The 39th Atlantic Rally for Cruisers (ARC) is officially underway, with a record-breaking 234 yachts leaving Gran Canaria to begin their 2,700-mile voyage to the Caribbean. Split across the ARC and ARC+ routes, the fleet showcases a vibrant mix of cruisers, racers, and multihulls, all setting their sights on Saint Lucia.

At 12:30 p.m. local time November 24th, 45 multihulls—the largest division ever for the ARC—were first to cross the starting line in a gentle southeast breeze. Leading the charge was Two Hoots, a Lagoon 400 helmed by Mark and Penny Belcher (GBR), with their sea dog Benji marking the first four-legged crew member to begin the journey. Close behind were Kenneth Frantz’s Fountain Pajot Elba 45 My Cherie Amour (USA) and Francesco Rongoni’s Neel 47 Ferdinand (FRA).

The IRC racing fleet followed at 12:45, highlighted by Jean Philippe Blanpain’s sleek Vismara 62 Leaps & Bounds 2 (MLT) and ARC racing veteran Jean Pierre Dick on his Swan 76 La Loévie (MLT). Mathias Mueller von Blumencron’s JV 43 Red 2 (CHE) and Johannes Schwarz’s Volvo 70 Ocean Breeze (AUT) rounded out the early contenders.

Finally, at 1:00 p.m., the cruising division enjoyed a smooth white-sail start as the wind picked up to 10–12 knots. The close competition at both ends of the line included Bengt Lyckåsen’s Mormor Alice (SWE) and Sebastian Gylling’s Swan 51 Eira (FIN). Meanwhile, Johanna Schalander aboard Greta (SWE) added a touch of cruising charm, baking and serving fruit pies as her yacht crossed the start.

World Cruising Club’s Paul Tetlow emphasized that the ARC is more about the journey than the finish line: “This is a marathon, not a sprint. Settle into your routines and enjoy the experience.” Weather expert Chris Tibbs predicts light southerlies veering through the day, encouraging many crews to aim for the traditional Cape Verde route before catching stronger trade winds.

Over the next few weeks, 820 sailors will face the challenges and joys of ocean voyaging. Some racing yachts may reach Saint Lucia in under 10 days, but for most cruisers, the crossing will take 14 to 21 days. No matter when they arrive, every crew will be warmly welcomed at IGY Rodney Bay Marina with a celebratory rum punch and congratulations from ARC’s iconic “yellow shirts” team.

Track the fleet’s progress on the YB Races app or at worldcruising.com as this global sailing tradition continues to unite adventurers on a shared Atlantic odyssey.

The post ARC 2024: Cruisers and Racers Embark on Atlantic Adventure appeared first on Cruising World.

Matthew Burzon was at the helm of the Swan 411 Albireo, offshore somewhere between Virginia and Bermuda, getting smashed in the face every few minutes.

The boat was making 7 or 8 knots in seas of 8 to 12 feet. Albireo is a well-cruised 1978 Sparkman & Stephens design, and this was happening in 2018, so there were no worries about whether the boat could handle the beating that Mother Nature was doling out. 

But the humans on board? That was a different story. 

“There’s big water out there,” Matthew recalls with a nervous chuckle. “You get wet. Every once in a while, a wave would hit, and it was the equivalent of taking a 5-gallon bucket of water to the face.”

Down below, his father, Steve Burzon—the boat’s owner and captain in charge of the trip—was out cold. Whatever had befallen Steve wasn’t seasickness, but it was something more powerful than a ­5-gallon bucket of water, and it was debilitating enough that the old salt decided that this journey on Albireo would be his last one offshore.

“I don’t know exactly what it was—­maybe just old age creeping in,” says Steve, who was 77 at the time. “I couldn’t perform. I couldn’t do anything. I would be in my bunk, back aft, and I remember Matt coming in. He’d say: ‘Dad, don’t get up. I’ll do your turn at the helm,’ or ‘I’ll cook dinner.’”

It’s not exactly how Steve or Matthew imagined that their first, and likely their last, father-son offshore sailing journey would be, especially after so many years of trying to make it happen. 

Steve and his wife, Nancy, had been ­sailors for what felt like forever, but Matthew’s experience on the boat with them was limited to coastal cruising, both as a kid and as a young adult. Steve had long wanted his son to join him out in bigger water, but Matthew was always in school or at work, running his recruiting business or volunteering as a firefighter. 

Finally, when Matthew was in his early 30s, this window of opportunity appeared. Steve needed to bring Albireo down from Lake Champlain in the Northeast United States to Sint Maarten in the Leeward Islands, which would become the boat’s new home. The plan was for Steve to cruise south to the Chesapeake Bay, then pick up Matthew and a few other hands, and from there, point the bow toward the warm ­waters of the Caribbean.

“I was pretty excited to get the call. It started this whole process of getting offshore foul-weather gear and all this stuff. I got all decked out,” Matthew says. “I was very excited. Dad had brought the boat down the Hudson River to Norfolk, Virginia. I was getting updates, which was building up the level of stoke.”

The plan was for 11 to 14 days at sea with no stops. The weather had other ideas, forcing Albireo and its crew to divert to Bermuda just as Steve’s health took a turn for the worse. 

And whatever was ailing Steve meant that Matthew and the rest of the crew would have to play bigger roles than any of them had anticipated, especially for his first time cruising offshore. 

A Lifetime of Learning

Fans of catamarans might recognize Steve, who is now 83, as an organizer and ambassador for the Caribbean Multihull Challenge on Sint Maarten. But for many, many years prior to that event being created, Steve was a monohull sailor based in the Northeast United States. 

He got started around age 16, while growing up in New England, and bought his first boat—a wooden 19-foot Cape Cod Knockabout—before he turned 20. That led him to a bookstore to find a title that might teach him to sail better. He brought the tome with him on the boat so that he could look things up along the way. He ended up having a blast.

As a young ad salesman, Steve kept ­sailing. He learned celestial navigation, figured out how to use a sextant, took jobs as a delivery skipper, and made his first offshore passage­—from Bermuda to Newport, Rhode Island. After doing a round-trip delivery from Connecticut to Maine on a Swan 411, he knew that was the boat of his dreams. He and his wife, Nancy, ended up buying it in 1984. 

That boat was Albireo. The couple would sail it from Maine to Grenada and all points in between, eventually with little Matthew in tow. Quite a lot of the time, Matthew would be asleep below, zonked out from the motion on the water.

Which was actually a relief to Steve and Nancy, given that the boy had, let’s call it, a relentless amount of energy. 

“Matt’s nickname is ‘Action Jackson,’” Steve says. “He’d swing from the handhelds like it was a gym.”

Matt played hockey. He liked stuff with engines that made noise and went fast. Being out on the sailboat, well, it quite ­literally put him to sleep.

“That was a lot of my childhood,” Matthew says. “But I loved going from destination to destination. I rode my bike all over the place—Nantucket, Stonington, everywhere. I think it was a mix of seasickness and trying to make a kid sit still.”

Steve adds: “My wife and I were into the romance of it, the beauty of it, and we brought our kid. We were forcing him to be with us, and he’d probably rather be driving his four-wheeler out in the yard.”

It wasn’t until Matthew got older that he realized the sailing itself could be exciting. Albireo was on Lake Champlain, and Matthew was between jobs trying to relocate back to Vermont, so Steve and Nancy let him live on board.

“Toward the end of that time, I would take my friends out and sail on Lake Champlain,” Matthew says. “That was the first time I realized, there’s something to this.”

So, when Steve called about the chance to head offshore together aboard Albireo, Matthew was finally ready to embrace the opportunity. 

Now, all they needed was the rest of the crew. Three more guys ought to do it, Steve figured, and a distant cousin of Matthew’s might be perfect.

Making It Happen

That cousin, Ben Fletcher, had gotten to talking with Steve at a family gathering. As it turned out, Ben and Steve had sailing in common. Ben had done the RORC Caribbean 600, as well as a big race in the Mediterranean, and had taught sailing too. 

“He’s a sailor,” says Steve, who figured that between Ben’s sailing know-how and Matthew’s mechanical brainpower, the two of them could figure out just about anything on the boat. “Matt is a mechanic. On this trip, Albireo was like 35 years old. Things go wrong. And Matt is agile. He’s an athlete. He can do anything physically. Ben was that same way.”

For the final two crewmembers, Steve tapped a couple of guys who used to work for his landscaping company. They, ­forevermore, shall be known only as “the two yahoos.”

“These guys used to dig holes for me, plant trees,” Steve says. “It turned out to be a big mistake. They were too immature to go away from Mommy and Daddy.”

But nobody knew that when Albireo set off for the Caribbean, and then Steve got sick. Matthew and Ben realized that they had to rise to the occasion as they looked out across the rising seas. 

“Ben was a competent leader, so he’d be on deck and I’d be down below,” Matthew recalls. “We’d get food together or whatever we had to do. We had to make all these adjustments—the lines that lash down the dinghy would come undone, and we’d have to keep an eye out for things like that. You build trust quickly with your crew. You wake up and say, ‘Good job.’ After that happens a few times, there’s camaraderie and trust.”

The two yahoos, well, they “kept you awake and entertained,” Matthew adds.

“Matt was watch captain for his watch, and Ben was watch captain for his watch,” Steve says. “They had brainpower and ­management skills.”

Ben and Matthew needed those skills for things such as navigating at night—again, not something that was part of Matthew’s typical program. He was at Albireo’s helm under pitch-black skies at 2 o’clock in the morning when the boat came upon a cruise ship.

Matthew lost his night vision. He was blinded.

“It was so bright—so bright,” he says. “I couldn’t tell which direction it was going. I couldn’t pick up on the red and green lights because there were just too many lights. I was close enough that their crew put the spotlight on me, so, yeah, that’s something when it happens.”

But finally, mercifully, they made it to Bermuda. They arrived at night, cruising in through the Town Cut and tying up at St. George’s. 

The two yahoos rented motorbikes and got themselves into a bunch of drunken trouble. That was the end of them. Ben was happy to get some sleep, as were Steve and Matthew—who later headed ashore for a shower, some lunch, and a couple of beers at the White Horse Pub & Restaurant. 

“It was like a little holiday. We stayed for a few days,” Steve says, adding that for the first time in their lives, the father and son seemed to have a better understanding of each other as people. “This was a father-son bonding experience. It was something I wish all the fathers in the world could have, that experience. It’s really special.”

And it will remain a special memory, never to be replaced, because Albireo—for the first time in Matthew’s life—is no ­longer part of the family. 

After owning the boat for nearly 40 years, Steve decided to sell it. After settling the boat in Sint Maarten, he found himself out in the waters around the island in 18 to 22 knots of steady, strong heavy wind. For the first time in a long time, he felt a little scared.

“I know I’m hooked in and everything, but going forward, I began to think, Maybe I should quit while I’m ahead,” he says. “It was a member of the family—two daughters, a son and a boat. That was the family. But that Swan is a very athletic boat. You need a lot of strength to be able to crank the winches. The gennie is gigantic in that design. I kind of began to feel like my balance wasn’t as good as it was. I was thinking that one of these days, I’m going to fall off the boat, and my poor wife is going to have to come back and get me.”

Helping to organize the Caribbean Multihull Challenge is now Steve’s passion. He and Nancy are getting to experience how the ocean feels from aboard catamarans—which are easier, stability-wise, on their aging bodies. 

Matt, meanwhile, is often out cruising aboard a 23-foot Boston Whaler Dauntless that he owns with his girlfriend, and looking forward to a time when he can share the family’s passion for offshore adventures with her.

“I’d love to get a sailboat,” Matthew says. “I think I’m not in the right phase of my life to get a sailboat—it would be challenging to be in southern Vermont with a sailboat. We like the Whaler. We trailer it around. We’re toying with the idea of doing a sailing photography outfit.” 

That’s definitely one thing that the Burzon men have in common: They find a way to get their boating fix. Steve is also a member of the Sint Maarten Yacht Club, which gives him access to all its boats from about 20 feet down to tiny dinghies. 

“I was thinking the other day,” Steve says, “I could get in a little boat and sail around Simpson Bay Lagoon.”

Matthew smiles. That sure sounds like fun to him too.

The post Buckets of Water, Waves of Change: A Father-Son Bond Forged Offshore appeared first on Cruising World.

Long-distance cruising isn’t for everyone, and there is no iron-clad argument that your partner will join you in cutting the dock lines. After all, your partner’s resistance might be based on a tangle of finances, fears, family, friends or physical worries. 

But there are some strategies that can help your partner transform reluctance into excitement. Getting my wife on board with my dreams of cruising adventures involved a slow, thoughtful process. I encouraged her to open her eyes to the wonder and possibility of bluewater cruising.

Here are four things I did that helped my partner accept and embrace the cruising life.

Make It Seem Normal

There’s no mainstream model for the cruising life, so it can be practically impossible to imagine. Most stories in the media about sailors include the word “rescue.” Making the idea of bluewater cruising more normal can also make it less scary. More manageable. More possible. And, ­eventually, more likely.

From the time Joy and I met, she was well aware of my passion for bluewater sailing. She was mildly interested, but in a way that could easily evaporate if I let it drop. So, I didn’t let it drop. 

I talked to her about my dream to sail oceans. We walked docks and boatyards. I shared passages from books, snippets of articles, and video clips. I always tried to remember that less is more. I didn’t want to overwhelm her. I wanted to make this extraordinary lifestyle seem almost ho-hum.

When we sailed our local waters for a few days or weeks, we chatted about what it might be like to go a bit farther. To stay out a little longer. Evenings at anchor lend themselves nicely to this kind of dream weaving.

Making the idea of bluewater cruising more normal can also make it less scary. More manageable. And, eventually, more likely.

I tried not to overdo it. I watched for signs that she was bored or overwhelmed. At first, those signs were anything but rare. When I could see that she’d had enough of the boat thing, I was happy to move on to other topics.

It took a long while, but all this talking and gawking, watching, roaming and reading helped her to normalize the idea of cruising. It wasn’t just my harebrained idea; it was something that people—regular people—actually chose to do.

Talk Less, Listen More

I asked her questions about the boats we saw. About the sailors we met. About the places she’d like to visit. About the opinions we heard. About how all this made her feel about the very idea of long-distance cruising.

And here’s the important part: I listened to her answers. I kept my mouth shut. (It was hard to do.) I redirected my impulse to interrupt into the simple motion of nodding my head. When she said that she was worried about leaving family and friends, I nodded. Just that. I didn’t try to minimize it, offer options or suggest solutions. I just nodded.

When she said she was frightened by the idea of being so far from land on such a tiny boat, I looked into her eyes and nodded. I could see her anxiety. I wanted so badly to say something, anything to minimize the fear. To make it better. To fix it. But I bit my tongue and focused on what she was sharing with me.

If listening like that comes easy for you, then you have a superpower. It sure doesn’t come easy for me.

What I learned is that if your partner can see that you get it, that you really understand their fears, anxieties and worries, then they can more easily let that stuff go. If you dismiss these issues by trying to fix them, by waving them off as irrational, then you force your partner to keep trying to explain, to keep trying to get you to understand. It’s a cruel cycle. And it gets you nowhere.

The big payoff from all this listening and incessant ­nodding is that I learned a lot. 

I learned that for her, cruising would be more about people than passages. I learned that feeling secure was more important than going fast. I learned that while simplicity is a virtue, she isn’t particularly into peeing in a bucket. I found out that she was excited by the process of provisioning. That she wasn’t even remotely intimidated by the challenge of creating delicious meals in a dinky galley. And that she had a deep and abiding fear of laundry.

A critical side note is that back then, she didn’t call it a galley. She called it a “kitchen.” And she called the head the “bathroom.” And she called the stateroom a “bedroom.” Resist, resist, resist the urge to correct your partner’s terminology. At least in the beginning. 

If you don’t, you’ll miss important stuff. The words will come.

Get Out of the Way

Give your partner the space they need to find their own way. This might actually be harder than the nodding thing, but it’s equally important.

Early on, I spent a lot of time sharing my love of sailing and cruising. I freely shared what I knew. What I thought. What I thought I knew. And when Joy expressed those first real glimmers of interest, I was ecstatic. 

It didn’t take long to ­recognize that my enthusiasm for cruising left little room for my partner to find her own excitement. I needed to temper my enthusiasm and let her make her own discoveries, reach her own conclusions. 

She attended a couple of sailing seminars for women, and I didn’t bug her for all the details. I saw a book about sailing on her nightstand, and I didn’t mention it. When she signed up to take a sailing class on her own, I resisted the urge to do cartwheels. 

If I wanted us to walk down this path together, I had to resist the urge to dash ahead of her. I needed to slow my pace to match hers. And in many cases, slow down enough to let her take the lead.

By slowing myself down, by getting out of her way, Joy was able to see details that I had just skimmed over. Or missed completely. Details that were important to her—and, subsequently, to us. 

Cede Control

Don’t let being “captain” go to your head (see: Bligh, William; captain, Royal Navy). Share the responsibilities whenever possible. 

And I’m not referring to the old trope of “blue jobs” and “pink jobs.” I’m not talking about “jobs” at all. 

Whenever possible, I let Joy take the lead. It works something like this: I make the ultimate decisions about departure windows and routes. I involve Joy in these decisions. We talk it through. I share my reasoning. I listen and act based on her concerns. But ultimately, I make those decisions.

Joy is OK with this, but she chafes at lacking control. So we created some balance. Joy controls our itinerary once we arrive in a country or an island group. She assumes the responsibility of deciding which atolls and anchorages we’ll explore.

To be clear, this is not a revolving dictatorship. We talk about all of this. We share points of view and trust each other to speak up if there is a problem. We make ­accommodations for each of our interests.

Joy was able to see details that I just skimmed over. Or missed completely. Details that were important to her—and, subsequently, to us.

We both need to feel in ­control. Neither of us is content to just be along for the ride. For us, this way of balancing control works quite well. And we’ve kept the balance of control as we’ve ­explored the Pacific from Mexico to New Zealand. 

Your results may vary. But if you can start with normalizing the idea of cruising and then truly listen to your partner’s concerns, you’ll be on your way. Give your partner space to explore various aspects of cruising on their own, and then identify areas where they can be in control. 

These deceptively simple steps can move you toward your cruising dream with an enthusiastic partner on board.

Harry Pattison and Joy Archer sail aboard a 44-foot Mason launched in 1988. They are circumnavigating the Pacific Ocean. When they’re at home, Pattison runs sail training for couples in and around Puget Sound. Learn more at ­matesfirst.com.

The post Cruising Couples & The Power of Shutting Up appeared first on Cruising World.

The documentary film 76 Days Adrift is now playing in select theaters and winning awards on the festival circuit. It’s based on The New York Times bestselling book Adrift: 76 Days Lost at Sea by former Cruising World staff editor Steven Callahan.

Directed and produced by Joe Wein, and produced by Ang Lee, the documentary recounts the night of February 4, 1982, when a catastrophic collision with a whale left Callahan’s boat sinking in the dead of night on the Atlantic Ocean. Callahan  had only moments to grab what he could before taking to his life raft with a basic emergency kit.

For 76 days, Callahan drifted across the ocean. The film documents how he confronted his deepest fears and limitations amid the raw power of nature, with a score by Fall Out Boy’s Patrick Stump.

Weir says he was inspired to direct the film after coming across the book in a used bookstore.

“I bought it on a whim, hoping it would serve as a temporary escape,” he reveals on the film’s website. “I had no idea that what started as a distraction would resonate so deeply. … His struggles mirrored my own—a man grappling with his identity, wrestling with the world around him, and pushing his limits sometimes beyond the point of reason. He found himself in an unthinkable situation, adrift in the middle of the Atlantic, confined to a life raft so small he couldn’t even stretch out fully. His raft was failing, leaking air, with no food or water left. The search for him had been called off; he was presumed dead. Alone, attacked by sharks in the dead of night, facing the most harrowing of circumstances, it seemed more comforting to let go, to slip quietly into the ocean rather than endure a slow, torturous demise.

“Yet, Steven never saw himself as a hero. When I asked him how he persevered, his answer was simple—he was more terrified of dying than comforted by it.”

Where to view the trailer and purchase tickets to a screening: visit 76daysadrift.com for tickets to upcoming screenings of the film, as well as to watch the trailer.

The post Now Playing: <i>76 Days Adrift</i> appeared first on Cruising World.

The International Yacht Brokers Association (IYBA) has announced the launch of a comprehensive new database for yachts and boats of all sizes in a consumer-facing marketplace, Yachtr.com.

Powered by Yachtbroker.org, Yachtr gives brokers a new option to list their yachts, and potential buyers an intuitive platform to browse yachts and boats for sale worldwide. Yachtr is the result of several years of software development backed by industry associations and led by IYBA.

Once users visit the website, they can search verified listings that are for sale by category: motor yachts, cruisers, fishing boats or sailboats; by broker or by yacht manufacturer. The association’s From The Bridge blog contains a host of educational posts on topics such as: What is a Sea Trial and Why is it Important?, How to Hire the Right Captain for Your Yacht and Boat Insurance 101: Types of Coverage Every New Boat Owner Should Know. Users can also subscribe to have new articles sent directly to their email. Users interested in selling a vessel can be connected directly to professional brokers by searching either by name, city or zip code.

“Yachtr is taking control from private enterprise solutions and putting it back in the hands of the community,” said Paul Flannery, Chief Operating Officer, IYBA. “We have heard concerns from our members, and we believe that Yachtr addresses and solves the challenges that current listing sites present. We want to provide a platform that is accessible to all, and inherently fair in its approach to displaying listings. Yachtr is and always will be an industry resource, meant to better serve our community and the needs of the boat buying and selling public. We firmly believe that if the industry can be able to control their data that they will then be able to control their destiny and provide an enhanced consumer experience. Help us spread the word about a better way to buy and sell yachts where you’re always in control of your data.”

According to an IYBA spokesperson, Yachtr saw a 25 percent increase in listings during the first 30-day period. Currently, Yachtr offers over 14,000 listings from 285 yacht brokerages, with listings growing every day.

The post Brokerage Platform “Yachtr” Launches appeared first on Cruising World.

What do we do while off-watch, or during the heat of midday anchored in a tropical cove? We stretch out in the cockpit, under the awning, and read.

The ship’s library is as important as the pantry to the crew’s well-being. Stocking both requires some serious thought.

It would be a shame to go sailing through the Caribbean without historical and cultural context. Before Street and Doyle began writing guides, dozens of books told of adventures and life sailing in the West Indies. Growing up on a lake as a teen in the 1950s,  I was messing about in small boats and reading about adventures in Yachting and Rudder magazines. Jules Vern’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea was the first novel I read all the way through. I was 14. I still have that book, with my handwritten notes inside.

That same year, my mother found an evening course for me to take, hosted by the US Power Squadrons. Piloting, Seamanship & Small Boat Handling by Charles Chapman was the textbook. I still have that book, too, and still use the knowledge and skills I learned. 

In high school, I began reading about my maritime heroes: Horatio Hornblower, Sir Francis Drake. Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island introduced me to young Jim Hawkins. I learned about scattering carpet tacks on the deck at night to repel unwanted boarders while reading Jack London’s South Sea Tales. In 1966, The National Geographic Society published Isles of the Caribbees by sailor Carleton Mitchell. It’s about a winter’s voyage aboard the yacht Finisterre, sailing from island to island. The book is lavishly illustrated by National Geographic photographers. The images got me dreaming of sailing through the tropics, and of becoming a photographer myself.

I bought my first boat, Quinta, a 34-foot wooden Alden sloop, when I got back from Vietnam and landed a paying job as a newspaper editor. Three more sailboats followed as my adventures grew more ambitious and my skills increased.  My library grew, too.

Heavy Weather Sailing by Peter Bruce and K. Adlard Coles is there; so are Don Street’s many books, including The Ocean Sailing Yacht, and Street’s Cruising Guide to the Eastern Caribbean. It was John Ridgway’s book Round the World with Ridgway that convinced me a Bowman 57 ketch was the boat I’d been dreaming of since I was a teen. I was in my mid-50s when Searcher came into my life, taking me to the Caribbean three times over the course of 14 years.

James Michener’s 1989 novel Caribbean will provide enough reading to fill an entire season in the islands. More contemporary authors, such as Peter Nichols, John Kretschmer, Beth Leonard, Lin and Larry Pardey, Charles Doane and Herb McCormick continue to write about a life sailing. I’ve not even gotten around to the technical and DIY books that need space in any ship’s library.

During my years of messing about in boats, my marine library has grown to fill a bookcase. Boxes are stuffed with past issues of Cruising World, SAIL, Sailing World, Sailing, Yachting—even a collection of Nautical Quarterly.

A few years ago, I was rummaging around the library at Libby Nicholson’s Pineapple House in English Harbour on Antigua. I stumbled onto Richard Dey’s book Adventures in the Trade Wind. It’s a true story about Morris Nicholson, an English chap who fled the UK after the war and sailed to the Caribbean. He worked his way up and down the island chain and eventually became a charter captain on one of the Nicholson schooners out of English Harbour. This is a story about island life before bareboats, GPS and tourism. I swapped it for one of my books I’d just finished.

I have Dey’s book with me here as I write this column. Curious about the writer, I reached out to Sally Erdle, founder and long-serving editor of Caribbean Compass, a magazine to which I frequently contribute.

“Richard Dey has written for the Compass,” she replied. “In fact, Richard compiled two very well-researched bibliographies on the literature of the Caribbean. We published them in 1999 and 2000.”

You’ll find Dey’s two bibliographies in the Compass archive, here and here.

I also just finished Carleton Mitchell’s The Winds Call, published in 1971. I can’t wait to read whatever comes next. 

David H. Lyman is an author and award-winning marine journalist who contributes regularly to Cruising World, Caribbean Compass and other magazines. Find him at DHLyman.com.

The post The Ship’s Library: Add These Essential Reads for Caribbean Cruising appeared first on Cruising World.

“Dear Mr. Parkinson: I’ve been a loyal Cruising World reader since the beginning.” 

Since the day I began at the editor’s desk almost three years ago, I’ve probably received more than two dozen letters from readers that started with these exact words. Naturally, when a letter from a reader leads with the phrase “since the beginning,” I tend to sit up a bit straighter in my chair, set down the coffee, and pay close attention.  

Still, I couldn’t fully appreciate the gravity that those words carried until this magazine snuck up on its golden anniversary and I took a deep dive down memory lane. 

For fun, I’ve been spending my nights and weekends this summer combing through 18 boxes of Cruising World archives dating back to the very first issue. Fifty years ago, an Aussie sailor named Murray Davis launched Cruising World on a shoestring budget and a whole lot of hope. It was a new voice for the cruising sailor dedicated to the great life afloat that came at a time when racing competition largely carried the headlines. 

For me, those early issues of Cruising World offer a fascinating snapshot of a time that feels both familiar and distant. As I turned fragile page after page, I was struck by how much has changed about cruising over the years, yet how much remains the same. 

Back then, gear was as basic as it gets. A compass, a paper chart and a healthy dose of seamanship were all you really needed to set sail—well, that and a boat of course. VHF radios were a luxury, and the idea of a GPS was pure science fiction. We’ve come a long way, but the core of the magazine has always remained the same. It’s about the journey itself, not just the means or the destination. 

I can’t say I’ve been a Cruising World reader since those early days—I was still a twinkle in my mother’s eye back when the magazine was born—but I sure remember the day I became one. I was 10 years old and really into sailboats at my first Newport International Boat Show back in ’86. My eyes were as wide as winches. We didn’t come home with a boat, but we did sign up for a subscription. 

Those first issues arrived in our mailbox like a lifeline to a kid dreaming of what lay beyond the breakwater of our local inlet on the Connecticut shoreline. I wasn’t cruising yet. Just the son of a sailor dad, but the articles about how to sail and all the faraway places you could go once you learned ignited a fire that’s never really gone out.

When my parents finally took the plunge into sailboat ownership in the ’90s, the tech revolution was just beginning. VHF radios, wind instruments, depth sounders and GPS were standard accessories. Yet, I rarely met a serious cruiser who didn’t have a sextant, either on board or back at home.

While I appreciate the comforts of modern cruising, I imagine that there’s a large contingent of longtime Cruising World readers who still yearn for the simpler days. I get it. Yet, change is inevitable. It’s hard to deny the allure of technology when it comes to safety and efficiency. As long as we remember the core skills of seamanship, these advancements can only enhance our cruising experiences. And as you’ve probably noticed, the way we cover them has evolved significantly as well.

Friends, with our October 2024 issue, the Cruising World brand is 50 years strong. It seems like an eternity, and at the same time, for many of those “since the beginning” readers, probably fleeting. In my time here, I’ve found that the true lifeblood of this magazine has less to do with names on a masthead, and more to do with our extraordinary community of cruising enthusiasts, contributors and readers who fuel it—lending each issue their technical expertise, their tales of adventure, and their shared love for the cruising experience.

Through all the years, we’ve met some neat people and heard some incredible stories. With your enduring passion to wonder and wander, I’m eager to see what the next 50 years will bring.

One thing’s for sure: The journey will be the adventure.

The post Gold Standard: <i>Cruising World</i> Turns 50 appeared first on Cruising World.

After six months aboard their 47-foot Bruckmann, Althea, Brad and Cara Read are returning to land life—with some reluctance. Sailing back into Rhode Island’s Newport Harbor, Brad thought of the French sailor who, instead of claiming victory in the 1968 Golden Globe Race, ­decided to keep sailing around the world. “Would I have done the Bernard Moitessier thing and kept going? I think I would have; I like living on a boat. But we had to go back to work.” 

Cara, who spent her teenage years living on her parents’ cruising boat, is more practical: “I would have extended it for maybe two months, just because it’s cold here.”

 The Reads are lifelong sailors and marine-industry veterans. In six months, they logged 5,000-plus miles, mostly on their own, clockwise around the western Atlantic. 

They definitely weren’t quite ready to become liveaboards in 2019, when Althea went up for sale. Brad has been Sail Newport’s executive director for more than 25 years, and Cara calls herself “the bookkeeper” for several small marine businesses. But the boat’s previous owner made them an offer they couldn’t refuse, so they bought a boat that was more than they really needed in and around southern New England. 

Three years later, a good friend died—and that sparked this sabbatical. “We did it because we’re young enough, healthy enough now,” Cara says. “But we’re not in any position to retire.”

Thanks to Starlink, both were able to stay in touch with their jobs. “It changed our world,” Cara says. When they weren’t offshore, she worked about 10 hours a week—or more when hunkered down, waiting for a storm to pass. 

“It’s really hard to leave cold turkey and then come back,” she says. “And the more you work away from the office, the more efficient you get, especially when there’s a carrot at the end like, ‘I want to go snorkeling.’”

Getting Ready

Before heading south, they made several upgrades. Brad says that the three most important were a watermaker, autopilot and furling inner forestay.

“Double headsails was one of the most important and smartest things we did right,” he says, adding that they call the smaller headsail “Cara’s sail.” 

“Brad loves the big sails because he likes to go fast,” Cara says. “But down in the Caribbean, staysail and full main or even a reefed main was the perfect combination. We’d get overpowered with the big jib and pull out the little one, and Brad would be like: ‘Well, we’re not going any slower. You got your wish; your sail is the right sail.’”

Three months before departure, Althea took a direct lightning strike on her mooring in Newport Harbor. Luckily, only the electronics—and a charred Ida Lewis Yacht Club burgee—needed replacing. The Reads were able to depart on schedule. In late October, they sailed out of Narragansett Bay for a three-day passage to Bermuda, accompanied by Brad’s brother, who is a champion sailor many times over, and his wife.

“Kenny and Melissa were great,” Brad says, before admitting to a tiny bit of fraternal drama. Chased by a storm, they entered St. George’s, Bermuda, at night—without a route programmed into the new chart plotter. 

“So, Kenny’s down below, telling me which way to turn,” Brad recalls.

“And with the engine on, you can’t hear anything down there,” Cara adds. 

“That’s when I got a little testy,” Brad says. “I need more information!” 

“When we first left, we needed other people,” Cara says. “And I wanted to learn from Kenny—what a rare opportunity.” But after the leg from Bermuda to St. John in the US Virgin Islands, she says, “We were like, ‘Yeah, we’re good.’” Their kids came for Christmas and a few other visits, “but the rest of the time, it was just us with minimal bickering.”

Their longest doublehanded passage was a five-day sail from the Bahamas to Virginia. Any longer, Cara says, and “I think Brad would have gotten really tired. He feels like he has all the ­responsibility, so he doesn’t really sleep well. And when you’re tired, you don’t make good decisions.”

Learning Underway

Doublehanding required fine-tuning their sailhandling, Cara says. Hoisting the main, “I would hump the halyard, and Brad would tail it. It’s a little tricky getting the fully battened main between the lazy jacks, but I would never go cruising without lazy jacks.” 

The water, Brad recalls, went from 15,000 feet to 40 feet in a matter of boatlengths. “That scared me,” he says. 

They also had to manage diesel ­consumption. On the passage from Bermuda to St. John, they ran out of fuel—verifying their theory that the tank was much smaller than specified. “When we bought the boat, they said we had 90 ­gallons,” Cara says. “We have 42.”

Fortunately, they carried jugs, and a crewmember on that leg was a mechanic. “After that,” Cara says, “we always kept 10 gallons in the bank because we didn’t want to have a situation where we couldn’t motor in an enclosed area.” Sometimes that meant reducing their daily progress offshore.

“Every boat is a compromise,” Brad says. 

Both Reads mention the US Virgin Islands landfall as a highlight of their cruise. On the five-day passage south, Cara says, “it got warmer and warmer and warmer every day, nicer and nicer. And the water got more and more blue.”

They sailed into Francis Bay on St. John at 2 in the morning. After celebratory beers and stargazing, the rest of the crew headed below for some much-needed rest—but Brad stayed in the cockpit. 

“I didn’t sleep a wink,” he says. “The moon was up, I could see the outlines of those beautiful hills, and it was just like, ‘Holy crap, we’re here.’ That was my best moment, and not by a little bit. It was just exactly what I wanted.”

Cara has a harder time picking a ­favorite moment, though she also really enjoyed the Virgin Islands—and other cruising benefits. “We lost weight,” she says. “Not sure why, though on the boat, even just sitting there, you’re always gimbaling. And you just eat less when it’s hot. Though you drink plenty.”

Challenges and Lessons

Their first major equipment breakdown happened on the passage south, when a weld started to fail on the boom’s gooseneck. They also broke two seacock handles, and one was in the closed position.

“We came up with a fix,” Brad says. “And Cara was a little reluctant on this—”

“I was,” she says. “We’re in the middle of nowhere. We could sink if things go—”

“We’re at anchor, in a beautiful place,” Brad interjects, explaining how he swam down and plugged the hole from the ­outside. “Undid everything, got the seacock off—”

“What if when you’re unscrewing it, something else broke?” Cara says. “What if, when you’re putting it back… I was freaking out. Brad’s like, ‘It’ll be fine.’” 

“And it was,” Brad says with a chuckle. “I saw it on YouTube.” Cara adds that they learned a new definition of cruising: “boatwork in glamorous places.” 

For her, the weather was the biggest challenge, especially in the Bahamas.

“The Bahamas are really low,” she says. “There’s no place to hide. And our 6-foot draft limited where we could go. That was a huge thing.”

Brad’s worst moment was on the passage from Puerto Rico to the Turks and Caicos. The couple had planned to leave the Turks to starboard, but after a few jibes to avoid Silver Bank, Brad opted for a more direct northerly route—which sent them out into a 2-knot adverse current that was bucking the strong easterly breeze.

“The currents are not well-documented,” he says. “Not only were we going slower, but it was also a pretty bad sea state. I got really mad at myself for
second-guessing the original plan.”

Studying the chart again, they cut back in to calmer waters before facing their next challenge: a skinny channel between an island and a reef.

“And it was at night,” Cara says. 

The water, Brad recalls, went from 15,000 feet to 40 feet in a matter of boatlengths. “That scared me,” he says. “We put ourselves in a tough spot—or I put ourselves in a tough spot. But as it turns out, it was fine. We got right through, and it was nice and smooth water on the other side.”

Unlike Cara, Brad had never lived on a boat before this past winter. “I did two weeks with the family when I was a kid,” he says, “and then some 10-day cruises with our kids. But never out of sight of land. All coastal cruising. It’s different.” 

Now he’s hungry for more adventures, including a return to the Chesapeake. “All the nooks and crannies,” he says. “I felt like we missed that because we had to get back to work.” 

Maybe next time, he’ll finally have his “Moitessier moment” and just keep sailing.

The post More, Please: Life After Six Months at Sea appeared first on Cruising World.

It was the last Monday of November 1979. I was a year out of college and somewhat adrift. Through an old high school friend, I’d landed an entry-level job at a new business that was hiring local yokels on the cheap in my hometown of Newport, Rhode Island. It was my first day as the new ­receptionist at Cruising World magazine. 

Little did I know when I answered my first phone call that my life was about to significantly change. In unimaginable ways. 

Five years earlier—precisely five decades ago this month—the first issue of Cruising World had made its debut at the US Sailboat Show in Annapolis, Maryland. It was the right magazine at the right time, riding the wave of a revolution in production-sailboat manufacturing. Publisher and editor Murray Davis was an affable Aussie who’d first visited Newport as a newspaperman covering the America’s Cup. His hell-on-wheels English wife, Barbara, managed the ever-expanding office. She terrified everyone but for some reason found me amusing. 

If she hadn’t, it would’ve been a quick end to this story. Instead, fatefully, I’d stumbled into a welcoming place full of happy, creative, nurturing souls. Somehow I’d tripped straight into my life’s work. 

My first big break came when I found a typo in a press release I wasn’t supposed to be reading while taking it to the printer. That got me kicked upstairs to the editors’ offices with a new title: editorial assistant. Proofreader to the stars! 

I wasn’t much of a writer, but knocking off dozens of papers as a history major at a fine liberal-arts institution had taught me some skills. The notion of using them professionally had never once crossed my mind. I’d played college football and thus could mindlessly grind winches, but I was even less of a sailor, my experience limited to some informal beer-can racing out of the Newport Yacht Club. 

That was also about to change. 

I’d have many mentors in the following years, but none more influential than my first two, both Great Lakes sailors: Dale Nouse, the magazine’s executive editor and a hard-nosed former reporter at the Detroit Free Press, and senior editor Dan Spurr, who’d sailed his Pearson Triton from Lake Michigan to join the staff. Nouse taught me how to compose a story. Spurr taught me how to sail. I learned a ton just by reading their always polished prose. 

I instantly fell in love with all of it. Sailing had everything I was after: travel, adventure, fun, competition and, of course, the wild blue yonder. Writing became a quest, to hone my craft to the best of my abilities. I came to see both pursuits as interlocked, inseparable. I couldn’t get enough of either.

Oh, the people I met and sailed with: Danny Greene, Robin Knox-Johnston, Alvah Simon, Gary Jobson, Mark Schrader and, of course, Lin and Larry Pardey. The Pardeys and I became such great, trusted pals that they asked me to pen their biography, As Long As It’s Fun. Such an honor. Still the best thing I ever wrote.

And, oh yes, the races that followed: Newport Bermuda, the Transpac, Pacific Cup, Sydney Hobart, Around Ireland, and literally hundreds of J/24 races (all with that old high school buddy, Ian Scott, who’d helped launch my improbable journey). Finally, holy cow, the places I sailed: across the Atlantic, down to Antarctica, through the Northwest Passage, around Cape Horn (twice), up and down the Caribbean, all the way around North and South America on an epic 13-month, 28,000-nautical-mile odyssey. Crazy. 

On this special anniversary, I’m amazed and grateful. After all this time and all those miles, Cruising World is still going strong…and I still get to contribute. I believe that Murray, Barbara and Dale—all long gone now—would be proud. And me? The luckiest of lucky lads. 

Back in the day, Dale critiqued every syllable of everything I wrote. He offered plenty of advice, the most memorable of which concerned wrapping up a story. He believed that a solid conclusion was the true key to any successful piece. And he was always praiseworthy whenever any of us, his colleagues and pupils, stuck the landing. 

“It’s the most important thing,” he’d say, time and again. “You’ve got to know how to get off the stage.”

Herb McCormick is a CW editor-at-large.  

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ARC Season 2024 is officially underway, with the first boats preparing to depart soon. Some 1,300 people on 240 yachts are expected to sail in the ARC and ARC+ transatlantic rallies. They are gathering now in the Canary Islands, where they will prepare before sailing across the Atlantic to the Caribbean in November.

This will be the 39th edition of the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers from Las Palmas de Gran Canaria to St. Lucia, and the 12th edition of the ARC+ rally, which sails from Las Palmas to Cape Verde and then to Grenada.

Both rallies attract sailors of all nationalities, ages and backgrounds, on a variety of yachts from custom builds to production family cruisers. Multihulls are increasingly popular, with a record 46 catamarans and two trimarans listed for the ARC, and 26 multihulls registered for ARC+.

Some 94 yachts are registered for ARC+ to Grenada, and 146 for ARC to St. Lucia, with 1,300 crew from 38 countries ages 9 months to 83 years.

In fact, 53 children younger than 16 are expected to cross the Atlantic this year with the ARC rallies. ARC+ via Cape Verde is the more popular route with families, as the stop in the islands provides opportunities for exploring new places. There are 19 family boats with 37 children scheduled to sail the ARC+ route, with 16 children on eight boats in the ARC.

The children hail from 10 nations and include three sets of twins. All children 6 to 16 years old can join the complementary ARC kids’ club in Las Palmas, giving parents time to make final preparations. Rally activities in Las Palmas begin two weeks ahead of each rally start.

The safety inspections, cruising seminars and activities such as a liferaft demonstration and sextant workshop all help to build bonds among the sailors.

More than 60 boat manufacturers and brands are represented across the ARC fleets, from Allures to X-Yachts, with Beneteau and Jeanneau leading at 18 and 16 entries, respectively.

The smallest yacht registered this year is Hallberg-Rassy 340 Aria Legra, and the largest is the Southern Wind 105 No Rush.

After departing Las Palmas on November 10, the ARC+ fleet will make landfall in Mindelo on São Vicente in the Cape Verde islands, 850 nautical miles and five to seven days’ sailing away. Then, on November 22, the fleet will head 2,150 nautical miles west to St George’s in Grenada, which should take around 12 to 16 days. The final prizegiving is December 12 on Grenada.

As for the ARC fleet, it will sail on November 24 from Las Palmas some 2,800 nautical miles direct to Rodney Bay in St. Lucia, a voyage of 18 to 21 days for most boats. The prizegiving takes place on December 21.

Which boats will finish first? Eleven yachts are racing under the IRC this year for racing purposes. The ARC record from Las Palmas to St. Lucia with no motoring was set in 2016 by George David’s Rambler 88 in eight days, six hours, 29 minutes and 12 seconds.

Potential first-finishers this year include the Volvo 70 Green Dragon, the Vismara 62 Leaps & Bounds 2 and the Swan 76 La Loévie, which is skippered by three-time ARC racing division winner Jean-Pierre Dick.

Where to learn more: visit worldcruising.com.

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