Rivers: Sails or bare poles?

[Jammer]

Do those of you who have done much river cruising find that it is feasible to use the sails, or is a river cruise best conducted under power with bare poles?

[DLincoln3]

Around the Detroit area, since there is often a lot of traffic around me I will usually run under power with the main up as a steady sail. The wakes from the passing boats and tankers can rock you rail to rail without it.

[toddster8]

It depends...

On the Columbia, the wind pretty much follows the river. During most of the year, the prevailing west wind allows one to sail up the river DDW. Or reaching back and forth a bit when possible. One CAN usually beat down river, but if you are in a hurry to get somewhere, motoring is usually the best option, since the course is always straight into the wind. Each stretch is a little different. Sometimes the channel is wide enough and the run of the river allows you to make some decent SOG on a tack. Maybe motorsailing. But it takes a lot of local knowledge - the current positions of all the sandbars aren't accurately shown on the charts. For that matter, shoals that were blasted away in the 1950's still are shown on the charts.

Absent local knowledge, it's usually best to "drive down the highway" from buoy to buoy.

Also, spring flood has a lot to say about where and how you can go.

[JPA Cate]

Good one toddster8!

We do some river sailing, and as above, adjust behavior to conditions. Sometimes we sail, but if the wind's not cooperating, we'll turn on the motor. The rivers we use are tidally influenced, and usually we try to utilize that to our benefit, as well. Our draft of 7'2" (2.2m) makes it so that we need to watch the tides carefully, to safely go without touching.

Ann

[Pete7]

Shooting the bridges can be a hoot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L970G0GMn9s

[Pete7]

We have sailed up to here on the river Frome at Wareham. However, bends in the river, houses banks and woods affect the wind direction requiring quite a bit of work if you want to sail up and down rivers. Other river users and shallows require quite a bot of attention and not having to constantly deal with changing sail angles is just one less concern.

Pete

[Hudson Force]

"Rivers" takes up a fairly wide range of conditions. We've sailed a lot on the St. Johns River in North Florida, but this is a tidal estuary that is often more than three miles wide and only drops a total of thirty feet over it's more than 300 mile length. The Saint Johns is a great river for sailing.

In contrast, I grew up along the New River in Fort Lauderdale. It's a winding congested path that is about 150 feet wide and typically carries tows of 100' vessels through numerous bridges. Nobody sails the New River.

There's no real answer for this question. It depends upon what river your cruising.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Pete7

We have sailed up to here on the river Frome at Wareham. However, bends in the river, houses banks and woods affect the wind direction requiring quite a bit of work if you want to sail up and down rivers. Other river users and shallows require quite a bot of attention and not having to constantly deal with changing sail angles is just one less concern.

Pete

Ahhh.. Wareham..!! I know it well being tied up on the river bank down stream by the B'yard for a year.. nice in the summer but winter.. YUK.!!!

[J Clark H356]

Kentucky Lake is wide where we generally sail - about 2-1/2 miles, but we cruise in some areas where it is more of a river than a lake. Depends more on the wind direction for us. If it is favorable to get some speed from the main, I'll put it out. We sail in the wide lake, motor sail or bare poles when it gets smaller.

We have done both motoring or motor-sailing in the Gulf intercostal - north coast and west Florida. Again, depends on the wind. If you can get some help from the wind then put your sail out. I have a roller furling main, so it is pretty easy to make the change.

We've motored 650 miles each way down and up the Tennessee River/Tenn-Tom route from Kentucky Dam to Mobile with the mast down and in the cradle. We didn't notice any instability issues and there are powerboat wakes, tows and other sailboats along that route.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Pete7

We have sailed up to here on the river Frome at Wareham. However, bends in the river, houses banks and woods affect the wind direction requiring quite a bit of work if you want to sail up and down rivers. Other river users and shallows require quite a bot of attention and not having to constantly deal with changing sail angles is just one less concern.

Pete

Wow, that is a tour de force of sailing skill! The Frome (a.k.a. Wareham Creek) is less than a boatlength wide over most of its length

I love it up there! But I would only dare to go up in my dinghy. You are trying to give us bilge keel envy, I can see . . .


Hard to believe that this idyllic place sits right on top of the largest known pool of petroleum in Europe.

[valhalla360]

Depends entirely on the river. Since you are from Minnesota, I'm guessing the Mississippi in your area. In that case, it's viable in the impoundments above the dams but in the narrow areas with the commercial traffic far less so.


On narrower rivers (and often the channel above dams is narrow), it's often not viable.


Also are you just out messing about or are you trying to get somewhere?

[zeehag]

i learned to sail hudson river in a 1903 gaff rigged raceabout. no engine, just sails.
watch your estuarial currents and tidal flows.
why shouldnt anyone be able to sail a river?

[Suijin]

It's like asking how long is a piece of string. Different rivers (geography, currents, traffic) and different boats (big, small, mono, cat, racer, cruiser).

If you have the room to tack and and maneuver, and the traffic is light, and the wind and current allow you to make progress, and you have the desire, then...yes you can do it.

What really bugs me is folks who sail up a channel to where it narrows and they end up causing all kinds of havoc with other traffic, and then they panic or something breaks and everything hits the fan.

Not so long ago come up behind a boat that was sailing through Snow's Cut, with the 3 knot current, at Carolina Beach. They lost their wind in the cut, rudder lost way, and they were carried almost into the bridge abutment. Never heard so many engines in hard reverse in one place before.

[a64pilot]

If I'm in an area with restricted room to maneuver, channel or whatever, or in something like the cut coming into Panama City which can have strong currents and has big rocks on both sides, I have the motor running and in gear, just in case

[Jammer]

Thank you all for the replies.

Originally Posted by valhalla360

Depends entirely on the river. Since you are from Minnesota, I'm guessing the Mississippi in your area. [...]

The Mississippi, St. Croix, and Minnesota around here. I'm thinking of renting a slip at Lake City when it's time for me to get a boat. It is on Lake Pepin, which is on the Mississippi:

Navionics Webapp

One question I'm trying to resolve is whether weekend or weeklong cruises away from Pepin would be fun and practical, and what sort of craft would be suitable for such trips. But the question is broader than that also:

Also are you just out messing about or are you trying to get somewhere?

Some of each. Part of the question is the practicality of longer trips down the Mississippi. Maybe I would be happier with a power boat. Maybe I would be happier with a home port on Lake Superior. Trying to figure out what's reasonable and avoid becoming committed to something that doesn't make sense.

Originally Posted by Suijin

It's like asking how long is a piece of string. Different rivers (geography, currents, traffic) and different boats (big, small, mono, cat, racer, cruiser).

If you have the room to tack and and maneuver, and the traffic is light, and the wind and current allow you to make progress, and you have the desire, then...yes you can do it.

What really bugs me is folks who sail up a channel to where it narrows and they end up causing all kinds of havoc with other traffic, and then they panic or something breaks and everything hits the fan.

Not so long ago come up behind a boat that was sailing through Snow's Cut, with the 3 knot current, at Carolina Beach. They lost their wind in the cut, rudder lost way, and they were carried almost into the bridge abutment. Never heard so many engines in hard reverse in one place before.

All that helps. I'm thinking of monohull cruisers around 30-35'.

Originally Posted by Pete7

Shooting the bridges can be a hoot

That was fun to watch.