The Evolution of Cruisers

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Back in the early 1980s all I had was a paper chart, compass, vhf with a 20 mile range and the skills to dead recon. So I knew enough to stay within 19 miles of some coastline, island or mainland. Today with nothing more than a single gps and a cell phone, there seems to be no shortage of knuckleheads out there doing dumb things with a false sense of security IMHO and first hand observations. The same holds true for mountaineering.

True, equally I remember, some people, rank begineers, get into a leaky plywood boat, baggy sails, piss poor atomic 4 engine( I think ) , no lifejackets, float plan, comms , and head out into a potentially very dangerous estuary ( 8 knot ebb). Seemingly they nearly died

I know this for a fact, cause it was 10 year old me and my uncles first time out. Ah the 60 s , if only my mother knew half the things. Lol

We made it back , just. There is a better bilge pump then a terrified man with a bucket, it's a uncle with a promise to his sister to bring her child back safety. Hey it was great, I got to steer the whole way back , even if it was a little scary after dark , " Uncle , what side is red on again !!"


Dave


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[delmarrey]

I think it's been XX% skill and XX% luck.
There have been very experienced sailors that never come back from the sea, and then there are those who sail the world unskilled on less then an adequate boat and come back to write blogs/books.

It's an "assumption of risk" we all take every time we leave the dock. Today's sailors are no different then those of the past, the adventurous. We can only use the education that we have available to us at/of the time(s). And two heads are better then one (if they're thinkers ).

In my personal opinion a person is not really a "Sailor" until he/she has spent 24 hours or more under way and standing watches. As for "Cruisers" that's a bit relative. There are thousands of boaters out there I wouldn't trust to go with, out side the jetty.

[Kenomac]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

True, equally I remember, some people, rank begineers, get into a leaky plywood boat, baggy sails, piss poor atomic 4 engine( I think ) , no lifejackets, float plan, comms , and head out into a potentially very dangerous estuary ( 8 knot ebb). Seemingly they nearly died

I know this for a fact, cause it was 10 year old me and my uncles first time out. Ah the 60 s , if only my mother knew half the things. Lol

We made it back , just. There is a better bilge pump then a terrified man with a bucket, it's a uncle with a promise to his sister to bring her child back safety. Hey it was great, I got to steer the whole way back , even if it was a little scary after dark , " Uncle , what side is red on again !!"


Dave

LOL !!

Dave,

How'd we get separated? Was that you on Uncle Orest's faded red beater boat back in '68? I was 12yrs old... Man, when we hit those waves coming out the estuary... I thought we were goners.

[Pelagic]

Some very perceptive posts.
Accepting that the evolution of yacht design/knowledge base/technological advances and its instant dissemination plus global support infrastructure has made cruising far safer....how has that affected the psyche of today's cruiser.

Is technology the new superstition and has the increased Numbers now made it less special?

Do we encourage a herding mentality? Attract a different type of multifunctional sailor who while enjoying a drink with Motessier at the bar...would probably avoid him elsewhere?

Generally speaking... Have we gone from being adventurous to more elitist as some have implied before?

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Pelagic

Some very perceptive posts.
Accepting that the evolution of yacht design/knowledge base/technological advances and its instant dissemination plus global support infrastructure has made cruising far safer....how has that affected the psyche of today's cruiser.

the smart ones are still kind of scared and use that to keep themselves alert

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Pelagic

.

Is technology the new superstition and has the increased Numbers now made it less special?

And some of the old and bold sailors go on like spoilt brats: we went cruising, but you can't! Like some kindergarten bully not sharing his toy.

They have to bring up all sorts of imagined crap to try to build a barrier so others can't do what the old timers achievement perception is.

I can tell you circumnavigating is NOT anything special! I did it! Its nothing all that difficult or tough. But the old timers want to pretend it is so no one can emulate them.


Heave the semaphore, HF crackle machine, Crossing the Line bastardisation, and sextants overboard and go have good safe fun with a modern use of materials and technology.




Mark

[atoll]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

And some of the old and bold sailors go on like spoilt brats: we went cruising, but you can't! Like some kindergarten bully not sharing his toy.

They have to bring up all sorts of imagined crap to try to build a barrier so others can't do what the old timers achievement perception is.

I can tell you circumnavigating is NOT anything special! I did it! Its nothing all that difficult or tough. But the old timers want to pretend it is so no one can emulate them.


Heave the semaphore, HF crackle machine, Crossing the Line bastardisation, and sextants overboard and go have good safe fun with a modern use of materials and technology.




Mark

aaarh laddie! but you have only done one circumnavigation.......and without children,nor passed the cape of storms...........

[VirtualVagabond]

Originally Posted by atoll

aaarh laddie! but you have only done one circumnavigation.......and without children,nor passed the cape of storms...........

LOL... Please tell me the cape of storms is the Horn and not Good Hope!

Vic

[atoll]

Originally Posted by VirtualVagabond

LOL... Please tell me the cape of storms is the Horn and not Good Hope!

Vic

my lips are sealed,last time we discussed stuff like this i had "her indoors"(deck scrubber) sending me PM's and questioning your sanity

[Capt RonB]

BTTOT (back to the original thread)
If you can believe wikipedia, homo neanderthalensis was sailing the Med over 100, 000 years ago.

When I was younger, much younger, and we raced sailboats, I think one of them was my bowman.

[SaltyMonkey]

Originally Posted by atoll

aaarh laddie! but you have only done one circumnavigation.......and without children,nor passed the cape of storms...........

That whole children thing is scar n' the crap outta me.

[Pelagic]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

.......
They have to bring up all sorts of imagined crap to try to build a barrier so others can't do what the old timers achievement perception is.

I can tell you circumnavigating is NOT anything special! I did it! Its nothing all that difficult or tough. But the old timers want to pretend it is so no one can emulate them.
Mark

Geez Mark you seem to have a few issues specific to old sailors.

Most of them I know celebrate the next generation continuing to live the Sealife.

Evolution is about changes and psyche is about what is imagined, so hard to discuss without comparing the generalities.

In any generation I think some sailors find it harder than others, or to be more polite.... "Have more adventurous experiences"
But that is another discussion

[JPA Cate]

I'm thinking that starting out on a circumnavigation as a specific goal is more common presently. It's like something they want to tick off on their "bucket list." Perhaps we have the combination of technological improvements and examples (Cornell's groups and the "Puddle Jump") to have fostered the attitude. People have seemed to think it's like buying a SUV and driving somewhere--having little knowledge of the ocean, they don't know they underestimate its force in interaction with them. In the past, proportionally, people were more aware of ocean dangers because more families were in constant contact.

I believe i read somewhere recently that Lyn Pardey wrote that her and Larry's contract in the beginning was "as long as it's fun", and they used the boat to take them places to which they wanted to go. Circumnavigating, per se, not as important as the exploration.

There are folks, too, who accept that if they want to wind up where they started from with their boats, they must needs circumnavigate. Circumnavigators vary considerably in how long they take to do it, among people I have met, from 9 months (a Sundeer) to 8 yrs. (homebuilt Roberts 38, who stopped to work along the way).

I think the most profound change I have seen is that people no longer row around the anchorages, trolling for friendships. Coastal cruisers seem less outgoing, as a whole. Maybe this points to the elitism mentioned above, or possibly only to peoples' privacy needs, which may increase as the invasiveness and stresses of their workaday worlds increase.

Ann

[goboatingnow]

Rowing around an anchorage , was great fun when there was 10 boats , now there a 100 in the anchorage. You need some privacy now.

Dave


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[Neptune's Gear]

Also, think about numbers. As a percentage of population, are there really more cruisers? I still think, although there are a lot (about 10,000 boats out of their home countries at the moment), it is still a tiny percentage of the population, and an unusual thing to do.
The scariest statistic I have heard in the last few years is that there are more people alive in the world today, than have ever lived!! 7.2 billion and counting...
Ocean sailors are, like they always were, adventurous people.