Rebel Heart's Contribution to the Cruising Community

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by minaret

To a guy like me who has spent twenty years or more working up to a bigger boat and building skills, family/crew, kitty, and all the rest, you guys both fall into that group. And that is in no way an insult, in my opinion.

I have been sailing since I was 12 including many years long offshore races, thousands of miles in total, represented my country in world championships and did Olympic trials, been a member of my yacht club for more than 35 years, and you think I am a belonging to what group????


Mark

[SaltyMonkey]

[CAELESTIS]

[Sailing Cowboy]

SaltMonkey share some of that popcorn.

[OutOfControl]

Originally Posted by Sailing Cowboy

SaltMonkey share some of that popcorn.

Hey Cowboy, want a drink with that popcorn?

[Doodles]

[Sailing Cowboy]

Dam I laughed at that Doodles...LOL

[Sailing Cowboy]

Originally Posted by OutOfControl

Hey Cowboy, want a drink with that popcorn?

Make it a double.

[nhschneider]

Despite the best preparation that can be made for an offshore passage, the one factor that we have no control over is luck. If we are dealt bad luck, though, then experience, skill and common sense will help to either mitigate or minimize its effects .

I thought I was well prepared for my first offshore passage with my wife and three children (Mexico, Hawaii and Alaska) but now that I have many more blue water miles under the keel, there are things that maybe I should have done differently. We were hit by a massive gale (986mb low) in the Gulf of Alaska but it caused no injuries or damage but, in hindsight, I think we were lucky.

I am willing to give Eric and Charlotte the benefit of the doubt and I wish them well in the recovery of their dreams. I also wish them good luck.

Fair winds and calm seas.

[robert sailor]

Kenomac....You make some good points but the one on small diesel tanks is not one of them. I know it seems like a big deal to many sailors today that motor more than they sail but as far as I'm concerned if he had 30 gallons of diesel and a jerry can or two there was no compromise on safety as long as his sailing skills were good and he had decent light air sails.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

If you go to Erics profile and select previous posts and find his first post in 2006 you will see he bought Rebel Heart in 2005.

Thats not 'go now'.

I bought mine in 2008 and have whacked 35,000 miles on it.

So Eric has had 9 years to clock up miles in prep of his circumnav.

I'm not critisizing his choices, but one can't possibly say he was in the go small go now group.



Mark

I see that too, but the blog would suggest that , while Eric may have had experience (what, I don't know of he had or not , or what type ) Charlotte certainly didn't have much, or it certainly seemed like it.


Personally, and this bears inspection, I've never supported the " go now" brigade. Especially when " go now" means crossing large oceans with just your wife ( never mind the kids) . When people are ready , is for them to decide, however , now and then, people get it wrong, they have to live with that decision.

There way too many " dreamers" , almost exclusively men, that feel they can accomplish this sort of task, and that the wife " will just cope", cruising crossroads are full of boats for sale as a result.

This is not an argument about Any one persons ability, this is an argument about looking at the whole situation holistically and evaluating what's right for the whole crew.

Mere time is of course irrelevant , I've seen people be ready in 6 months a d I've seen people who could take a lifetime and not be ready, very little of it has to do with boat prep by the way

Dave


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[robert sailor]

Well while it doesn't come naturally, lol, I'm going to agree with Dave on this one. The most important part of boat preparation is in ones mind and it certainly appears that it was in short supply on RH. We have met so many people over the years that were just not cut out for crossing oceans and we've seen it destroy marriages (water soluble type) so its not to be taken lightly.

[FecklessDolphin]

In regards to the initial question, if this incident will shed some positive light on cruising, the issue is getting a lot of exposure right now through this article out today in the NY Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/13/op...f=opinion&_r=0

[Greggegner]

This story is just an example of everything bad happening at once. Most of us could have been in a similar situation if a couple of thing happened at the same time. If the child had not gotten sick, thus would have been a story about what I will next time. The extra cost to the government was 1 airplane flight and at the most 10 days guard pay. I hope they sell their story, buy another boat and get out there where I am striving to be.

[robert sailor]

My guess would be that the last thing on their minds right now is another offshore boat.