Cruising Sailboat How To
Tillers break. Sausages outlast wine. Here’s what actually works aboard a cruising sailboat.
Posts are listed newest first.
-
Small Craft Warning: How I Repaired the Tiller I Broke Sailing in 25 Knots
The morning my tiller broke, I woke to a small craft warning on board my Nimble 24 sailboat Grit and decided to go sailing anyway. I hoisted her tanbark sails,…
-
No Fridge, One Burner, Two Weeks: Cooking Aboard a Small Sailboat at Shackleford Banks
My wrist caught the bowl of oatmeal on Grit‘s galley table. It did a steamy Charlie Brown loop and landed next to the centerboard case with a plop, spraying oatmeal…
-
How to Provision a Sailboat for Two Weeks: Why the Sausages Worked but the Wine Didn’t
The homemade cured sausages that survived Lucky and Diggity were a hit. The bottle of red wine that had a cork instead of a cap was a bust. Here is…
-
The Rock, the Vine, and a 40-Knot Gale: Anchoring at Shackleford Banks
“The single commandment of anchoring is, ‘Thou shall create scope.’” Reese Palley / flamboyant art dealer, author, sailor, environmentalist and businessman The best time to write a post about anchoring…
-
The Grit List: Things to Do Before Setting Sail for Shackleford Banks
My wife Julia and I are sailing our yawl Grit to Shackleford Banks, North Carolina, to observe the wild horses that live there. We plan to head out March 15…
-
Why I Prefer an Outboard Well Over Transom Mount on My Nimble 24
Vince recently wrote me the following: Good morning. I was wondering how you feel about having the outboard in the cockpit well. It seems like it would be noisy and…
-
Sky Water: Catching Rain on a Sailboat with No Water Tank
Last week I wrote about how my wife Julia and I lost water at our cabin and I needed to figure out what was wrong. This week, I was going…
-
How to Rebuild a Katadyn Survivor 35 Desalinator
The email came from the Falkland Islands. “Do you have advice and information about watermakers?” It was from my friends, sailors Thies Matzen and Kicki Ericson aboard Wanderer III. A…
-
How I Quit My Office Job to Sail Around the World
Until my late twenties, my life went like this. Boats, horses, something else, boats, horses, something else, boats, horses… There was the jockey phase, the Alfa Romeo mechanic phase, the…
-
Boat Building for Jockeys
It was 1991 and I was riding as a steeplechase jockey but what I was really dreaming about was running away to sea on a sailboat. Unlike these days, when…
← Back to Travel by Sail — more trips aboard Grit, Sea Bird, and other boats.
Let's Keep in Touch
Sign up for The River, the RiverEarth newsletter, for occasional doses of rambling and homestead life. Plus you'll get a free copy of my 155-page illustrated ebook 19 Million Mule Steps.
Explore More of RiverEarth
