Sail Far Live Free

...the object of cruising is to make a complete change of surroundings, a change for  the eyes, ears, and nose...a cabin should be very different from a city apartment... you should not lug along what you are trying to leave behind... -L. Francis Herreshoff (boat designer, naval architect, and author) Our big cruise for this summer is nearly upon us. My anticipation is building like the waves of a storm as they roll over a shallow sandbar. We plan to head north out of Muskegon with a very loose goal of eventually crossing Lake Michigan and exploring Wisconsin's Door County Peninsula. But as any experienced cruising sailor knows, the winds dictate the destination and we only control the journey. Even if we don't end up in Door County we'll bare in mind Herreshoff's quote and remember that we're doing this for "a complete change of surroundings, a change for the eyes, ears and nose."  I've crossed Lake Michigan under sail twice, both during the 2008 Qu...

This not my usual "Picture This" post. The picture (and video!) this week are not my own, but are too extraordinary not to share. For many of you who keep up with sailing, you'll know that this stunt by Alex Thompson first appeared online earlier this year. Nonetheless, the pictures and video are definitely worth another look, so have at it! Alex Thompson performs his "Keel Walk" Check out the video too:

I love water, whether it be the refreshing drink that comes from the my sink's tap, the Great Lakes, or the world's oceans. I've always felt a connection to the water  and credit/blame that connection for my addiction to sailing (see " Why I Sail "). I'm not much of an activist and I think you know if you've read my posts here over the years that I'm not very political either. However, I feel compelled to stand on a soapbox today and share an eye-opening graphic about ocean pollution and the importance of keeping our waters clean. Maybe it's my academic and professional background in marine biology, or maybe just my hope that my kids can see oceans cleaner than they are today. In any case, check out the following graphic and let it sink it in... Created by: MastersDegree.net

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." Benjamin Franklin Sailing downwind is bliss for many cruisers. The wind is at your back and the seas are often following. Heeling is reduced or absent altogether and the sailing is just generally quieter. You've also got options for which sails to hoist and how to set them. If your boat is so equipped and the air light, you may opt for a spinnaker. Or maybe you prefer wing-and-wing with the headsail on one side of the boat and the main on the other. Wing-and-wing on a downwind run We have a nice and colorful symmetrical spinnaker that we occasionally fly on Island Bound , but more often we'll go wing-and-wing when we're cruising downwind. While the methods for wing-and-wing sailing vary from boat to boat and with crew to crew, I thought I'd show our most common method in hopes that it may give some ideas to other cruisers out there. Spin pole used to hold out the genoa We typically use a whisker/s...

The Sun always Shines after the Rain

I have always had a Nicro solar vent fan on my forward hatch for keeping moisture down, preventing mold, and reducing bilge/head odors. Recently the battery on the old Nicro 2000 quit on me so I replaced it with a new Nicro Day/Night Plus vent fan. The new Day/Night Plus model moves more air, comes with interchangeable intake and exhaust fan blades and an on/off switch, and&nbsp has a shut-off damper for use in rough seas. If you're only installing one vent fan, Nicro recommends using the exhaust blade. In my particular installation, the exhaust fan draws air in through my louvered companionway hatchboard and circulates it through the cabin where it then exits through the vent fan above the vee berth. The new vent fan has the same 4" diameter cut-out size but a larger on-deck footprint and a greater depth so I had to have a custom riser pad fabricated to create clearance. Alan from Cesany Plastics in Oakland Park, Florida promptly cut and shipp...

We took a 5 day mini-cruise south of Muskegon over July 4th and visited Grand Haven, Port Sheldon, Saugatuck, and Holland before returning home. I'm again amazed at just how revitalizing cruising as a family aboard a small boat can be. The compilation of pictures below tells the story better than I could ever hope to in words.

I've recently been reading a couple of books, both of which share a common thread: The Good Life Parable.  Mark Albion, a dreamer and writer from Harvard Business School, asks "Questions Every MBA Needs to Answer" in his book titled More Than Money . He also shares a story of an MBA who meets a Mexican fisherman that he calls "The Good Life Parable". I first ran across "The Good Life Parable" in an eBook titled Sail the Seven Seas of Freedom by Captain Rob Lee. Lee uses Albion's parable to kick off his book on the way to telling us how to live the pirate lifestyle on the high seas in a modern world. Both books are worth a read, but the Good Life Parable is an excellent highlight from both. You can check out the animated narration of the parable in the YouTube video below or read the parable yourself at the bottom of this post. Here at Sail Far Live Free, I try to promote reaching for your dreams and making the cruising lifestyle a reality.  Lis...

Nature's Playground