictions of all the “work” involved were stacked like bricks in a wall, preventing me from accomplishing my goal. Once I began to sail, those walls were easily diminished and when I didn’t die after the first full weekend of sailing the concerns of others for my safety turned to curiosity. Buying a boat instantly separates you from the main pack, and buying a sailboat puts you into an even smaller group. But the separation doesn’t end there. The difference is something internal, and it’s something other people seem to fear or at least not understand. It’s the idea that you might one day sail away on your boat, and never return, or that somehow you're opting out of a lifestyle they have so much invested in.

Early one Friday morning in the month of October I was preparing for my longest journey to date. My living room was a physical inventory checklist.

Backpacks and boxes littered the floor. A backup outboard motor lay in the hallway just behind the front door. Jerry cans and coolers sat on the porch welcoming any passerby. I was steadily rolling over every box and bag making sure everything was accounted for. I had already said my goodbyes to family and friends the day before, and that night we had burned

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some meat on the grill and had a few cold beers. The mood that evening was of someone going on a vacation, but in my mind it was anything but a holiday. The trip would take me, in a 1981 Hunter 25, some 640 miles from Tennessee to southern Alabama through a narrow system of waterways, and would not provide the most

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relaxing experience. Preparing for the trip was like a marathon. Gathering the necessary groceries and supplies for the expected month long “getaway” was an activity I did not associate with the word vacation. Most folks headed to Disney World don’t have to think about 30 days worth of meals ahead of time or take backup motors with them on the cartoon themed roller coaster rides careening through the Magic Kingdom. After packing all the bags and boxes into every available space in my car, with outboard motor riding shotgun, I locked up my house and took a final look.

The fall morning air was cool and tranquil. A feeling swept over me as I sat behind the steering wheel and prepared to disembark. It was the feeling of being alone. The next five weeks this feeling would give way to the magnificent hues of every sunrise and sunset. Egrets and coots would prove to be en10

tertaining guests but poor conversationists. On a few occasions, when I had cell phone service, I would make a call to a friend or family member to let them know my location and general status. I spent a lot of time just enjoying the beauty of the natural world. I cooked simple meals, took naps, read books, and even worked on trying to write my own. My body and soul synchronized with the gentle rhythm of the world, and for the first time I felt truly satisfied. As my journey came to an end a new feeling emerged.

It was a feeling of resurrection. I was coming back to life, back to a world of time and hustle. Back to what I knew, and away from what I wanted to understand. One part of me was excited and anxious to see familiar faces. Another part of me desperately wanted to continue to

remain in the timeless, rolling spaces that reside at the end of the ever stretching tether.

After a nine hour car ride I returned to my home to find it still and empty. Once again my floors were filled with boxes and bags of various sizes containing the leftover supplies, and dirty clothes from my long “vacation”.

It felt good to be home, and I marveled at the standard appliances one would find in most domestic settings. I began stuffing clothes and blankets into the washing machine, popping bowels of chili in the microwave, and nearly fell over from that feeling of the boat still in BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

my legs when I took a hot shower. That night I found my bed uncomfortable, and ended up sleeping on the floor. The following morning friends were stopping by early and eager to hear stories from my adventure.

Again questions and curiosities ruled the dialogue for the next few days, and as I settled back into the pace of life on land, I once again found myself alone, cut off by thoughts of a simpler life on water, unable to immerse myself back into the rhythms of daily life.

Life on a boat can be rough and dirty. The conveniences of land are few, and most of the time found in a metal can, but are outweighed by the simplicity and beauty of a life on water. Gaining a closer look at the laws of nature and the organic consequences that come along with them, change the way we view the world. We learn from our mistakes or we sink. We make life easier one adjustment at a time, and find quiet accomplishment in solving our own problems.

When we face our fears, we disillusion ourselves by seeing the reality that mile markers can, in fact, be passed and oceans crossed. We become one with the world, and when we do that we realize we are never alone, and we understand that everyone is alone.

This contradiction is part of the human condition.

It’s why we return and it’s why we leave the ones we love behind. No particular words in any particular order will ever be able to fully explain the calling that adventurers feel in their hearts. But those who take a chance, those who believe, who put tillers and helms and paddles in their hands, and hulls under their feet, in order to seek a life in motion, are usually met by that same indescribable but universal feeling which provides a wanted reply to that potent longing in our soul. It’s the reason we sail. And once touched by it, it becomes the reason we live. BWS

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Volvo Ocean Race Stops in U.S. to Huge Crowds

T

e Volvo Ocean Race is a unique sailing event. It’s one of the longest and toughest regattas in the world and, at the same time, it is also a very successful international marketing event for Volvo and the other sponsors.

The VOR made only one stop in North America when it sailed into Newport, RI just before dawn on May 8 for a 12 days stopover.

The race for the line in Leg 8 from Brazil to Newport was amazingly close; and the Spanish yacht Mapfre was able to pip Team Brunel at the post and after 15 days of hard racing took line honors by 61 seconds. The rest of the sevenboat fleet arrived within the next few hours.

That there were hundreds of Newporters and race fans at the docks and dozens of boats out on the water to greet the fleet is a 12

solid testimony to how passionate sailors from this part of the world truly are. It was a cold, foggy, almost windless dawn but the hard core fans stuck it out until the end.

Charlie Enright, co-skipper of Vestus 11th Hour Racing is a Rhode Island native and knows what the local sailing crowds are made of. “It’s been an unbelievable stopover here in Newport with all the support we’ve had,” he said, on the last day of the stopover. “Newport has shown its true colors this week, it’s been astounding.”

With the boats lined up at Newport's Ft. Adams and with the back drop of the U.S. Coast Guard’s tall ship Eagle right behind them, the scene was set for a 12-day party and celebration of all things nautical and all things Volvo.

The VOR in 2018 is making 11 stops around the world and will cover more than 45,000 sea miles.

Volvo images@ Ainhoa Sanchez/Volvo Ocean Race

At each stop, the sponsors set up a complete VOR village of prefab structures that are shipped in containers around the world. There are in fact two identical villages so they can leap frog each other from one venue to the next. The boats are headed next to Cardiff, Wales, and there the crowds will gather in the village that had been shipped from Brazil. The village in Newport will next be erected in Gothenburg, Sweden.

There was a lot to do, see and imbibe at the VOR village. You could check out the latest and greatest Volvo models or play with a back hoe on display. You could check out Omega’s watches and try on Musto foul weather gear.

One of the central themes for this year’s race is the scourge of plastic pollution in the world’s oceans.

The boats are taking water samples around the world and one of the boats, Turn the Tide on Plastic, skippered by Dee Caffari and with an all-youth crew, carries that theme on it’s transom.

While in Newport, Volvo hosted BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

Salty Dawg Sailing Association Update THE Salty Dawg Sailing Association has a lot going on for East Coast cruisers over the next six months..

Here’s the 2018 SDSA Schedule: July 7: Southern Chesapeake Rendezvous. Hampton Yacht Club, Hampton, VA. July 8: Rally to Maine Departure from the Chesapeake Bay. (If you cannot join the Rally to Maine, you might like to know that the Ocean Cruising Club has invited Salty Dawgs to sign up for the OCC Southern New England Cruise, July 1-15. Go to www.oceancruisingclub.org for more information.)

July 12: Newport Rendezvous, Jamestown, RI, during the layover in the Rally to Maine.

July 13: Rally to Maine Departure from Dutch Harbor, RI. July 18: Downeast Rendezvous, Rockland Yacht Club, Rockland, ME. July 18 to 22: Salty Dawg Maine Mini-Cruise.

August 8: Rally to Nova Scotia Departure, Rockland Harbor, ME. August 25: Upper Chesapeake Bay Rendezvous, Bodkin Creek, MD October 3: “Essentials of Blue Water Sailing” Seminar, Annapolis, MD October 4: Annapolis Rendezvous, Annapolis, MD October 31: Halloween Rendezvous, Blue Water Yachting Center, Hampton, VA November 3: Fall Rally to the Caribbean Departure, Blue Water Yachting Center, Hampton, VA. For more information. www.saltydawgsailing.org.

Jesus Renedo/Volvo Ocean Race

an Ocean Summit to discuss plastic pollution in the oceans and at that meeting Volvo CEO Martin Lundstedt announced that the international company was removing all single-use plastic from its offices and showrooms to be replaced with sustainable, environmentally friendly products.

The Volvo fleet put on three days of inshore racing that thrilled the fans. The Volvo 65s are amazing ocean sailing machines capable of sailing at 30 knots of more. Seen up close, the power and speed in these boats is awesome.

The fleet set sail for Wales on Sunday May 20 for the run across the North Atlantic. It is 3,300 miles and the teams expect to finish in eight or nine days. Check out the VOR at volvooceanrace.com. BWS

{ BILLBIEWENGA }

Problems come in assorted flavors.

When they strike your steering system, you need to have a backup plan that will work. Lashing the head door to the spinnaker pole is not among them

M

any years ago on a delivery from the east coast of the U.S. to the Caribbean, I was engaged to move a small ketch to the BVI. The boat had recently undergone a professional survey that had failed to spot a number of problems.

14

One was the undersized packing around the prop shaft. Another was the aged and cracking rubber bellows in the emergency bilge pumps, and another was the lack of hydraulic pressure in the steering system. By the time we stopped in Bermuda, we had discovered those problems and more. I can now look back on that experience and testify

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Steering By Any Other Means

to the fact that whatever doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger… or perhaps wiser… or perhaps more neurotic. In any case, there are quite a few things that deserve checking prior to departure, and when considering hydraulic steering systems, knowing that the hydraulic steering holds pressure and doesn’t leak is among them.

Having replacement fluid and a means by which to fill the reservoir while offshore is another.

That, of course is only one of many possible afflictions that can strike your steering system. Those types of problems don’t happen often, but there is a wide array of possible problems. Ultimately, you need to have backup plans. Any BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

{ OFFSHORE }

and all steering systems can fail.

This is not meant to raise alarm.

They are usually extremely reliable, lasting for years with few if any problems. It is meant to raise awareness. Because they are so reliable, we seldom think about steering systems until they become a huge problem. At that point, you dearly wish you had given your trusty steering system more thought. Backup plans for steering should be part of that thought process.

SOLUTIONS TO STEERING ISSUES My first alternative when suddenly confronting a wheel that no longer steers the boat is to turn on the autopilot. That may solve the problem at least temporarily while determining the real cause of the problem. Cables might be temporarily replaceable with high-tensile line like Spectra or Vectran. If the autopilot is connected to the quadrant and the quadrant fails, you may need to go to an emergency or jury rigged steering system.

Forget the idea of tying the head door to the spinnaker pole; that’s a fairy tale that ends badly. Unless you have a machine shop onboard, you won’t be able to fabricate the gudgeons and other pieces necessary to hold that configuration together in a seaway.

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Trimming your sails to achieve a particular direction will be tricky to say the least. Of course it will help with whatever solution you decide upon. It’s highly unlikely that you will be able to steer your boat solely relying upon sail trim, but loads will be eased and your jury rig will perform better. In the meantime, you can heave to, slowing the boat to a crawl while you put your plan into effect.

With a failed autopilot while singlehanding a monohull with tiller steering, I’ve used bungee cord to balance the tiller, over-trimming the headsail and properly trimming the main. The boat would alternately pinch into the wind and subsequently fall off when I left the system alone. When I could, I hand steered merely by overriding the bungee cord. The boat zigzagged, but the system allowed me to eat or grab a few minutes of sleep as I lurched my way for 3 days and 600 miles to complete a passage across the North Atlantic.

Mike Birch, at one time the top offshore sailor in France, used a somewhat different method to temporarily control his 90' catamaran. He tied and placed several buckets on each side of the boat.

When he needed to steer to port, he dropped one or two buckets over the side on the left of the boat, slowing that side more than

15

starboard. It worked, despite its lack of elegance.

BEST PRACTICE Perhaps the best way I’ve found to assist steering in an emergency is using directionally controllable warps. I’ve used them in the Southern Ocean, and one friend of mine used the same system to steer his sloop 1,000 miles to England when his rudder failed. In order to visualize the system, think of a line run from one winch aft to another winch aft, around the back of the boat, outside of the backstay and everything else. In the middle of that line you have tied a loop prior to deploying that line in order to create a bridle. From that loop in the middle you have tied several dock lines which will trail behind your boat. The dock lines are your

The best way I’ve found to assist steering in an emergency is using directionally controllable warps

warps, and if you would like to further reduce speed or use fewer warps, you can tie overhand knots every couple of feet in the warps. With the original bridle mounted on winches, you can now adjust the position of the loop (and trailing warps) behind your boat. That will steer your boat or slow it down in heavy weather conditions. I’ve offered that solution to one crew on their way to the Virgin Islands.

With 500 miles remaining in their journey, they were happy to find how well it worked. It’s a system that takes about 20 minutes to create and doesn’t require any tools or equipment other than a few lines.

It would be worth trying during your spring shakedown cruise.

AN ELEGANT SOLUTION An even more elegant solution to emergency steering has been developed and described by a friend of mine, Mike Keyworth.

Formerly a very experienced Maxi captain and a boatyard manager for Brewer’s Yacht Yards, Mike removed the rudder in his Swan 44, Chasseur and experimented with how best to use a Galerider drogue to effectively steer in a variety of

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• May 2018

wind directions and strengths.

They attempted to control their heading using sail trim alone, motoring with various sizes of drogues, and sailing both upwind and downwind with the drogue. A variety of sail combinations were tested, and they experimented with how best to position the drogue.

An important aspect of the testing proved to be the size of the drogue.

The 12" drogue provided no directional stability. The 18" drogue was marginal in winds less than 10 knots, and the 30" drogue proved effective in all wind speeds tested, as did the 36" model, although the larger drogue also added more drag, reducing boat speed more significantly.

The results of his experiments have been video recorded, and that video is available for free on You-

Tube. (See: https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=vupIl68mCYg) I would strongly urge you to watch the video, and perhaps include it as part of a crew brainstorming session to discuss and consider ways to prepare yourselves for an emergency steering situation. It’s better to think about these things over pizza and beer than in the heat of the moment.

Of course all boats are different and will react differently in a variety of conditions. The best way to get to know your own boat is to experiment with it, perhaps lashing the wheel and rudder to centerline and attempting to steer using alternate means. We’re all easily lulled into complacency, but getting home safely requires vigilance and awareness. There can always be the rare and unforeseen

events such as a collision or rudder failure. You need to be prepared for those rare circumstances since your safety and the safety of those aboard may depend on it. Simple, regular inspection and maintenance of your steering system can be priceless and will help you to avoid most of the problems associated with steering systems’ cables, hydraulics and the other elements in the system.

Problem avoidance is preferable to problem solving. But when the wheel spins lock to lock without a response, steering by another means may be the only way to provide you with a way home. BWS Bill Biewenga is a navigator, delivery skipper and weather router. His websites are www.weather4sailors. com. He can be contacted at billbiewenga@cox.net

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{ CLASSICPASSAGE }

Cruising Guide to the

Western Caribbean

F

or U.S. east coast cruisers looking to extend their cruising experience beyond the Bahamas, a Western Caribbean cruise offers an adventurous alternative to the more common Eastern Caribbean destinations such as the BVI and Windward Islands. My favorite Western Caribbean route includes the Bahamas, Cayman Islands, Honduran Bay Islands, Belize and Mexico.

For those with a bit more time, Cuba and Jamaica are also convenient to this route. One of the greatest aspects of this itinerary is 18

For a change of pace, spend a winter cruising from Florida to the Western Caribbean and back.

Here’s how by Bill Weigel that most of this sailing route takes advantage of favorable winds and currents. This is a key difference between this Western Caribbean route via the “Thornless Path” of traveling upwind from the Bahamas to the BVI via Turks and Cacaos, Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico. That can be a real slog.

DEPARTING THE BAHAMAS Georgetown, Bahamas, with its proximity to the Windward Passage, offers a good starting point for the Western Caribbean. Skipper and crew wait for a period of light winds from the northeast and steer a course directly for the western end of Great Inagua Island. ExitBLUE WATER SAILING

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ing Georgetown via Hog Key Cut to the southeast of Georgetown is a neat little adventure. Vessels with six feet of draft or less can use this short cut.

Alternatively, you may sail around the north end of Long Island and then steer southeast to the same waypoint at the Western End of Great Inagua. We did not make landfall on Great Inagua but used this as a waypoint before steering toward the Windward Passage just east of Cuba. We know boats that have stopped at Matthew Town on Great Inagua. It is possible to clear out with Bahamas customs and immigration at Matthew Town.

Once you have cleared the southeast corner of Cuba, the passage to Grand Cayman is an easy downwind run in the prevailing trade winds. For much of this leg of the trip, you glide along the south coast of Cuba approximately five to 10 miles offshore. If

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someone wanted to enjoy a stop in Cuba, Santiago, Cuba is an official point of entry and an easy diversion from the rhumb line to Grand Cayman.

Or, if someone wanted to make a stop in Jamaica, Port Antonio or Montego Bay are just 60 miles south of the course to Cayman Islands. Our passage from Georgetown, Bahamas, directly to George

Town, Grand Cayman, took 5 days.

For much of the passage we were on a very broad reach or sailing wing and wing. For our passage, the winds were less than 15 knots with seas less than three feet for most of the trip.

GRAND CAYMAN Grand Cayman is a wonderful island to visit. Although the

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{ CLASSICPASSAGE }

island has a bustling cruise ship port and numerous resort hotels, it remains quite accommodating to cruisers. Clearing customs is easy at the port of George Town.

The offices are Camana Bay, Grand Cayman located right on the waterfront and an officer an easy walk to a major discount will guide you to the different grocery store. For an experience offices – Immigration, Customs, that is truly unique in the Westand Port Authority. There are ern Caribbean, we tied up at the free moorings right at the port of Camana Bay Yacht Basin. The George Town and a secure dinghy cost was less than a mooring on dock. A wonderful Kirklands gro- the U.S. east coast. Camana Bay cery store is walking distance from is much like Coconut Grove with shopping, restaurants, a movie the dinghy dock.

For boats drawing seven feet or theater, and the best gelato in the less, North Sound offers settled Caribbean. For a polar opposite anchorages and a variety of places experience, we traveled across to visit. One of the best all-around North Sound to the seclusion of anchorages is in Governor’s Creek. the Kaibo anchorage and enjoyed The entrance is easy and we went snorkeling off Rum Point. in and out several times never seeing less than eight feet of water. We HONDURAS After clearing out of the Caypreferred to anchor just inside near the Cayman Islands Yacht Club. man Islands, you again sail downFrom here it is an easy dinghy ride up a canal to the back side of Seven Mile Beach or ashore to the restaurants near the Yacht Club.

We a l s o took a couple of trips with Alembic through the canals to a wonderful quiet basin that is Guanaja anchorage, Honduras 20

wind for two and half days and will find y o u r s e l f o ff Guanaja, 25 miles northeast of Roatan, Honduras.

Guanaja is a great place to start your Bay Island experience and an easy destination to enjoy. A unique aspect of the place is that the majority of the population lives on the small island that sits one mile south of the main island. Over 4,000 people live on this small island in the town of Bonacca. Helpful ambassadors will meet you at the dinghy dock and guide you through the immigration and customs process.

Fees are minimal and the authorities are helpful and pleasant. The ambassadors are happy to receive a $10 tip for their services.

After clearing in, enjoying a cold beer in one of the small bars, shopping, and exploring the busy small town of Bonacca you will want to move over to El Bight Bay to anchor among the other cruisers and enjoy this tranquil setting.

Ashore there is a delightful walk to several different restaurants as well as an adventurous hike to the peak of the island.

A short dinghy ride from the anchorage are wonderful reefs for snorkeling and fishing.

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Roatan is an easy daysail downwind from Guanaja. The Frenchman’s Cay area offers both an excellent anchorage behind the reef as well as a welcoming marina.

From here it is an easy walk or short cab ride to a modern grocery store for provisioning. It is also an easy place to arrange transportation to other areas of the island.

Roatan can be a bit hectic. After a short visit here, the mellow vibe of Utila is a short daysail farther west. Utila has a wonderful anchorage right off the main village, which is an eclectic destination for divers and young travelers. It is an excellent place to find whale sharks during the season and several reefs are a short dinghy ride from the anchorage. Restaurants are inexpensive and it is a handy place to provision especially for beer and wine before traveling to Belize. Don’t miss the authentic

French crepes from the small creperie on Main Street. Clearing out of immigration and customs is also very easy to complete in Utila.

BELIZE From Utila, the offshore Belizean atoll of Glover’s Reef is just 60 miles to the northwest. We chose to leave Utila at about 2200 hours in the evening and sail overnight so we could arrive at Glover’s Reef in the morning with the sun high enough to navigate through the entrance to the atoll. Leaving the anchorage at Utila in the dark can be a bit dodgy. If you save an incoming track on your chartplotter, following this track on departure can give you some peace of mind.

The channel into Glover’s Reef is easily followed in good light. The entrance on the south end of the atoll is wide and calm and a wonderful anchorage lies just inside

this southern entrance through the reef. This anchorage offers a delightful sense of all Belize cruising has to offer. The reefs are healthy and are teaming with fish of many species. Spear fishing is allowed on the southern edge of the reef, while the reefs in the conservation zone offer spectacular viewing.

From Glover’s it is best to sail

Belize dive shop, Mayan ruins above www.bwsailing.com

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{ CLASSICPASSAGE } Belizean fisherman

Placencia, Belize

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directly to Placentia to complete the clearance process. Clearing into Belize at Placentia is actually an enjoyable adventure. Captain and crew pack up the ship’s papers and passports and walk through town to the Hokey Pokey water taxi to Mango Creek. Upon landing at Mango Creek, hop into any taxi and the driver will transport and direct you through the different offices you need to visit in Big Creek including: Immigration, Agriculture, Port Officer, and Customs.

Although, there may be a short wait at one or two of these stops, the officials are always courteous and friendly.

While you are in Mango Creek, ask the taxi driver to take you to one of the local restaurants for breakfast or lunch. The last time I cleared into Belize, I took the first boat in the morning from Placentia and had time for breakfast before the immigration office opened.

I had a wonderful breakfast in a small local place. Eggs fresh from the chicken coop out back and fried jack, a Belizean specialty.

After completing clearance and provisioning in Placentia, you are off to the many cays along the barrier reef that runs the length of Belize. In total, we have spent over 10 weeks cruising Belize and there are still numerous cays and anchorages that we have not explored! If necessary, you can easily cruise from Placentia to Belize City in one week with a short sail each day and a fresh anchorage each night.

We find Belize is a wonderful place to host guests. You can either meet them in Placentia or Belize City and share a wonderful week of unique sailing, snorkeling, and dining. We have spent time in the BVI as well as Belize. Our experience is that Belize tops the BVI as a destination for sailing in sheltered www.bwsailing.com

waters surrounded by amazing reefs and other natural wonders.

There are also plenty of beach bars to enjoy sundowners or an occasional meal ashore.

HOMEWARD BOUND Once your time in Belize comes to an end, it is time to start heading north to Mexico or the U.S.A. As for Mexico, El Cid Marina in Puerto Morelos or Isla Mujeres are both an easy overnight sail. Once you near Cozumel, the favorable Yucatan current kicks in at nearly two knots. With prevailing easterlies trade winds, this sail is typically an exhilarating close reach.

Mexico offers a great place to breakup the trip back to the USA. Clearing in and out, however, can be a bit tedious. Our experience is that it is worth using an agent.

They are well worth the $50 cost for this service.

Whether leaving directly from Belize or from Mexico, the trip back to Florida will be the toughest part of the overall trip. With the right weather, heading straight to Key West or the Dry Tortugas is the preferred route. One year we made the trip from Belize City to the

Dry Tortugas in just over 72 hours traveling just south of a front that pushed out the prevailing easterly trades. Another year, we left Isla Mujeres and sailed for southwest Florida closehauled in settled easterlies. We made our landfall in Fort Myers after three and a half days on a single tack. Both of these passages were good for building our experience with sailing close to the wind and managing currents that flowed in variable directions along the passage.

Your return to U.S.A. will close the loop of your western Caribbean cruise. You will have visited a number of new cruising destinations that will expand your horizons beyond the more commonly cruised waters of the Bahamas and Lesser Antilles. You will also have logged over 2,000 nautical miles and built your confidence and experience for other cruising adventures. BWS Bill Weigel and his wife Helen have been full time cruisers since 2015.

They have spent two winters in the western Caribbean sailing back to Maine each summer. This summer they plan an Atlantic crossing on their Whitby 42 ketch Alembic.Â

Homeward bound, Warderick Wells, Bahamas

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{ LIVINGABOARD }

A Hard Night In The Caribbean

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Engine trouble forced them to moor under sail…in the dark and 20 knots ofby Joanna windHutchinson

t had been a long day. We’d begun the 90-mile sail from Tortola in the BVIs to Saba shortly after breakfast. The wind had been blowing the predicted force five from ENE, and we’d spent the day close hauled with waves assaulting us from two different directions. It’d been a pretty wild ride and after 15 hours out on the water we were all looking forward to our arrival and a good night’s sleep.

It was close to midnight when we approached the southwest shore of Saba in darkness and 24

headed towards a cluster of anchor lights where we hoped to find a mooring for the night. We furled our jib, turned on the engine and started to prepare a mooring line and search light. Three miles from the coast the noise of the engine suddenly faded and died. Our hearts sank. Our engine was usually so reliable, but without it now we realized we might have a long night ahead of us.

We dropped the mainsail to slow down and give ourselves time to check the main fuel tank. It was as we’d feared: empty. We lifted

up the floorboards in the saloon to attach a fuel pump so we could transfer diesel from our second tank to the main one. The pump died. Hunting around in the dark, stress levels increased as the land looming in front of us grew closer.

Fortunately, it was just a blown fuse which was easy enough to replace and the pumping resumed... but not for long. Our second tank was also empty. How could we have let this happen? I was sure we’d had more fuel. I felt so annoyed with myself for not checking. We had two reserve fuel canisBLUE WATER SAILING

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ters buried deep under the cockpit with another 10 gallons of fuel in total, but it would take a while to dig them out so we decided to try picking up the mooring under sail first. We were a sailboat after all, and with a crew of nine we had plenty of hands on deck.

Our boat Pantagruel is a 50-foot, 22 tonne, long keel classic wooden yawl built in 1920. Sailing her on and off moorings in the middle of the night in 20 knot winds, in an unfamiliar location, is not something we practice very often. We sailed slowly towards the moorings using just our mizzen and staysail, which we furled in and out in order to approach at the right speed. We located a suitable buoy with our search light, and a long-armed crew member positioned himself on the foredeck ready for action.

Once the buoy was in reach, he lunged with the boat hook for the pick-up line attached, lifting it out of the water. It was not to be, the end of the boathook snapped off under the strain and we drifted slowly away.

In a moment of inspiration the owner and skipper, Micha, switched to the second fuel filter and tried to start the engine once more. Miraculously, it sprang to life just long enough for us to motor back to a good approach position before it died again.

Knowing this could be our last chance, Micha crouched down on the toe rail and grabbed hold of the top of mooring with his hands.

At the same moment the staysail unfurled itself and began to propel the boat forwards too fast for him to hold on. Could anything else go wrong?!

We sailed away in the opposite direction before trying to tack back around to try picking up the mooring again. There was some www.bwsailing.com

current against us and with our reduced sail area we couldn’t get enough speed to turn through the wind and soon realized this was not going to be an easy task. We weren’t keen to hoist more sail as the moorings were so close to the land and the wind was gusty.

Deflated, we hove to, drifted slowly back out to sea and dug out the spare fuel canisters. Once new fuel was in the tank (and all over the deck) we restarted the engine. It wouldn’t start. After a few more tries we decided the filters must be blocked and gave up before we drained the batteries completely.

Disappointment and exhaustion were written over everyone’s face as the reality of the situation sunk

in. At 50 meters, it was too deep to anchor here, plus our anchor winch was electric and we didn’t feel comfortable taking any risks now that the battery voltage was so low. If we couldn’t pick up a mooring here we’d have to sail 20 miles further on to the next island Statia to find an easier anchorage there in daylight.

Blocked primary fuel filter

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{ LIVINGABOARD } Secondary fuel filter

As a last resort for getting some sleep that night we made for different moorings further around the coast to the south of the island. We sailed in silence, all eyes scanning the water, until our searchlight reflected a new buoy and we aimed slowly for it. We were on target when a gust came and blew us straight past.

Not willing to give up yet we Searching for moorings along the coast

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patiently sailed back against the wind to position ourselves to try again. We lined ourselves up, took it slow and arrived almost stationary next to the buoy. I didn’t want to risk us not being able to get the mooring line onboard.

I took off my life jacket, attached a rope to myself and the boat and jumped into the water (something I would have thought twice about had we been sailing in Scotland!).

I tried to examine the mooring in the dark and handed the pick-up line to the crew onboard. It was broken!

This was such bad luck I thought miserably scrambling about in the water to see if there was another solution. Micha spotted another rope underneath me and I ducked down to try to reach it.

This was the right line! I handed it up to the outstretched hands of

our crew who hurriedly thread our mooring line through it’s eye and tied it securely on deck.

Finally, the end of our night was in sight.

The next morning, we checked the main fuel tank and realized we’d made a mistake, it was still half full. It’d been hard to see that in the dark and with the boat rolling we had completely misjudged things. Instead of beAttempting to pick up a mooring under sail

ing out of fuel, the problem was that the outlet of the tank and the filters had been blocked with sediment. It’d been three years since we had cleaned the tanks and the bumpy ride down from the BVI had stirred up the dirt.

We now had no choice but to pump the fuel back out and spend the day giving our tanks a good clean! At least we had clear turquoise water to jump in once we’d

finished. We replaced the filters and the engine growled back to life. It was like hearing the voice of an old friend. We set sail for Statia silently vowing to maintain our tanks better in future and we are thankful that this happened in the relatively calm warm waters of the Caribbean. BWS Joanna Hutchinson grew up on the outskirts of London, completed a

PhD in mathematical physics in Bristol and worked as a scientific researcher in Australia, India and Japan. She started sailing intensively six years ago and finished a RYA yachtmaster last summer.

She is currently on a circumnavigation aboard the classic wooden yawl Pantagruel in honor of her 100th birthday! You can follow our journey on our website www. sypantagruel.com”

{ CRUISINGLIFE }

Antonio’s Forbidden Coconut

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hy would an Italian single hander know anything about coconuts laying on the ground in the San Blas Islands?

They litter the flat sandy islands by the hundreds and like brown colored leaves in the fall, the large nuts and fallen tropical branches look to be a nuisance no one cares to kick into a pile and burn.

We were a flotilla of four sailboats that watched our anchors 28

In the San Blas Islands, a group of cruisers encounter law and order Kuna Yala-style by Patrick Childress

bury into the sand near Port Obaldia, one of at least 365 islands in Kuna Yala in the San Blas Islands along the north coast of Panama.

My friends on the second Italian boat Ghibli, with brothers Leonardo and Max, had their hands full dealing with their excited small black dog, Imanez, who was wound up and bouncing at the sight and terrestrial scents and the need for an unrestricted run.

With the third Italian boat and a fourth French boat, both skippered by singlhanders, we all conferred;

we organized an excursion to stay far away from the village, which we knew was out of sight, just around a bend in the shore. We would walk along the fine white ribbon surrounding a forest of bushy headed coconut palms where there were no signs of humans.

On the way back to our beached dinghies, Leonardo and Max thought it would be a tropical food gathering experience to pick up two brown coconuts and work through the challenge of opening the sturdy layers, digging into the BLUE WATER SAILING

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edible white part, and drink the liquid we could hear shaking on the inside. Since they had no nut opening tools on their boat, they put the two nuts in my dinghy as we would eventually meet in the evening at my boat and see what damage we could do to the fibrous husks with my sharp machete.

After half an hour, three squat, solid shouldered, Kuna men paddled a long log, roughly hewn on the inside to form a canoe, along side my sailboat. The men were composed and friendly when they replied to my question about anchoring around the corner in front of the village.

“Yes, but you must pay the Saila (chief) $5 per day per boat and

another $50 for the two coconuts.”

These men wore no shirts, and certainly no uniform, yet they had the presence of self assured authority.

During this discussion, the Italian brothers, minus their dog, and the two singlehanders from the other two boats, became curious about the lingering delegation so they all arrived as an armada of dinghies surrounding the Kuna canoe. I first informed our fleet of foreigners about the charges for anchoring which seemed agreeable and then told them the charge of $50 for the two brown coconuts, which were still sitting in my dinghy.

That lit a fuse bursting with great howls of laughter from the sailors.

The Kuna men were not amused.

Being an agreeable lot, we were more than willing to return the two coconuts, even to place them in their previous resting spots on the sandy ground inland from the beach. But this was to no avail. The Kuna delegation wanted money!

Maybe they didn’t understand how much $50 really was so we offered some things to trade; a hat, t-shirt, a small flashlight and cigarettes for the coconuts. The deal was done, everyone was happy and I received a written receipt for our exchange.

The next morning I saw a Kuna canoe closing the distance directly for my boat, but it had only a single Kuna paddling determinedly. I

{ CRUISINGLIFE }

suspected complications were brewing so I put out a call on the VHF to my floating friends to come quickly. The Kuna man was very upset and absolutely not friendly.

He insisted we must pay $50 for the two coconuts that were no longer on his island. Despite showing him our receipts of trade for the coconuts, he was adamant about payment. He insisted those were not coconuts for others to sell. He wanted the money!

There was no immediate resolution but there was a possible solution. The Kuna man said we must all go to the Saila, the big “chief” who administers the day-to-day political and social affairs of the island. This was the day he held court to settle personal disputes in the village.

THE SAILA DECIDES So all five of us cruisers organized an expedition to plead our case in front of the Saila. Now Lello, the other Italian single hander, is always a great humor30

ist to have around. He decides we must march together and display cohesiveness, dignity and act like the organized international delegation that we are. We must march single file, the first person carrying on a stick raised high, displaying a tremendously large Italian flag that Lello happened to have on board.

I had guarded possession of one

of the offending coconuts, while Bubu, the French singlehander, cradled the second coconut with determined possessiveness. With our big flag waving high over our heads, we gleefully marched and joked far behind the Kuna who was determined to drag us into justice.

Our formation came to a highstepping, foot-pounding halt, in BLUE WATER SAILING

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front of a long weathered building made of vertical wood sticks and a large sweeping thatched roof.

Dipping the staff of our glorious flag and our own heads to enter the doorway, we shuffled through the sand into the shaded interior.

Inside, we stood shoulder to shoulder in front of a long, weathered table, behind which sat the regal Saila. This was a time for decorum, respect, no smiles, no jokes.

The foot of the staff of our delegation’s banner rested in the sand, supported by the hand of Lello, the Italian colors hanging limp from the lack of breeze. The Salia was flanked by two seated “voceros” who function as interpreters and counselors. The offended Kuna man spoke first. On and on he pleaded with hand motions and expressions but we had no understanding of his words. Certainly, he is explaining what great thieves these invading Europeans are.

Then it became our turn. Bubu and I placed the treasured coconuts on the table in front of the Saila. The Saila studied us individually then as a group for a full two minutes of silence. I don’t think he had ever seen Italians and a French man before. Then he asked, “Well, Italiani?” and we replied, “Yes” “Pasta?” We are not quite sure what he means but we answered “Yes” “Pizza?” Maybe these are things he has heard about Italians and he is seeing if it is true so we replied “Yes” “Mafia?” he asked. “Oh Yes!” we replied.

“What do you say about the coconuts?”

ers in a language that was Greek to us. Then he declared “The problem you brought here is too banal. Go away and find a friendly solution between yourselves. But all of you must stay away from the village unless you are accompanied by a Kuna guide.”

Being dismissed by the Saila, everyone filed outside into the bright sun.

We proposed a simple solution to the Kuna man. We did not feel it was right to pay $50 for two coconuts but we offered to pay that much for one of his pigs. With the pig, we would make a big barbecue on the beach for his family and the Kuna community. Surprisingly, he agreed.

The Kuna man went home to prepare the pig and we went back to our boats to begin cooking spaghetti al pomodoro, a big focaccia bread, red wine and we dug out stores of cigarettes. Shortly after noon, on the beach in front of our anchored sailboats, a pit was dug where a large fire was built and the pig was roasted. It was a festive event. Other native foods and

fruits were piled onto a blue tarp we had laid in the shade of the tall palms. It grew into a great feast, with guitars, singing, even the Saila and his voceros came. Everyone had fun and the party lasted well into the night.

From that day forward, anytime we went ashore, villagers offered us banana, mangoes, papaya, and coco, too. And, the Saila gave us permission to visit the island and village without a guide.

This story happened many years ago. Now, there are far more visiting sailboats and there are far more people living on the islands of Kuna Yala. Much has changed.

We hope they protect the islands.

We send a message to every sailboat visiting San Blas........the coconuts are forbidden, but if you treat people gently, they will offer to you far more. BWS Patrick Childress is have been out cruising with his wife Rebecca aboard their Valiant 40 Brick House for the last 10 years. When he was in his twenties he circumnavigated singledhanded in a Catalina 27.

THE VERDICT We recounted the experience and showed him the receipt. The Saila huddled with his two adviswww.bwsailing.com

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{ TECHREPORT }

The 200,000-Mile Refit of Mahina Tiare

by John Neal

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n May 2014, we set sail from Auckland, New Zealand for a 20 year, 200,000-mile refit of our Hallberg-Rassy 46 Mahina Tiare in Sweden near where she was built. We took our time enjoying the journey with stops in Tahiti, Rarotonga, Hawaii and Alaska before leaving our boat for the winter in Sidney, BC. Our next season included landfalls in San Diego, Mexico, Cocos Island, Panama, BVIs, Azores, Ireland, Scotland and Norway before leaving Mahina Tiare in a boatyard an hour north of Gothenburg.

That first winter Mahina Tiare 32

One of the most well-traveled cruising boats on the planet, Mahina Tiare sails to Sweden to a complete two-year refit of all her major systems, plus new teak decks

spent at Adams Boatcare where she got new teak decks (2mm thicker than the original and vacuumbagged without any fasteners), a new motor, shaft and prop, two (12 & 24 volt) new Mastervolt Chargemaster battery chargers plus all new thru-hulls and ball valves.

All went well with the refit and a year ago we did a shakedown north to visit Oslo for the first time before setting sail on 8,000 miles of sail-training expeditions to Orkney, Tromsø (northern Norway), Bear Island, Spitsbergen, Iceland, Faroe, Scotland and then back to Sweden last September for the final

refit at Bröderna Martinssons boatyard where we’d had our 10-year, 100,000-mile refit done.

This past winter’s final refit was a lot easier on the budget, with only the fridge and freezer, all electronics including radar and autopilot replaced, along with the rudder seals and bearings, steering gearbox, genoa, nav lights, main anchor plus standing rigging and lifelines.

Why Sweden when we could have had the same work done for a similar price in New Zealand, Sidney, BC, Seattle or San Francisco?

Partly as a reason or excuse to sail back to Spitsbergen and to explore BLUE WATER SAILING

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Electronics installer Sven adjusting the new Raymarine MFD

Iceland for the first time, and partly because we really enjoy working with Swedes. Their work ethic, sense of design, 10,000 years of boatbuilding tradition all counted.

Also figuring into the scenario was the fact that this was where MT had been built and the source for the engine, rigging and some of the hardware we planned to replace.

The island of Orust, an hour’s drive north of Gothenburg has long been a hotbed of boatbuilding excellence, but since the decline in new construction, many of the yards have turned into refit specialists, with yacht owners sailing or shipping their boats from all over Europe and Scandinavia and even some from the U.S. for refits.

When I was shopping for new instruments, I asked boatyard owner Hakan Martinsson about the quality of the sub-contractor he used for installing electronics.

Hakan simply answered, “They get it done. If there is a problem, they come at night or on the weekend, but they always get it right.”

We just had cause to test that statement.

Months ago I had asked the electronics installing company if they could send a tech out three days after we returned to test out the electronics which had been installed while the boat was in a huge, heated hall for the winter. www.bwsailing.com

They did, and during our shakedown, when the tech turned the new autopilot on, the boat veered hard to starboard. In seconds Per Martin dove below into the aft cabin, lifted up the mattress and switched out two wires on the pilot control unit. A couple minutes later, that was resolved and he went through the instruments, quickly calibrating and adjusting.

We headed back to the yard and thanked him.

A week later, on a six-mile jaunt south to the Hallberg-Rassy yard where MT had been built, the depth sounder went blank after five minutes, and didn’t start sounding again until we were moored. A call to Per Martin and he said it was most likely the junction box but to be certain, he ordered both that part and a new triducer. He arrived, installed the box, and it worked perfectly on a test run and he then installed the very latest update that had just been issued.

Later that night we noticed that neither the chart table or aft cabin repeaters showed depth or speed.

An emailed reply said that he thought when he installed the software update the two repeaters had lost their settings. He forwarded a PDF of the entire 115-page installation and operation manual, plus a note saying to read page 39 and follow the directions for resetting.

That did the trick!

Fitting the new wider, thicker deck planking 33

{ TECHTALK } New Frigoboat K35 fridge and freezer compressors; tiny, slilent and super-efficient

Here is a list of what we’ve replaced over the past two winters, why we chose the suppliers we did and how it has worked out.

Engine: Our original Volvo TMD31L 95 hp engine was still running perfectly after 14,000 hours, never broke down or used oil, but the cost of replacing it was within $2000 of the cost of rebuilding.

The Volvo D2-75 has mechanical, not common-rail injection and is 260 pounds lighter. It has proven 30% more economical, cleaner, much quieter and has increased our top speed from 7.9 to 8.5 knots. In actual fact, the gains in economy and speed may be equally

due to both the more efficient engine and the change of propellers.

Prop: The stopping ability and non-spinning when sailing were great aspects of the Max-Prop, however, after having to have it rebuilt three times over 200,000 miles at a cost of $1200 each time, the reports of the simplicity and improved efficiently I heard from several owners plus the reports of two propeller tests tipped my choice to Flexofold. An added bonus is that the Flexofold feathers with blades trailing aft, instead of sticking out to snag lines.

Instruments and Autopilot: Our

New Volvo D 2-75 motor with standart 130 amp, 12 volt and optional 110 amp, 24 volt alternators 34

20-year-old Autohelm ST50 instruments had proven reliable, but it had become increasingly difficult to find parts and the Autohelm linear drive Type 2 autopilot had become occasionally erratic. We’d replaced the original R20X radar when it died at ten years, but chart cartridges were no longer available in the format required by the C80 that we replaced the original with.

Bonuses with the new Raymarine system are that it draws a fraction of the amps required for the old ST 50 and C-80 system plus has better, brighter displays.

Frigoboat Refrigeration and Freezer: Our keel-cooled fridge and freezer systems were working ok, but we’d had to have refrigerant added several times and they were no longer as efficient as when first installed. The cost of replacing both including labor was the equivalent of US $3400 and the replacements are using considerably fewer amps, only rarely coming on.

Aqua Signal Series 34 LED Nav Lights: The original Aqua Signal lights were large, and occasionally filled with water, plus the red and green lenses would turn frosty white every seven years, so replacing them with much smaller, more watertight LED’s has proven a good solution.

Mastervolt Chargemaster Battery Chargers: For the past 20 years we used a portable step-down transformer to turn 220 volts into 110, temporarily perched under the dodger. It was a hassle to drag it out from bilge stowage, so many times I didn’t plug us in when free shore power was available.

Christer Verta at Adams Boatcare did an excellent job of installing two Mastervolt Chargemasters (one for each our 12 and 24 volt banks) and they have worked very well. We are surprised how many BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

marinas and docks in Scandinavia and Europe have free shore power included with moorage. We charge the batteries with 220 volts, then run the inverter to get 110 volts for onboard appliances. When we return (briefly) to the lands of 110 volts in Antigua, Panama and Hawaii, we’ll simply plug a 110-volt cord into the second shore power inlet. Simple!

Lewmar/Whitlock Steering Gearbox: After 200,000 miles, the equivalent of eight world circumnavigations, our steering had become stiffer and after boatyard owner Hakan Martinsson replaced the gearbox in the engine room, the steering is easier.

Ultra Anchor: For the past 42 years and 350,000 miles I’ve relied on CQR anchors knowing that they slowly drag through mud and don’t work well in kelp and weed.

In talking with Nigel Calder and several other very experienced cruisers, I believed that the newer generation of anchors including Rocna offered better holding, but the roll bar design would mean having to modify our double bow roller in order to accommodate both a Rocna-type and a second anchor (currently a 44lb Delta) on the two bow rollers.

We met Peter Smith, the intrepid Kiwi inventor/designer of the Rocna, and he nearly convinced us to try Rocna’s new Vulcan anchor, but in the end we chose to try the Ultra, a stainless steel Turkish-built anchor. We recently used it at Fair Isle, halfway between the Orkney and Shetland Islands where we’d never been able to get the CQR to set, and it set immediately, even through the mass of kelp and weed. It will be interesting to see how the Ultra works in the Med later this summer, and in the South Kate lying in Palau Pacific next season. BWS www.bwsailing.com

All plumbing fittings below the waterline replaced: bronze thruhulls and composite Tru-Design ball valves

Yard owner Hakan Martinsson and Amanda switching hardware and reefing lines from old to new boom

Replacing 21 year old original 75 lb CQR with new stainless 35kg Ultra anchor. New custom stainless mooring cleat which replaced original cast aluminum cleat Gori 35

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MAN

OVERBOARD 36

BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

Here’s how to prevent a tragedy from happening at sea

by BWS staff

www.bwsailing.com

37

Attached by tether to the saftey line that serves as a handhold and jackline, above; harnessed in with secure clips for safety below

B

ack on March 26, those of us who have been following the Volvo Ocean Race, in which seven high tech racing boats are racing around the world, we were reminded once again just how dangerous a man-overboard emergency can be. Deep in the Southern Ocean, John Fisher, a crew aboard the Chinese backed yacht Scallywag, was swept over the side in storm force winds and mountainous seas just before dawn. The crew reacted immediately and started an exhaustive search but Fisher was never found.

Most of us never sail in the 38

@Mahina Expeditions

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Southern Ocean or in the high latitudes of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans where storms are ferocious and frequent. But, there are still plenty of opportunities for a person to fall overboard, even in relatively calm weather, so we need to be prepared for such an emergency.

STAY ON THE BOAT

The first rule of seamanship has to be “Don’t fall off the boat!” So, the boat has to be rigged and each crew needs to be equipped with the right gear to make sure that everyone stays onboard.

Pad eyes should be fixed at strategic points in the cockpit and at the mast so you can clip in easily

when emerging from the cabin or working at the mast to raise and lower sails. I also like to fix pad eyes at the helm or helms so you can be attached while steering in bad conditions.

A jackline should be run the length of both decks so you can clip onto them before leaving the cockpit and remain clipped in while moving up the sidedecks and while working on the foredeck.

The experts who run the Safety at Sea seminars for US Sailing recommend using heavy webbing for your jacklines since they lie flat on the deck and won’t roll under foot when you step on them. This makes sense but it is important to realize that webbing perishes in sunlight so you cannot leave the jacklines rigged all the time and need to replace them after a few years of use.

Alternatives to webbing for jacklines includes 1 by 19 stainless wire with pelican hooks at each end that clip to permanent pad eyes. These will roll slightly underfoot but the strength, lack of stretch and longevity of stainless wire makes this an attractive alternative. Plus, you can leave them mounted all the time. Some skippers like to rig a fore and aft line at chest height that doubles as a hand hold and a jackline. These should be made fast to the boat and kept relatively taught. Usually such safety lines are rigged only when heading offshore.

Each crew should be equipped with an inflatable personal flotation device (PFD) that has a safety harness built into it. Not all inflatable PFDs have a harness built into them. The best PFD/harness will have crotch straps so it will not be pulled off a MOB who is being dragged in the water. But, these are awkward to wear so many crew opt BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

for harnesses without them.

The tether is your link to the boat and needs to be in good condition and very strong. Some tethers have elastic covers that make them more compact than standard harnesses. Some tethers have clips at the end and in the middle so you can keep yourself on a short leash when working at the mast. It is important to have snap shackles attach the tether to the harness so you can release yourself in a situation when you are being dragged underwater. It is better to be free and floating than dragged under water.

The clips on the tether are vital

pieces of gear. Standard springloaded clips are not our first choice for tether clips. When hooked to a pad eye, the stanchion base of cleat spring clips will self-release when a side load is applied. This happened to a crew in the current Clipper Race who found himself in the water and un-attached to the boat. Luckily, he was rescued.

The best clips have a positive latch that keeps the clip closed no matter where the loading comes from. These can be hard to undue when your hands are cold but they are the safest and will keep you on the boat.

Each PFD harness should be

fitted with a light, either a Fresnel type or a strobe. The Fresnel type is not as easy to see from a distance but will not blind the MOB or the rescue crew. The strobe type is easier to see from afar but is hard on the MOB because it can blind him and hard on the rescue crew who must look at it to haul their crewmate back on board. A good option is to go with a PFD that has a Fresnel light but carry in your pocket a small strobe that can be turned on and off as needed.

The last item that each crew should have as part of his MOB kit is a personal locator beacon. See the article on page 42.

Photo courtesy Switlik

www.bwsailing.com

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the person, the chance of rescue diminishes.

QUICK STOP

RESCUE MANEUVERS

A lot of research and sea trials have gone into the best ways to stop a sailboat and return to the MOB’s position and some good practices have been established.

The Seattle Sailing Foundation, The Cruising Club of America, US Sailing and many dedicated volunteers have made it their purpose to make MOB emergencies as survivable as humanly possible.

The first principal of a MOB

rescue is to stop the boat as quickly as possible to reduce the distance between the person in the water and the boat. It has been proven that the farther a boat sails from an MOB, the chance of rescue diminishes rapidly. Also, it has been proven that if you can have one crew focus on the MOB right away and maintain a visual contact with him as the boat stops and maneuvers, the chance of rescue is greatly improved. Once you lose sight of

With these facts in mind, the Seattle Sailing Foundation worked on a series of maneuvers to see which worked best and came up with what they named the Quick Stop. When reaching or sailing up wind, the instant the “man overboard” cry is heard, the helmsman throws the boat through a tack without releasing the jib sheet. He then steers the boat in a circle first running then rounding up to arrive at the MOB. As the boat turns in this circle, the engine should be started, the jib should be dowsed and ultimately the mainsail furled. Also, it is important to drag a safety float behind the boat that the MOB can grab. In the process of working this maneuver, the SSF came up with the LifeSling, which doubles as a floatation device and a sling for hoisting a person out of the water.

To make sure the MOB can grab the LifeSling, the boat may need to make a much smaller circle around him before stopping as close to him as possible.

When running, the simplest Quick Stop is to round up to windward, sail about as far as the distance between you and the MOB and then tack. You will be on course to his position where you can deploy the LifeSling as you circle around him and then stop with sails furled.

FIGURE EIGHT, FAST RETURN

The downside of the Quick stop when going upwind, is the need to jibe the mainsail as you make the first circle, which can be problematical in bad weather.

The solution to this is a maneuver called the Figure Eight or Fast Return. Instead of throwing the 40

BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

PRACTICE

The safety protocols noted above and the rescue maneuvers are not all instinctual. You really do need to practice MOB drills with your crew and to make sure the decision making and boat handling are crisp, clear and efficient.

Your ability to execute a Quick Stop or Fast Return maneuver and then hoist a man from the water can make the difference between a good sea story and a tragedy. BWS boat through a tack right away, you bear off onto a reach for two or three boat lengths and then tack.

Once on the new tack, you fall off the wind for two or three boat lengths while you start the engine and deploy the LifeSling.

As you sail past the MOB, you round up and position the boat to sail to windward of him as you dowse and furl the sails. You can then motor around him to make sure he grabs the LifeSling. This sounds simple, but in high winds and big seas, you have to be very careful to stay as close to the MOB as possible without running over him.

The key to making this work is twofold. First, you have to position the boat on the windward side of the MOB and amidships. Then you need the top of the lifting hoist, ie., where the hoist attaches to the halyard, to be high enough for the MOB to be able to get a foot hold on deck as he is hoisted from the water.

RESCUE

Once you have the person attached to the boat with the LifeSling, you need to haul him in and hoist him aboard. On modern design cruising boats with swim platforms, you may be able to get him on board with the swim ladder and some assistance. But if it is rough, the stern can be deadly as the boat pitches.

Another option is to use a LifeSling hoist attached to a halyard, probably the main halyard. The hoist has a multi-part purchase that can be attached to the sling which is powerful enough for a smaller person to hoist a larger one up to the deck level. www.bwsailing.com

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PERSONAL LOCATOR BEACONS SAVE LIVES

D

uring the 20132014 Clipper Around the World Race, crewmember Andrew Taylor was working on the foredeck of the 72-foot racing yacht Derry-Londonderry-Doire when a wave swept over the bow.

In that instant he realized that he had unclipped his tether to move to a new position so when the wave struck him he was lifted off his feet and plunged head first into the 38-degree water of the North Pacific Ocean.

Taylor has written a book about his ordeal and eventual rescue after the crew spent 100 minutes look-

42

Both the satellite and VHF based PLB systems will help you find your crewmember in the water by BWS Staff

ing for him. Had he not been wearing a dry suit and carrying his own AIS man-overboard beacon, they would never have found him. But they did. Here’s an excerpt from Taylor’s new book 179W. “The day it happened was March 30, my mum’s birthday.

I’d been on deck since 5am and it was an hour before I was due to go off watch at midday.

I cannot properly describe the hideous, sickening realisation that I wasn’t clipped on to the boat – a standing order in rough weather and especially when working on the pitching, tossing foredeck.

“The impact of the cold was BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

instant, the sea temperature being no more than thirty-five degrees.

Even though I was wearing a dry suit (which provides thermal insulation in water) I began to feel the iciness seep in, gnawing at my extremities and the small of my back. Had I not been wearing the suit I would have been dead in minutes. Clipped to my life jacket was an AIS beacon, a device which once activated would alert those on the boat I was in the water and help them to locate me. I had bought it myself before the trip and now it was my only hope. I reached down into the water and turned it on, praying that the signal to the boat would be picked up and alert them to my position.

I clutched the beacon as tight as possible in my hand and tried as hard as I could to stop being tossed like a rag doll between the waves.�

WHAT ARE PLBS?

Personal locator beacons originally evolved from the technology developed to create Emergency Positioning Indicating Beacons, EPIRBs, which broadcast an SOS and specific information via satellites to the world SARSAT network. They use the 406 MHz frequency to talk to the satellites and also the 121 MHz frequency

www.bwsailing.com

to provide a homing signal for a search and rescue team.

406 PLBs provide a very accurate position for a person who has fallen overboard but the signal has to travel through the whole SARSAT system before it can, hopefully, be accessed by the crew of the yacht from which the MOB fell.

With the advent of the Automatic Identification System (AIS) for both commercial and recreational vessels, a new technology has become available that allows a new class of devices that rely on local VHF frequencies that can be accessed by any vessel in the vicinity of the MOB. Both systems have their pros and cons.

406 PLBS

PLBs that use the SARSAT system have been approved for use in the U.S. since 2003 and have saved hundreds of lives over that decade and half since. Each unit contains a GPS that provides a position to within 10 meters which is trans-

mitted to the SARSAT system and then to all parties in your area.

The notice will go to local coast guards whereever you are who will decide what agency will coordinate the search and rescue. An important link the the rescue chain are the ships at sea in your area. These are coordinated by the Automated Mutual-Assistance Rescue system (AMVER). When you read reports of a ship coming to the rescue of sailors at sea, this was made possible by the links between their EPIRB and the SARSAT and AMVER systems.

In the case of a man overboard, the complexity of this system and the time it takes for all of the moving parts to be coordinated means that it is will be over an hour between the moment a man in the water activates his PLB and the time the rescue information contained in the SOS message is in the hands of potential search and rescuers.

For the crew on the boat from which the MOB fell, they may not get the information at all unless they can make contact via sat phone or SSB radio with the Coast Guard and shore support.

When the PLB signals distress, one of the things that happens is that the Coast Guard will contact the designated family member or friend of the MOB to ascertain the veracity of the signal. The CG will give the family member the exact 43

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coordinates of the MOB so this can be transmitted to the boat as soon as possible. With this information, the skipper can figure the MOB’s likely set and drift for the coordinates and sharpen the search and rescue pattern.

The EPIRB-PLB system works very well for vessels in distress that can maintain themselves for hours or more. And it works well for those who have to take to a life raft because the mother ship has gone down.

But for a person in the water, floating on the waves, being pushed by the wind and suffering increasing hypothermia, time is of the essence.

HOW AIS WORKS

AIS is one of the most important safety technologies to be developed in the last 20 years. It is required aboard commercial vessels and most countries that are member of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) require AIS on all commercial shipping, fishing and working vessels. Sailors and cruisers adopted AIS as soon as they could since they know that a collision at sea with a ship has only one winner.

AIS broadcasts and receives via VHF frequencies so it operates more or less in a line-of-sight ra-

dius from each transmitter. So, it is very local to your actual position.

There are three types of AIS designated for different uses and budgets. AIS A is the commercial ship system that is required on vessels of 300 tons or more. System A transmits and receives the signals and broadcasts the ship’s position every two seconds while underway.

The message it broadcasts gives a lot of information about the ship as well as its course, speed, turn rate and destination. Broadcasting at 20 watts, AIS A is an energy hog but very effective.

AIS B was designed for pleasure craft that do not need the 20 watt broadcast power and energy use that goes with it. B broadcast at two watts every 20 seconds, so the energy consumptions fits with the limits of sailors offshore. B does not broadcast a full suite of information about you and your boat, just the essentials of name, course, location and speed.

With AIS B running, you will always know what boats are near you and whether or not they present a risk of collision, a function that the AIS unit calculates and updates as it receives the signals.

The third variety of AIS is the receive only systems, which do not

AIS 700 by Raymarine, contact screen 44

broadcast any information about you and your boat and only collect the data from the ships and vessels around you. This is certainly useful, but as a safety device, the receive only devices leaves others in the dark about you and that is not a good thing. So, AIS B is the system most offshore sailors choose.

The information received by your AIS B appears on a multifunction screen or chartplotter as an overlay to the digital charts. You run the cursor over the ships you are near, or use the touch screen, and a box of information will pop up that gives you all the data you need.

AIS IN MOB EMERGENCIES

The wonderful AIS system seems tailor-made for use in man overboard emergencies since it delivers its signal to the boat the instant the MOB hits the water.

The AIS transmitter is mounted on your inflatable life vest and will be turned on automatically when the life vest inflates. The signal will be logged by the AIS receiver on the boat, will set off an alarm and an icon with coordinates will appear on the MFD screen. That gives you a positive fix that you can return to as soon as possible. Even if the AIS signal is lost for some reason, the original position will remain on the MFD screen.

The signal will also be received by all of the AIS equipped vessels within range, which is about a seven-mile radius. So, even if the boat from which the MOB fell is somehow incapacitated, others can come to the rescue.

Compared to the complicated and time-consuming process of using the 406 SARSAT system, the AIS man overboard rescue beacon gives rescuers the information they need right now. And, it has been proven that in MOB emergencies, time is very much of the essence.

BWS

BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

P

ersonal Floatation Devices (PFDs) are required by the US Coast Guard to be on all boats and you need to have one PFD for each person on your boat. Many regattas and offshore races stipulate that all crew must wear a PFD at the start and the finish of a race. So, taking some time to figure out what the best PFDs will be for you and your crew is not just a practical safety precaution, it is conforming to the laws of the land and the rewww.bwsailing.com

Photo courtesy Mahina Expeditions

Personal Flotation Devices with Integrated Harnesses

Innovative design has vastly improved the comfort and safety of modern inflatable vests by BWS staff

quirements of sailing events.

The Coast Guard approves and rates PFDs from the simplest throwable devices to sophisticated inflatable PFDs with hydrostatic inflators and built-in safety harnesses. Here’s a quick run down on the five Coast Guard approved types of PFDs. Type I: Large bulky life jackets intended for commercial use and not for recreational sailing.

Type II: The old fashion, over-thehead life vests with one strap. These are bulky and uncomfortable.

Type III: The most popular

type of life jackets, these have 15 pounds of flotation and come in a wide variety of styles. They fit like a vest or a jacket and do not hinder your motion.

Type IV: These are throwable cushions or devices and at least one is required on boats over 16 feet.

Type V: This is a catch-all category that include modern inflatable PFDs. The Type V inflatable vests will also be rated by their flotation as either Type II or III. All Type Vs with built-in harnesses are rated Type III. 45

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46

CHOICES

INFLATABLE SOLUTIONS

To be legal, all you have to carry aboard your boat is enough Type II PFDs for all of the crew. These will be the least expensive and the most uncomfortable PFDs, which means that no one will wear one unless forced to by bad weather or a Captain Bligh skipper.

But, a life jacket is of little use if you are not wearing it. That’s why most of us choose to carry more comfortable Type III life vests that fit around your torso, zip up the front and don’t restrict your movements as you move about the boat.

But Type III vests don’t fit easily with offshore foul weather gear or with a safety harness so offshore sailors have a quandary as to how they can combine all three.

The answer is the modern inflatable PFDs, Type V and rated Type III, that fit neatly over foul weather gear and have an integrated harness.

Today’s inflatable PFDs are third generation designs that have eliminated some of the drawbacks of earlier models. In the old days, it was common for sailors on the rails of races boats who were wearing their inflatables to get dowsed by a wave that soaked the inflation device and thus deployed the inflated bladder.

Alternatively, because the inflation mechanism relied upon a soluble disk, you never knew if the disk was in good condition or not. There are instances when the inflated bladder did not deploy simply because the disk was no longer serviceable.

A good life jacket should keep your head well above water when deployed but early versions of the inflatable PFDs often had plenty of buoyancy in the vest but not enough in the collar. This allowed

your head to fall backwards as you were tossed by a wave and could force water into your face.

And, older inflatables were heavy and uncomfortable to wear so that crew would often remove them as soon as possible once underway. In hot weather, early inflatables chafed on your neck to the point of irritation.

The modern crop of inflatable PFDs with harnesses are much better and just about all of the problems with early vests have been eliminated. The main players in the field are Mustang Survival, West Marine, Crewsaver and Spinlock.

The best modern vests have automatic hydrostatic release devices that activate the inflation of the bladder. That mean the vest won’t deploy while you are sitting on the rail and it won’t fail to deploy because the activation disk is not

BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

working. The hydrostatic activator reacts to the pressure change when the vest is four or more inches below the water, which is the only time you want it to deploy.

Some of the new vests have activators that react to water but only when the water is flowing upward. That means that spray or rain will not deploy the vest at an unexpected moment.

The new vests are designed specifically to keep your head above water and have large collars that wrap around your head and keep your face out of the water. This is a huge improvement because part of any MOB rescue is the ability of the person in the water to be alert and to work with those who are trying to get him back on board.

You can’t do that if you are fighting to keep your head up.

One interesting new vest has a transparent hood that deploys with the collar so you can pull it right over your head. This keeps water off your face but still lets you see and work with your rescuers.

But the real improvements have been in the way inflatable PFDs fit. The modern designs are much lighter than earlier vests so you don’t always feel the weight on your shoulders and neck. The www.bwsailing.com

modern vests have sculpted designs so they fit around the curves of your body neatly and without a large bulk on your chest.

For even more comfort, the better vests have neoprene or other soft material in their collars so you don’t chafe when you are wearing them without foul weather gear or even a shirt. If the vest is comfortable to wear, you are much more likely to wear it. The integrated harnesses in the modern vests are built right into the structure so you don’t feel as though you have any extra webbing wrapping around your body that constricts your motion.

While all of the modern inflatable PFDs with harnesses are suitable for offshore sailing, the Spinlock Deckvest 5D may be the Rolls Royce of the field. This is the vest with the transparent spray hood that prevents secondary drowning. It has a sculpted design that fits your body unobtrusively; a water activated LED flashing light; a knife for cutting away a safety line if need be; a mesh pocket for your PLB and a whistle for alerting rescuers. The Deckvest 5D has leg straps that adjust to your shape and will keep you safely in the harness if you fall over the side and are being dragged by the tether that is still attached to the boat.

TETHERS AND HOOKS

Inflatable PFDs with harnesses are safety tools that you hope you never have to use. In other words, if the harness does its job of keeping you on the boat, then the vest will never have to inflate. But the harness is entirely dependent on the tether you use to keep you hooked to the jacklines or the pad eyes on deck.

There are several styles of tethers that you can choose from.

Standard straight webbing is most common but you can use a tether that has an elastic cover that makes it more compact and less likely to get tangled or to trip you up.

At the vest end of the tether, you should have a snap shackle with a lanyard on it that attached to the vest’s D-rings. The shackle is designed to be released if you need to unhook from a vessel that is dragging you dangerously through the water or actually sinking.

The hook at the boat end of the tether is critical to your safety.

Most tethers come with simple spring activated clips that snap easily onto a jackline or pad eye. But, it has been shown repeatedly, that these simple hooks can suddenly release when the clasp gets loaded from the side. Sailors have gone overboard because of this feature.

The better solution is to use a double action hook that can’t selfopen under a side load. Wichard makes a double action hook for tethers that requires two motions to open it. These can be done with one hand but it can be difficult when your hands are cold. Still, a double action hook on your safety tether is the best way to stay safe out there.

As Captain Ron reminds us, “If it’s gonna happen, Kitty, it’s gonna happen out there.” BWS

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ON BOARD MEDICAL KITS How to prepare to be medically self sufficient when you take to the high seas

W

hen we were preparing to head off with our two young sons on a voyage around the world, we knew we needed a comprehensive medical kit that would provide all of the tools we would need for emergencies, illnesses and injuries. As it happened, our family doctor in the Newport, RI area, had worked with a number of offshore and singlehanded sailors as they prepared to be medically self-sufficient at sea and had a lot of notes already to share with us. So, we sat down with him and went through our 48

own needs and he filled us in on what we needed to learn.

We went away and took the CPR and first aid courses our doctor recommended, practiced giving shots to helpless oranges and read all of the how-to medical books for sailors that we could get our hands on. From our experience and research, we knew we needed some specific treatments, such as Epipens for ciguatera fish poisoning, but we left the choice or prescription drugs to our doctor. He did not fail us.

On our last meeting, he handed us a three by five index card box full of cards. Each was titled with a symptom or symptoms and below was a description of what the symptoms indicated and a way to confirm the diagnosis. Below that was a course of treatment. There were about 50 cards. He had given us medical school in a box plus all of the prescriptions that we needed

filled to stock our medical kit.

In those days, there were no commercially available medical kits as comprehensive as we needed for self-sufficiency so we gradually collected all of the splints, bandages, wound control tools, etc. that we needed. A friend of ours is a distributor of veterinary supplies so he was able to get us some wonderful tools, like tooth pullers, scalpels, syringes and more. In the end we filled two large plastic tool boxes with all of these supplies and in each we had specific categories separated in their own gallon plastic bag such as “Burns”, “Wounds” and “Breaks.”

Over the course of our fiveyear circumnavigation, we went through the supplies and had to replace them in some fairly exotic places. But, luckily, we had no serious accidents, no real emergencies and only one serious sickness – dengue fever in French Polynesia.

BLUE WATER SAILING • May 2018

Thanks to medical school in a box, we knew there was no medicine we could use for treatment, that we needed to keep the patient hydrated and we could treat joint pain with Tylenol but not aspirin.

OCEANMEDIX

Now 20 years later, sailors like us who are planning a long voyage to wild and isolated places, don’t have to go to all of the trouble that we had to. There are commercial medical kits available that will cover all of the bases you need covered. Among the best is a growing company called OceanMedix which is run by a very experienced sailor and captain who knows what sailors need for medical supplies we when go to sea.

We used the Adventure Marine 3000 kit form OceanMedix aboard our last boat, Lime’n, for trips to the Caribbean, Bahamas and South Florida all of which involved long offshore passages. What we like about the kit is that they are organized in much the same way as the www.bwsailing.com

medical kits we put together for the circumnavigation, only with many more supplies and a closer focus on combating infection.

The Marine 3000 kit has seven modules for burns, wounds, fractures/sprains, CPR, dental, medications and bleeding. To this we added the antibiotics, pain treatments and specific prescriptions that we had prescriptions for from our doctors. In each module are the supplies you will need to both be as clean and sanitary as possible and the actual tools you will need to treat whatever medical emergency crops up.

To the ship’s library, we added three books that should be on a voyaging boat: Marine Medicine, A Comprehensive Guide by Eric A. Weiss, MD and Michael Jacobs, MD; First Aid Afloat by Peter F. Eastman, MD; and, Dangerous Marine Animals by Bruce W. Halstead, MD. And, as

luck would have it, we still had that amazing three by five index card file box that contained our own medical school in a box.

Every cruising family and crew will have its own special medical needs but starting from scratch is no longer the only way to build your medical kit so that you are self-sufficient at sea. For under $1000, OceanMedix can do the job for you. BWS

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Leopard 50: Luxury Afloat

The new Leopard 50 is destined to be one of the most popular mid-size family cruisers in the multihull market by George Day

W

e were all checking our phones as we gathered at the Leopard 50 in the Harbor Towne Marina because the forecast was for serious thunder squalls later that morning. The storm was brewing over southwestern Florida and aiming right for us in Dania, which is just south of Ft. Lauderdale. The green blotches on the radar had large yellow and red highlights that indicated both really heavy rain and probably lightning.

But that didn’t stop us. We climbed aboard the new 50, let go 50

the lines and inched our way out the marina entrance in Dania Cut. At the helm was regular Leopard skipper Calvyn, plus Steve Long and Katie Baker from the Leopard sales and marketing team.

Under power, the 50 handled smartly, turning in its own length inside the marina and then strutted easily into the building breeze at cruising revs as we motored down the canal toward the cut at Port Everglades that would take us to the open sea. The boat comes standard with two 57-horsepower diesels that are easily accessible in the large engine compartments aft.

The 50 we sailed had the optional raised lounge on top of the

hard Bimini that covers the cockpit. This is a great space and even though it is quite high, you do not feel like you are on top of a multitiered wedding cake. The helm is raised to starboard and at a level right between the cockpit and the raised lounge so the helmsperson is always in contact with the rest of the crew.

Visibility from the helm is good but the port bow is just out of sight behind the cabintop for those under six feet tall or so.

The ergonomics of the helm are well thought out so a lone watch stander can manage all lines and sheets through a battery of deck organizers, line stoppers and the three electric winches. Certainly, on a boat of this size, owners would be wise to go with electric winches instead of manual ones.

Once we reached the ship turning base at Port Everglades we hoisted the huge mainsail which has a two-part halyard and a country mile of line to gather as the sail BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

inches upward. It’s a big sail with full battens and 1,066 square feet of area. We motorsailed out the cut and then fell off the wind and rolled out the genoa.

In big cruising cats, the sensation of speed or even acceleration can often be muted or subtle. That wasn’t the case with the Leopard 50. The big mainsail and 125-percent genoa with a total area of 1,750 square feet, packed plenty of power to get the cat moving smartly. The wind was blowing at about 12 knots and we were making 7.5 to 8 sailing up wind at an apparent angler of about 50 degrees. We threw the big cat through a few tacks and determined that it would easily tack inside 100 degrees and in flat water would get close to 90 degrees. But, a big cat like this is happier sailing at about 50 degrees AWA instead of being pinched.

Calvyn was happy to let me run the boat so I took the helm and ran through a series of tacks and jibes without assistance from the crew. The boat can easily be singehanded if the autopilot is working properly and the electric winches are functioning. Once you get the lay of the land, all lines and sheets are where they should be so even jibing in the rising breeze was not a huge challenge on my own.

Off the wind the 50 was more in her element and at 110 degrees apparent it really showed the performance built into the design and sail plan. The breeze was building and the dark clouds of the advancing squall were rising over the western horizon but we carried on and tried to get the boat to maintain 10 knots while accelerating to over 11 in the puffs.

We finally had to relent as the dark clouds gathered and the radar images on our phones showed an www.bwsailing.com

alarming number of dark red thunder head patches. We raced back into the inlet and quickly dowsed the sails. The mainsail fell neatly into the stack-pack sail cover and the genoa rolled away with the

press of a button.

With the throttles down, we hightailed it back to the marina and managed to get the big boat into its marina slip in a piping cross wind just in time to beat the 51

{ BLUEWATERBOATS }

for couples cruising on their own.

rain, thunder and lightning. The Leopard 50 was a pleasure to handle under power and showed a good turn of speed at over 8 knots when we were in a hurry.

Under sail it performed above average for a modern production cat intended for the charter fleets as well as private owners.

Ten knots is a pleasant cruising speed and the 50 can do that in the right conditions. Plus, the boat is set up so it can be singlehanded, which is a requirement

52

LIVING ABOARD While an owner might choose the Leopard 50 for it’s overall ease of handling and performance, there is no question that at the top of the list of positive qualities will be the boat’s spaciousness, accommodations and dedication to comfortable living.

The main cockpit is huge but it is only one of three outside cockpits. The U-shaped dinette will seat up to eight and will be the spot for most meals in warm weather.

There is a drawer style fridge in the cockpit and easy access to the staircase that leads to the lounge.

Aft, between the hulls there is a platform that rises and low-

ers mechanically that doubles as a massive swim platform and a dinghy dock, with a folding cradle, that will hoist the dinghy clear of the water when underway.

On the foredeck, you will find another cockpit with a roof with a sliding hatch over it where one could sit in the shade and read or simply watch the world go by.

This can be accessed through a large, weather-proof door from the saloon. Just ahead of the cockpit is a large sun bed that runs across the bridge deck. Under the pads you will find the generator, the water tanks and the windlass and chain locker.

There are large storage lockers on the forward ends of both hulls for fenders, lines, downwind sails, a second dinghy and other spares.

The starboard locker can be fitted out as crew’s quarters with a single bunk and a head.

The saloon is set up for indooroutdoor living with the door in the front and a large sliding door and sliding window aft. When everything is open, the breeze will flow unobstructed right through the boat from bow to stern.

As you enter the saloon from the aft cockpit, there is another eight-person dinette that will be the spot for meals in rainy or cool weather when the boat can be buttoned up. The chart table is forward and to port while the huge galley takes over the whole starboard side of the saloon. With giant windows all around, the saloon is a very bright, airy and inviting space.

The hull accommodations can be set up with three, four or fivecabin layouts and up to five heads.

The boat we were sailing had the normal four-cabin layout with two comfortable cabins in each hull.

Access is via a single stairway into BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

the port hull or via two stairways into the starboard hull. The master cabin in the four-cabin layout is the aft starboard cabin.

The cabins are large and have plenty of ventilation and light.

Plus, the boat can be rigged with air conditioning run by the genset so you can stay comfortable even on hot muggy nights. There is a remarkable amount of storage space throughout the boat which in turn makes the 50 ideally suited for living aboard and long range cruising.

The fit and finish of the 50 has been done to a high standard with an emphasis on simplicity and uniformity in all of the veneers, table and counter tops, doors and the floors. Keeping a boat like the 50 in trim and clean will be easy and not require a lot of elbow grease.

BWS THOUGHTS The Leopard 50 does a lot of things well and will be a great addition to a charter fleet or a fine private yacht for an adventurous couple. It is east to sail and does sail very well. It powers efficiently and handles tight quarters with twin-engine ease.

With 264 gallons of fuel, the 50 will have a cruising range under power at 7 plus knots of nearly 900 miles. Running on one engine at six knots would give you a range of more than 1,200 miles – which, FYI, happens to be the distance between Bali and Singapore in an equatorial region known for little or no wind.

The 50 is a very large 50 footer so even with the four-cabin layout, you will always have www.bwsailing.com

privacy and a place to find some quiet time. Fifty feet seems to be the new mid-size for cruising cats and I can see why. The boat is big enough to be a proper home yet not so large that it swallows you.

It is easy to sail and fast enough to make quick work of long passages but not too complicated for a couple to manage on their own.

The new Leopard 50, which replaced the very popular Leopard 48, is destined to be an even bigger success. BWS

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53

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{ BROADREACHING }

by ANDYCROSS

RACE READY Preparation can make all the difference

E

xperienced sailors know that proper preparation is crucial to the success of any offshore passage. Whether it’s getting the boat and its gear right, tracking and assessing weather, recruiting and training a good crew, or thinking through various safety and emergency scenarios that could happen while out at sea, there is simply no substitute for a well found boat and its sailors.

And while the majority of my prep over the past few years has been focused on our family’s cruising and racing plans aboard Yahtzee, I now find myself in the midst of preparations for two big sailing events this summer: the 750-mile Race to Alaska (R2AK), and the 333-mile freshwater classic, Chicago to Mackinac Race.

The R2AK is a tricky one to prepare for because it is unsupported, boats aren’t allowed to have engines and, as race organizers put it, “It’s like the Iditarod, on a boat, with a chance of drowning, being run down by a freighter, or eaten by a grizzly bear. There are squalls, killer whales, tidal currents that run upwards of 20 miles an hour, and some of the most beautiful 66

scenery on earth.”

The challenge of finishing this adventure up the infamous Inside Passage on a Santa Cruz 27 with three other seasoned sailors aboard means there are a lot of details to work through. A lot.

Fortunately, the four of us own and cruise our own boats, and have raced together before, so collaborating for this event is right in our collective wheel houses. But previous experience alone doesn’t help if we haven’t fully thought through things like provisions, navigation systems, and the need for a full complement of safety gear. As I write this in mid-April, those plans are ongoing, which is all part of the fun.

As for the Mac Race, I’m dealing with an entirely different animal that can be just as challenging as the R2AK. Skippering a Henderson-designed Hunter 39 alongside my dad, three siblings, wife Jill, and two friends, means that I’ve got a larger crew to get ready. But with relatively less experience aboard for this race, I need to make sure that I’m accounting for all of the boat and crew details.

Accordingly, lists are being made and, as always, safety was given top priority.

And though the courses are quite different, there are some similarities in preparation between the races. For both boats and sets of crews, we’ve made big safety decisions and purchases including EPIRBs, new inflatable PFDs, communications equipment, and much more. The crews have been doing their fair share of work, too, as Safety at Sea Seminars have been attended, boat work has been assigned and is ongoing, and race strategy is being formulated.

More than anything, I want to leave very little to chance and reduce the amount of stress for me and the crews when the start times near. After all, the races themselves are supposed to be exciting and memorable experiences, which is truly where planning and readiness come in.

Certainly there is some amount of sheer luck involved with doing well in each event, but in the end it always comes down to the basic principles of good seamanship: keep the water out of the boat, keep the people in the boat, and don’t hit anything.

Do that, I figure, and we’ll be just fine. BWS Andrew, along with wife Jill and sons Porter and Magnus, are currently based in Alaska with their Grand Soleil 39 Yahtzee. Follow their adventures at threesheetsnw.com/yahtzee.

BLUE WATER SAILING

• May 2018

Join the Salty Dawg Rally and enjoy the camaraderie of fellow blue water

sailors. Sail to and from the Caribbean, attend free safety and seamanship seminars and demonstrations provided by veteran passagemakers and the U.S. Coast Guard. And, benefit from the many valuable discounts that are available only to Salty Dawg Rally members.

Events in 2018

(Check the website for the exact dates: www.saltydawgsailing.org.)

May: Spring Salty Dawg Rally from the B.V.I to Hampton, Va. July: Salty Dawg Rally to Maine October: Salty Dawg Great Lakes Rally to Hampton October: Safety and Seamanship Seminar in Annapolis, Md.

October: Visit the Salty Dawg booth at the Annapolis Sailboat Show October: Safety and Seamanship Seminars in Hampton, Va. October: Annual Family Halloween Party and Raffle in Hampton, Va. November: Fall Salty Dawg Rally from Hampton, Va. to the B.V.I.

Go to saltydawgsailing.org for more information.

onsors Our sp Chris Parker Marine Weather Service • Blue Water Sailing magazine • Bitter End Yacht Club • Beneteau • Jeanneau • Outbound Yachts • Quantum Sails • Leverick Bay • Bluewater Yachting Center • Crowne Plaza Hotel, Hampton • Falvey Insurance • West Marine • Enterprise Car Rental • Downunder Diving • Bamboushay Pottery • Golden Hind Chandlery • Rite Way Food Market• Yacht Shots Photography • Bluewater Divers • Life Raft & Survival • Hampton Visitors Bureau

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