The Valiant 32 was designed by Bob Perry as a smaller version of the successful Valiant 40. In the 1970s, a 30- to 35-foot boat was considered the optimum-size boat for a cruising couple. In response ...
People may be impressed by a millionaire’s rocketship, but “ooohs” and “aaahs” are saved for the classic. A British author once wrote, in effect, that you can go away for...
Whether constructed of steel or aluminum, metal yachts deserve a second look In the 1960s and early 1970s we rarely saw metal yachts in North American waters. Steel yachts had been built in Holland an...
The rig Americans made their own is still “scooning” after 300 years It’s not discreet to say this, but I’ve been having an affair, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. It...
Ted Brewer reviews the ins and outs and ups and downs of keel design The purpose of a keel, fin, or centerboard is to provide resistance to making leeway; in effect, to keep the yacht from sliding sid...
Check the pros and cons before you decide which tender is right for you The age-old question of what dinghy is best will never find a universal answer. Each boating situation has too many variables to...
At an age when many sailors retire, sell the house, move aboard, and go cruising, my wife, Dee, and I built a house, sold the boat, moved ashore for the first time in 25 years, and started a business....
Catalina Yachts: One big family Call the Woodland Hills headquarters of Catalina Yachts in California, and one thing strikes you right away about the choices the telephone answering system offers you....
Reading 200,000 Miles: A life of adventure, I had the sense of sitting over a cup of tea, below deck, with a sailing legend, while he enthusiastically told me everything I ever wanted to know about of...
… and two more proper little yachts Issue 127: July/Aug 2019 The McCurdy & Rhodes-designed Seafarer 26 is a proper little yacht, with full standing head-room, an enclosed head, a full galley...
A good and forgiving starter boat for coastal cruising Issue 127: July/Aug 2019 Rich Sutorius first became interested in sailing from watching a 1960s-era National Geographic special about Irving John...
On day 20 of a Pacific Ocean crossing, having long-since raided the fresh-food stores, my husband and I were subsisting on cans of chicken and “vegetable medley.” I know now that if I’d read St...
Have you ever heard the machine-gun rat-a-tat of halyards slapping masts? I have, quite often in my marina and marinas I visit. It occurred to me that some folks are oblivious to the need to qu...
When they were new, the four Rayovac 6-volt golf-cart (GC2) batteries on Phantom, our Pearson 365 ketch, had plenty of electrical capacity to provide all the power we needed to go three or more days b...
Orkney-born John Rae (1813-1893) acquired many of his survival skills and his toughness from an idyllic childhood. He became a surgeon for the Hudson Bay Company and soon thrived in the challen...
Anybody who lived through, and was part of, the extraordinary growth in offshore racing in the 1970s will be familiar with the name Ron Holland. He and his friend Doug Peterson, and later, German Frer...
. . . and fellow CCA-to-IOR transition boats Issue 126: May/June 2019 The late 1960s was a period of transition in the history of yachting, when fiberglass construction, combined with a secure and gro...
A distinctive big, fast sloop from the giant of West Coast boatbuilders Issue 126: May/June 2019 Craig Shaw’s search for a racing sailboat ended when he found a Columbia 43. That was 35 years ago. Tho...
Most of us know Michael Palin from his days with Monty Python’s Flying Circus, but he has also produced several superb BBC travel documentaries. It was probably his fame from the former and inv...
Peter Brennan has “wrung more salt water out of his socks than most of us have sailed over.” This memoir encompasses 10 voyages the author has made aboard his Pearson 30, Happy Times; on Mists ...
Over the past several years, the sailing community has been blessed with the publication of several excellent biographies of prominent yacht designers, including those of L. Francis Herreshoff by Roge...
Glen Patron was born, as he says, “on the wrong side of the docks,” and grew up on Great Neck, on Long Island, New York. As a young boy, Glen developed a love for all literature that had anything to d...
. . . and two true centerboarders Issue 125: March/April 2019 It is often said that all boats are compromises, but that is especially true with regard to cruising center-boarders when it comes to deci...
A true shoal-draft cruiser from the UK Issue 125: March/April 2019 When you are used to sailing a performance cruiser with a 7-foot draft, the prospect of spending winters in the shallow waters of Sou...
Jasna Tuta and her partner, Rick Page, are self-described sea gypsies, members of the water tribe who cruise the world’s oceans. Their first book, Get Real, Get Gone: How to Become a Modern Sea Gypsy ...
When I started reading this humorous take on boating and boaters, I expected more of the usual, but Dave Selby has a new and refreshing approach to the genre. The description on Amazon says a lot: “It...
“I feel my body gone glass, emptying and refilling with Arctic swell. Darkness and safety a trick of the mind, as distant as the long, light fields of home.” So writes Jenna Butler in Magnetic ...
Great Lakes sailor James Barry was inspired to write his first historical fiction novel by a true story he discovered while sailing among the islands of Lake Huron’s North Channel. The short ve...
On November 24th, 1995 the sturdy 47-foot Compass, Melinda Lee, sailed in 35-knot gusts and 8-foot seas at the end of a long passage and only 20-odd miles from her destination in New Zealand. Mike and...
This is a guide to everything you could possibly want to know about anchors and anchoring. Rigging Modern Anchors includes elegant illustrations and informative graphics and tables. Frye presents fact...
