Do you have any sailing superstitions you follow?

[buzzstar]

Originally Posted by thinwater

....[*]Gingers. Well, maybe there is something to the fiery redhead thing (). My wife seems to bring good luck (except for fishing), but I have it on good authority that her red hair is fake (since she has me dye it).[/LIST]

Thinwater, I do not know you or your wife, but male intuition, not superstition, tells me you may be tempting fate.

[michaelratinter]

In the years when I thought of building exactly what I want in a boat, I imagined her name would be Freyja Njordsdotter. But, when I bought an existing boat that matched my wants exactly, I chose not to rename her. Besides, my wife and I are big Clapton fans.

Rick
S/V Blind Faith

[bsurvey]

no yellow fruit

[Hasbeen]

I was crewing on a small one tonner racing yacht. Being smaller we needed stronger winds to be competitive.


We discovered that when ever we put a pot of peas on the stove, the wind would get up, & throw the pot off the stove, & peas all through the boat.


We cooked peas often, & didn't mind the laborious job of cleaning the peas out of the bilge.

[Hudson Force]

We learned to expect change. Every time we experienced a storm we recalled that it had been calm before the wind increased. Each time we left yellow bananas in the galley they would eventually turn black. We would risk starting a voyage on a Friday, but we always woke up to a Saturday. Things were always happening,- phenomenal!

[Nostrodamus]

Thank you for all the replies to my original question. There were some really good answers and I enjoyed reading them all. There were many other superstitions I came across whilst writing the blog would have gone on far too long. Having said that I did enjoy trying to find the origins to them.

One which I found was that the old boat makers believed a ships personality would start to develop from the moment the keel was laid. If there were many accidents or problems building the ship a builder believed that ship would be unlucky and would destroy it. In a time where there was only word of mouth no ship maker wanted to be known for producing a unlucky ship otherwise no one would hire them.

The only one I stick too is not having Mermaids on board. The leave a huge slimy mess on the decks which makes it dangerous to walk on afterwards.