Sad story about fire onboard

I came across this story on Facebook. Definitely not all cruising stories are perfect.

A fire on-board is one of the most dangerous things that can happen. I do love Diesel engines on sailboats, not to self...avoid turbos.

Anyways, a lot of good lessons there....Read about it here.

Jim Morris "Godfather" of Trop Rock passes away

I love Trop rock music, been listening to various artists for a long time by buying theirs CDs (Mark Mulligan, Eric Stone, Michael McCloud, Buffett of course, etc).

But only last year did I start listening to trop rock radio, mostly internet Beach Front Radio. Love that station.


So, for me, I only discovered Jim Morris around that time, and bought a few CDs six months ago. If you do not know his music, I recommend the album "Seafood Platter" as it is a best of.

Anyways, I was sad to first hear through Facebook that he had suffered a brain aneurysm, and the he subsequently passed away. More details here.

Cheers to you Jim, didnt meet you, but your music is with me forever! Thanks!

WindGlider instructions

If like me you got a used WindGlider that did not come with instructions, do not despair, the setup instructions are on YouTube in 2 parts (phew). Part 1 above and Part 2 below. I would still like to find a PDF of the instructions however. If I do find them I will post it here.

Cheers!

Praise for Windglider

Not me!

Last fall, I came across a WindGlider for sale on Kijiji (more popular in Canada than Craigslist). I tried it once very quickly this winter while in Florida, maybe 1 hour, but did not have time.

Finally yesterday, I spent a whole afternoon "gliding", a bit frustrating at first, but it didnt take too long to finally be able to glide effortlessly...proof that you can teach an old dog new tricks (I'm 51), though I have sailed my whole life, this is a bit different, learning to tilt the mast to turn and control directions, it takes a bit, but is slowly becoming more natural.

So turning the board is still a challenge. I first tried tacking...ouch.  Now instead, I am gybing, still not perfectly, but better.

This thing is a hoot, great fun...not too fast, easy to control and very stable.

Cheers!

Yacht Teleport

I like to follow world cruisers and explorers.

One of my favorite, if you have not come across is the one of Chris and Jess from Yacht Teleport.

They have a great YouTube channel, where  you will be probably be sucked in watching all the episodes. And do start at the first one.

These guys have accomplished a lot, starting by restoring the boat in Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada. It is a beautiful wooden boat. And you thought you needed a steel boat for the arctic eh?

Then, yes as hinted above they crossed the arctic from east to west over the course of a couple of years.

The story is fascinating, you will learn about perseverance, junk rig sailing (which I am a big fan of, for its simplicity) and, yes Love.

The only downside, is that they only publish sporadically.

Cheers!

"Uncharted Waters" a sailing documentary

I just came across this, a very nice sailing documentary about the journey to the Olympics for sailors.

Very well done, and about 1 hour. You can also watch it here on Vimeo,

For people, like me, that like to watch offline or on the boat. You could download it using a service such as ClipConverter. This will go right on my local cloud (a Seagate MyBookLive)!

Enjoy!

What is this blog about?

Well, I used to have a blog called CruisingDream, where we were planning to sell everything and sail away!

But responsibility and real life took priorities, instead, this blog will be about anything water related, as we love to boat and generally do anything with water.

The subjects will be varied, but all water related, book, boats, boat repairs etc....and it could be that one day, once retired, we do take off, that is still a possibility!

So. stay tuned, the adventures should be good!