Belay earlier transmission. Or part of it anyway. That "old Open 60" I pointed out in my last post, I learned yesterday is actually a new Open 60. Or nearly new. Turns out it was first launched in 2010 and was both designed and constructed by its owner, Michele Cassano (see photo up top), who...
I'm on the ARC beat in St. Lucia again this week, chilling with my SAILfeed compadres Andy Schell and Mia Karlsson and stalking the pontoons checking out all the peeps and boats that coagulate here in Rodney Bay as the world's biggest bluewater cruising rally comes to an end. It was a rougher ride than...
I'VE BEEN MEANING TO SHARE more about my time in Bermuda visiting the ARC Europe fleet, but I hadn't thought I'd end up having to write a post like this. You may have heard the news over the weekend: one of the 33 boats that departed St. Georges for the Azores last Wednesday was abandoned...
The view from on high. Bermuda Radio's perspective on the world I FLEW HERE INTO BERMUDA on Sunday to catch the start of the World Cruising Club's ARC Europe rally, which departs tomorrow afternoon for the Azores and Lagos, Portugal. It is not the first time I've flown to Bermuda, but this will be the...
I'm hitting the rally beat hard these days. After recently not sailing in the Caribbean 1500, I'm now down in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia, checking out the end of this year's Atlantic Rally for Cruisers. To get a feel for things, I took a long stroll yesterday around the docks. I don't know about you,...
Good news: I've heard back from my people and can now share some pix and verbiage on how the voyage south went for Katahdin. Rather than paraphrase, I thought I'd share the raw dispatches.
Having been left behind on the dock, I've been obsessively following the progress of this year's Caribbean 1500 via the rally's online tracking page. For much of the fleet it has been slow going. After prudently waiting the better part of a week for Tropical Storm Sean to go away and then for a cold...
I've never seen this before... a subtropical storm with a name. But there you have it--sub-storm Sean, reportedly packing max winds of 40-50 knots, is stalled right over the Caribbean 1500 route and is going nowhere fast.
I should mention that I'm in Virginia right now, and will depart today (maybe) in this year's Caribbean 1500 cruising rally to Tortola, BVI. I'm crewing on a Cambria 44, Katahdin, which you see here, as of yesterday evening, all ready to go. Sort of. We launch this a.m. at 0900 and will be praying...
Editor's note: Later this fall I'll be crewing on a boat in the Caribbean 1500 cruising rally, which departs from Hampton, Virginia, on November 7. The prospect has me recalling the last 1500 I sailed in, way back in 1998, when the rally fleet had a serious run-in with Hurricane Mitch. It was a very...
