Navigation, boat-handling, practical sailing skills

Use Coastwatch to check your AIS

2020-11-06T11:22:58+00:00May 8th, 2019|Seamanship|

The Cruising Association (CA) Regulations and Technical Services Group (RATS) has come across the use of National Coastwatch Institution (NCI) stations to check AIS ( Automatic Identification System) transmissions. This seems to us to be good practice, certainly at the beginning of the season. A vessel’s AIS transceiver may use the same antenna as the [...]

Sailing to a Viking festival across the North Sea in January

2020-11-06T11:23:30+00:00March 1st, 2019|Life Afloat, Seamanship, Snugberth Cinema|

Inspirational winter passage by Erik Aanderaa, a true latter-day Viking, sailing his Contessa 35 Tessie from Haugasund in Norway to the three-day Up Helly Aa winter Viking festival at Lerwick in Shetland (in 30 hrs!) on 29 January this year. In temperatures are around 1ºC Erik gets onto the foredeck (sans harness tut-tut) to tell [...]

Using a Breton Plotter

2020-11-06T11:23:31+00:00February 28th, 2019|Seamanship|

  Navigation Refresher The Breton Plotter – sometimes called a Portland Course Plotter – consolidates parallel rules, a protractor and the compass rose into a handy chartwork instrument that is the simplest tool for the job and hence ideal for the small boat navigator It was invented by Captain Yvonnick Gueret a merchant navy skipper, [...]

Man overboard on a cold January morning

2020-11-06T11:23:39+00:00February 8th, 2019|Features, Seamanship|

It's not often a man overboard situation is caught on camera(s) but the crew of the J97 Windjammer can be seen in this video dealing with the potentially dangerous incident when a female crew slips over the side, through the guard wires during a tacking manoeuvre. It happened on a windy Sunday in late January, [...]

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