VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: [1], 2, 3, 4 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 12:43:52 02/02/09 Mon
Author: Ari
Subject: Re: Engineless Sailing Motto
In reply to: robert 's message, "Re: Engineless Sailing Motto" on 12:12:24 02/01/09 Sun

Well, I'll respectfully disagree with your general premise.

Being an SF Bay sailor also, I would heartily agree that you cannot ignore currents around here.

But....

Unlike weather, currents are 100% predictable. Engineless sailing really means that tidal currents are not a minor detail of the trip. In come cases, they ARE the trip, or at least a significant part of the groundspeed for the trip.

Saying you need an engine to stem a 6 knot tidal current is like saying you need a gasoline-powered pogo stick to help you get up an escalator that's going down... Rather than brute force, how about a little forethought and finesse?

This is not hypothetical - I'll readily admit to miscalulating the tide near the Richmond-San-Rafael bridge (on more than one occasion even). The only cure is to admit you've fucked up, turn around, and come up with a better plan. Usually that involves killing time by tacking around or anchoring until the current changes.

In a non-auxiliary sailboat, you simply cannot say "Well, screw the external conditions of the world around me, I'm going from point A to point B whenever I bloody want to!"

I will agree that motors make most boaters safer most of the time, kinda sorta. But it is crazy to see sailboats getting towed home in perfect sailing conditions. My buddy saw it the other day: a 30-odd-foot sailboat getting towed DOWN the Alameda estuary with 10 knots of steady breeze on her stern. Sunny day. Slack tide. Sail cover on the main and rolling jib furled. He's not even an engineless sailor and he spontaneously started yelling "Shame, shame." Like Bill's motto about sailors, not sailboats, needing engines, it seems to me that when we consider auxiliary failure in such benign circumstances as a calamity requiring outside help, that we've lost something pretty profound as sailors!!!

I'll also admit that sailing engineless (on a big boat) frankly means that you'll sail less. But when you do sail, the quality of the experience is (in my opinion) greatly enhanced and intensified. You plan more. You maneuver more. (Think of it this way: many of our neighbours in the Alameda estuary motor out to the bay, raise sails, tack a few times, and jibe a few times home. By the time we leave the estuary we've tacked 50-100 times depending on current. Is it a pain in the arse? Sometimes. Do we have our tacks down? Hell yeah!) You notice and react more. (I can tell if the slot in front of the golden gate is ebbing or flooding even without a tidebook or taking ranges by the shape of the chop, the color, even the smell of the water. I ain't claiming some heroic mystical powers -- lots of folks can, but it represents progress for me I couldn't do it until I started sailing engineless.)

My wife and I sail big and little boats engineless (everything from 16 ton Macha to an 8 foot Fatty Knees) and with engines (everything from J24's and to J105's and Ultimate 24's) And while it is definitely 10 times easier to take a J-boat with an engine out for a spin after work, I learn 10 times as much every time we take Macha out.

I also totally agree with the concept of "waterman" life. I love to windsurf and longboard and I'm interested in learning to fish, dive, etc. I see this happening with my friends too: you start with one ocean-related-hobby and soon, rather than just that one sport, you start to fall madly in love with the ocean itself. Not sure why, but clearly it's been going on for thousands of years...

In my case, I don't see diesel maintenance as part of that ideal lifestyle. Honestly, when going from my last boat (that had a Universal diesel with a few quirks), I realized that I was faced with a choice: either become a competent diesel mechanic or learn with sail without an engine. Otherwise you're in the position of relying on a system that you don't fully understand and can't fix. At the end of the day it was probably an aesthetic choice that tipped me in the direction of sailing engineless rather than trying to become an amateur mechanic. And we'll probably never settle a debate about aesthetic choices.

When you say "Not every one has the sailing skills and knowledge that Mr. Fitzgerald has", I totally agree. But, the point is, they could if they wanted to... :-)

- Ari

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

  • Re: Engineless Sailing Motto -- Bill, 22:26:17 02/02/09 Mon
  • Re: Engineless Sailing Motto -- Ari, 16:02:10 02/04/09 Wed
  • Dead on. -- Jay, 10:12:01 02/25/09 Wed
    [ Contact Forum Admin ]

    Forum timezone: GMT-8
    VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
    Before posting please read our privacy policy.
    VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
    Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.