Tabla de contenidos para April 2022 en SAIL

It was a busy winter and early spring down in South Florida as the Bacardi Invitational and West Marine US Open series saw scores of boats doing battle off Clearwater and Fort Lauderdale and on the shallow waters of Miami’s Biscayne Bay. As in years past, the six regattas making up the two series featured many of the world’s top sailors competing aboard such established one-designs as the J/70, Laser, 470 and Megles 24, as well as the venerable Star. Equally fun, was the way these two series also offered a glimpse of sailing’s future, with a number of brand-new boat types in the mix. There’s been a bit of a revolution, for example, in Olympic sailing of late, with a whole new kind of sailboat taking the stage. Gone…

When most sailors think “charter,” warm-weather destinations like Antigua, the Bahamas and the British and U.S. Virgin Islands spring to mind. And there’s no denying that palm trees and endless white-sand beaches have their appeal, especially in the dead of winter for those of us who live up north. It’s important to remember, though, that there is a whole other world of charter destinations out there offering a different, but no less satisfying kind of sailing. The very first bareboat charter I did was up in what most people think of as ski country on Lake Champlain. With its empty anchorages and innumerable small towns and farmhouses, it remains one of my favorite places to sail to this day. Other less-known charter destinations my family and I have sampled include…

Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay is a sailor’s paradise, not only because of its vast expanse of sheltered water, coves and seaside towns, but because of the many nearby destinations it offers as well. The last time a group of friends and I chartered out of Narragansett Bay, we used it as a base for an amazing tour of Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard and Cuttyhunk islands. This time we set our sights west. west. Of particular interest was Shelter Island off the tip of New York’s Long Island. My Swedish-born great grandmother, Ingrid, used to have a sprawling home on the shores of this sleepy island, which we used to often visit when I was a small child. Our family stayed in an apartment over the garage, and I have fond memories…

Part of the remodeling of the chart table area on my 45ft schooner Britannia involved making a new section of floorboarding or, to use its proper nautical term, cabin sole. The floor beneath was just rough plywood, unlike the remainder of the boat, which was beautiful teak with white-wood strips. It was perhaps just as well, because in order to reposition the electrical distribution board I had to cut this floor out completely to re-route the wires underneath. I naturally wanted any new floor to match the boat’s existing sole and scoured the web and any sources of teak flooring with whitewood strips to match the existing floor pattern. Unfortunately, I was unable to locate the exact pattern anywhere. Britannia’s strips are ⅜in wide, and the nearest I could find…

Are you out there sailing, cruising and living the sailing life? Share your experiences with other readers. Send your photos to sailmail@sailmagazine.com And don’t forget to sign up for our free eNewsletter, Under Sail, via our website sailmagazine.com Junior 420 sailors taking a break between races at the Lake Lanier Sailing Club Halloween Regatta — Tom King, via sailmail@sailmagazine.com Who says sailing has to be expensive! My 54-year-old Albacore still loves to kick up her heals in a gentle breeze. Photo by Jennifer Dumas, New Gloucester, Maine — Michael Cloutier, via sailmail@sailmagazine.com Light sailing on Ciao! a Beneteau 343 in the Atlantic off of NYC Harbor — Pat Mihich, Lambertville, NJ Sunset over the Fortescue Creek, New Jersey, inlet from the Delaware Bay. I was helping deliver a 1986 Pearson…

The January 14 volcanic eruption in Tonga not only triggered tsunami surges in coastal communities as far away as Japan and Canada, these same surges battered hundreds of boats throughout the region. The most damage was done on Tonga’s largest island, Tongatapu, where volcanic ash covered the island and tsunamis brought down buildings along the coast. At press time, the Tongan government confirmed three deaths, although communications in and out of Tonga remained difficult, as power cuts had disrupted the cable system used to connect Tonga to Fiji and other international networks. In addition to washing boats ashore in Tonga, surges impacted boats and marinas in countries to the southwest, in particular. In New Zealand, for example, the Tutukaka Marina suffered considerable damage as the boats there weathered a cyclone…

With so many manufacturers dreaming up bigger production boats, more and more mid-sized cruisers fall on the smaller end of their lines. However, “smaller” does not mean less, and the tricks for optimizing larger models have helped with squeezing more enjoyment into less LOA. As seen in these three designs, there’s more than enough comfort, space and speed to be had in this size range—plus so much variety that performance and cruising sailors alike are sure to take notice. X-YACHTS 43 If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it? Maybe not! Despite the X43 being one of X-Yachts’ most popular models ever, the Danish boatbuilder is still doing a redesign to improve on a classic. Since launching in 2016, over 100 X43’s have been sold, but rather than tweak the old…

With 2,000 miles of coastline, 270,000 islands and seemingly countless bays and inlets, Sweden is truly a sailor’s paradise. One of the top sailing destinations here is the archipelago just outside the country’s second largest city Gothenburg (locally known as Göteborg), on the west coast, near where the North Sea meets the Baltic. Even though it’s second in both notoriety and size to Sweden’s capital, Stockholm, Gothenburg’s port is the largest harbor in Scandinavia due to its strategic location on the eastern shore of the Kattegat, the shallow strait located between Sweden and Denmark’s Jutland Peninsula. This maritime heritage is symbolized by the Sjömanstornet—a 230ft memorial tower for sailors standing near the center of downtown on the banks of the Göta River and crowned by 60ft sculpture of a woman…

Even the dome of light glowing above the city behind us had disappeared as if swallowed in a gulp by Noah’s whale. The moon was absent. Not a star twinkled overhead. The night was so dark we could have been floating in a pot of black ink. The only artificial lights to be seen were those of the fore and aft running lights and the barely illuminated compass on the cabintrunk. Bioluminescent microorganisms stirred by our passing, shone faintly in our wake. Waves hissed as they swept past underneath us, lifting our stout, New Englandmade 30ft cutter, Kluane, (an Athabaska name meaning “big fish”) to heights impossible to judge in the dark. The troughs we slid down into seemed bottomless. Less than two hours had passed since we’d weighed anchor…

Imagine a sailboat under 60ft with private en suite accommodations for five couples plus professional crew. Add to that enough space to allow those same lucky guests their own private lounging areas outside. That’s a lot of room. That’s the Fountaine Pajot Samana 59. DESIGN & CONSTRUCTION The design emphasis of the Samana 59 is on easy maintenance, a welcome feature to any boat owner. The fiberglass hulls and structural bulkheads are molded with balsa cores and reinforced with carbon. The interior joinery is Alpi wood laminate, the countertops are made of synthetic resin, and the only visible solid wood in the entire boat is a few tabletops and doors. The primary structural member of this big vessel is a husky, welded aluminum truss that passes under the bridgedeck to…

A sail on Lake Tahoe has been on my bucket list since the day I first laid eyes on it, and come hell or high water, I decided I was going to someday charter a boat there. North America’s largest and deepest alpine lake, Tahoe sits at 6,225ft above sea level and straddles the state boundaries of California and Nevada. It’s big, beautiful and cold, trailing only Lake Superior in depth and volume. nd volume. It’s also one of the clearest, purest and sunniest lakes you’ll ever see, with clarity that rivals bottled water, being 99.9 percent pure. Indeed, many communities around Tahoe are exempt from having to provide filtration before pumping it into homes as drinking water, and many residents eschew bottled water, preferring instead to fill up straight…

Although the 1903 defender of the America’s Cup, Reliance, was deemed a “racing freak”—the boat pushed design rules to their limit and couldn’t be beat, at least in very specific conditions—designer Nat Herreshoff was nonetheless onto something. A century later, purpose-built boats have become a staple in the world of speed records, whether they be race records, course records or outright records. Among these records are a few that eclipse all others in terms of prestige: the Outright, Nautical Mile, 24-Hour, Transatlantic and Circumnavigation Records. Each of these records is currently held by a multihull, some more unusual than others, but all representing the absolute cutting edge of design development. Here’s a brief history of the ultra-fast and how we got here. OUTRIGHT (500M) RECORD CURRENT RECORD HOLDER: VESTAS SAILROCKET…