Engine-less Cruising

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by thomm225

I went to the library and got a book on Captain Cook. I know I wil enjoy it and maybe others will also.

From the book:

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...sm-115822.html

Besides numerous folks writing about Cook, one can (and should IMO) read his logs of his many voyages. They've been published in verbatim and abridged versions, and are most interesting (at least to me)... a glimpse into the thought processes and shipboard procedures of the era. I was left with the conviction that he was not just a great navigator, but an astonishingly modern thinker for his time in terms of crew treatment, health issues and interactions with the native populations that he encountered.

Of course, those folks eventually killed him...

Cheers,

Jim

[gjordan]

pistarckle (post #40) said something we should all think about. quote "We are all just one dead battery away from being engine-less". Interesting thought, isnt it??? _____Grant.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by gjordan

pistarckle (post #40) said something we should all think about. quote "We are all just one dead battery away from being engine-less". Interesting thought, isnt it??? _____Grant.

Not so bad with solar, wind gen and a Honda genny onboard

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by gjordan

pistarckle (post #40) said something we should all think about. quote "We are all just one dead battery away from being engine-less". Interesting thought, isnt it??? _____Grant.

IMO, there is a big difference between having a dead battery and "engineless cruising". One is a temporary situation, the other a long term commitment.

Yes, one should have the skills required to deal with the dead battery, but that is a far cry from the realities of long term cruising.

Cheers,

Jim

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

IMO, there is a big difference between having a dead battery and "engineless cruising". One is a temporary situation, the other a long term commitment.

Yes, one should have the skills required to deal with the dead battery, but that is a far cry from the realities of long term cruising.

Cheers,

Jim

Agreed, it's like saying we are one big wave away from a sunk boat, so lets drill a hole in the bottom.

[Panope]

40 years ago, A friend of mine built a wooden spray replica. No engine, No electrics. Family of 5 and 5 years to circumnavigate. A great trip that included wonderful passages followed by lengthy stays (up to a year) in one place. Not much local exploring by boat. They did need to be towed into some ports. The trip was a success but it did end with a divorce and sale of the boat.

I would not choose this style of boating. I prefer to be able to use the boat on a moments notice for even a trivial mission like setting a crab trap.

Steve

[Jammer Six]

Originally Posted by Jammer Six

Ann, do you have a citation for this claim?

That's pretty much the response I expected.

[charliehows]

Originally Posted by rognvald

I think Kiwi has made a good point and, in reality, the "fuzzbummles" probably outnumber the people who truly sail their boats.

there seem to be several stages that people go through in a lifetime of sailing. you've gotten to the one where people who use engines arent 'real' sailors. Ah, what fond memories I have of those naive days. But I'm a lot fonder of my beautiful, ageing but ever reliable (sort of) purring little yanmar 2 cylinder workhorse. When a boat gets to a certain size, it just becomes more work than its worth to sail without an engine to meet a pointless idea of what makes a 'real' sailor. When the wind is with me I stack on every bit of canvas i can get me hands on, but when shes on the nose, or the channels are too narrow or theres a bloody traffic jam of monster tankers heading up the harbour or any of a dozen other bloody annoying scenarios, the lovely little cast iron spinnaker gets hoisted to the top royal and off we go with nary a backward thought...dont worry - you'll get there yourself, eventually...

[charliehows]

Originally Posted by gjordan

pistarckle (post #40) said something we should all think about. quote "We are all just one dead battery away from being engine-less". Interesting thought, isnt it??? _____Grant.

?? I've got 4 batteries - 1 dead one doesnt make a blind bit of difference to anything...

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Besides numerous folks writing about Cook, one can (and should IMO) read his logs of his many voyages. They've been published in verbatim and abridged versions, and are most interesting (at least to me)... a glimpse into the thought processes and shipboard procedures of the era. I was left with the conviction that he was not just a great navigator, but an astonishingly modern thinker for his time in terms of crew treatment, health issues and interactions with the native populations that he encountered.

Of course, those folks eventually killed him...

Cheers,

Jim

Although the Hawaiians did kill Captain Cook, they gave him a ritualized burial ceremony usually only used for the most noteworthy of their group. They burned the body and removed the bones and returned them along with his charred hands and other parts.

As was common back in the day, a sailor averaged a gallon of beer (or pint of rum) a day on the voyage. When they left, they had on board 1200 gallons of beer, 1600 gallons of rum, and 3032 gallons of wine.

So I guess if you are prepared maybe sailing without an engine isn't to bad as long as you have the proper fuel.............

[frank_f]

Captain Cook was on a job. His five year mission was to seek out, no wait..., that's somebody else.

Anyhow, in it's day, Cook's vessel was the height of technology. He didn't look longingly at dugout canoes or papyrus reed sails and say "Wow, that's a real sailor."

If Cook was doing it nowadays, he'd be using a trawler with AIS, GPS and a pretty blank chartplotter. He would also be towing a fuel barge.

Just sayin'

[captain58sailin]

No doubt, Capt. Cook used the tech. available in the day. As many do here. He wasn't limited by funding, only choices. When he left on his voyages, the charts were marked "Past here, there be sea monsters!" So he didn't have a lot of information to work with, he had to work with what he had. Nowadays going engineless is certainly a challenge, can be done, and you would most certainly be a better sailor for the experience, if for no other reason than your level of awareness would be so much higher.

[highseas]

Capt. Cook didn't have to dodge ships on collision course at 25knots.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by frank_f

Captain Cook was on a job. His five year mission was to seek out, no wait..., that's somebody else.

Anyhow, in it's day, Cook's vessel was the height of technology. He didn't look longingly at dugout canoes or papyrus reed sails and say "Wow, that's a real sailor."

If Cook was doing it nowadays, he'd be using a trawler with AIS, GPS and a pretty blank chartplotter. He would also be towing a fuel barge.

Just sayin'

Actually in the book Blue Latitudes, the author does compare Captain James Cook to Captain James Kirk.

Kirk a farm boy from Iowa, Cook a farm boy from Yorkshire where it was much harder to overcome a low class birth.

Cook even said:

Ambition leads me not only farther than any other man has been before me, but as far as I think it possible for man to go.
This from the late 1700's.

Google Image Result for http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4a/Cook_Three_Voyages_59.png/600px-Cook_Three_Voyages_59.png

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by highseas

Capt. Cook didn't have to dodge ships on collision course at 25knots.

No but he had to dodge folks throwing spears and every other darn thing at him. Plus he had no GPS, AIS, weather reports, charts, or maps of any kind and that's just touching the surface of how hard it was. He didn't have a clue as to what was ahead.

Plus, he was old for his time......in his 40's, and he didn't have gasx, allergy medicine, nexium, a good dentist, etc