When a pond and a river were heaven on earth Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 I grew up on an old farm in Connecticut. A hundred yards behind the house was what we called “the cow pasture” — a boggy area beyon...
Wintertime on the Great Prairie Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Parade rest! The voice shouted at me from long ago and far away. Haulout on the northern prairie is a melancholy time. There was a light frost o...
Out with liquid soap, in with GPS Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 With prices becoming more reasonable, I broke down and purchased a handheld GPS. I chose a Garmin GPSMap 76. Handhelds eat batteries, so I pur...
Detecting that faulty bilge-pump switch Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 If you have never had a bilge level switch fail, sooner or later it’s bound to happen. For a few bucks you can buy a stand-alone, batter...
Upholstering for those who hate to sew Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 My husband, Chris, and I have been sailing in the Pacific Northwest for 15 years on a variety of sailboats. We look for older sailboats t...
How to move your stranded boat by human power Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 My edition of the Oxford English Dictionary lists the origin of the word “kedge” as “uncertain” but goes on to describe it as “a v...
Emergency kit saves boat after sailor drills hole in hull Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 A fellow sailor told me he was installing a new water-tank fill pipe and almost sank his boat. He said he was tired of...
An Alaskan summer idyll Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 What are your favorite sailing memories? Do you flip through last summer’s mental photo album searching for a scene to replay that’ll get you through a ...
Marine surveyor Tim Lackey makes a name for himself Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 How puffed up would you feel if almost 3,000 people a month admired your handiwork? Tim Lackey’s boat projects get at least ...
Converting an awkward quarter berth into a handy cockpit locker Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Our Bristol 29.9, Quintessence, was built in 1978 when most builders’ brochures made much of how many people a b...
An unconventional catboat with the advantages of small size Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Allow me to interject an opinion in search of a premise: it is easier to travel from the cockpit to the bow on a 25-...
Keep your batteries topped up with a slow but steady charge Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 On a bright, sunny day, with the sun directly overhead, the sun supplies about 1,000 watts of energy per square mete...
The boat sleeps under snow now, but tropical sunsets will follow Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 It’s a cold New England winter morning. I’m up early to get a few sights of Jupiter before the morning twilight...
Home canning is the answer for fridge-less cruisers Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 On Lake Superior’s north shore one brilliant sunny day we met a lovely young couple who informed us that, in spite of having...
How to equip your boat for the wild blue yonder Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Visit a marina, yacht club, or boat show, and you will meet or hear of sailors who are planning a long cruise or circumnavigatio...
The basic rules of anchoring — and staying put Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Everyone who owns a boat have occasion to anchor at one time or another, perhaps when cruising overnight, clamming, fishing, swim...
A pioneering designer of many early production fiberglass sailboats Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Philip L. Rhodes (1895 -1974) was one of the most distinguished yacht designers of the past century. Indicat...
How changes can affect the strength of a rig Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 In recent weeks I’ve had several inquiries from boatowners asking for advice on mast rigging. Their questions prompted me to write ...
A major refit for a 1967 Ted Hood 24-foot trailersailer Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 She was a wreck. When I first saw her, she was sitting on a derelict trailer with two flat tires. Her hull was faded fro...
Built for comfort with Robert Perry performance Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 If you and your spouse have ever designed and built a house (one of the few activities that rivals a married couple trying to an...
A shoal-draft schooner for family cruising Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Finding three similar boats for comparison purposes is never simple, but finding three to compare with a keel/centerboard schooner wa...
He’s a jack of all trades and master of most Issue 46 : Jan/Feb 2006 Renaissance man was not a term in use when Good Old Boat contributing editor Don Launer was growing up prior to World War II. It wa...
Soon a dream of escape will come true Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 I have a large dog. She’s a Rottweiler/shepherd mix: no tail, like a Rott, but looks like a shepherd in the face. At my yard, here i...
And we’re keeping this one to ourselves Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 In the summer of 2004, the largest U.S. sailing magazine ran a list of the top 10 towns that are perfect for sailors: “Sailville, USA,” ...
Here’s a handier way to keep it in place Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 Our boat has halyard winches to port and starboard near the base of the mast and another winch on the boom for the outhaul and reefs. I...
An automatic cycle counter for next-to-nothing Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 Living in Colorado, with my Pearson 424 tied up in New Bern, North Carolina, I sometimes awaken in a cold sweat, wondering if my ...
Classic varnish solves boater’s problem Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 Any owner of a good old boat will, at some time or another, be confronted with the sight of brightwork that no longer lives up to the na...
Use these socks on your portlight screens Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 I dream of there mass extermination but, alas, it remains a dream — no-see-ums (midges, punkies, sand flies, and sand fleas) are a fac...
Or how a desperate sailor drilled out a sheared stud Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 So there we knelt, staring at the bolt head in my hand in horror. What was once a beautiful 5⁄16-inch x 3-inch bolt was now...
It’s easy to help these pesky pests on their way Issue 47 : Mar/Apr 2006 Drat those wretched fruit flies! Here’s an odd, but quick and effective, way of dispatching them. Keep a plastic bag with...
