Introduction: seeking autonomy at sea.

[ScienceSailor]

I just realized this subforum existed and thought it would be polite to say 'Hi!'

I'm 45 yo, I have experience in sailing monohull and I'm about to embark in a 12 month training exercise to learn on cats more advanced courses, with the view to end up in as close to 'autonomy' as possible, at sea, no less.

I realize the enormity of the challenge but don't worry, no rogue sailor here, I am doing everything by the book while pushing a few boundaries. From radio licenses to survival training, I even have a couple of doctors looking after me to make sure I'll make it through the journey.

It's a crazy project by most people standards, but it's valuable one. Honestly, you might not realize it because you are all experts out here, but for the average joe, the very idea of even a recreational boat has become a bit outlandish due to the steep learning curve. As for the concept of autonomy at sea, it requires such discipline (rationning food, acquiring skills from plumbing to electricity and electronics, even IT and of course all navigation skills and so on), that it's just 'out there'.

I hope that by demonstrating my commitment to this project and documenting my journey throughout, even if it ends in failure (ie, no go, as don't worry, I'm not to undertake any unnecessary risks), it would be motivational for many people out there who have considered the idea only to shake their heads and go back to their 9-5 .

Anyways, glad meeting everyone, and I run a small telegram group if you want to help like-minded people participate in this adventure virtually

Cheers!

[Chotu]

You’re not going to fail. It’s not even that hard. If you can understand whatever branch of science you are in, you can certainly understand how to do all of the independent from land stuff. It’s actually quite interesting to the scientific mind. I am a former physicist. We have another former physicist on here and probably others we are not even aware of. There are many, many engineers. And even more tech people . Goes to show you that education pays doesn’t it?

In any case, this is a good thread. I thoroughly enjoy these topics and explored them about 15 or 20 years ago. In depth. Full-time. I even went and experimented to see what it would be like to try to live without money at sea. The short answer is you are always going to need an anchor or some thing and you can’t make those yourself at sea. So you will never be independent on a boat. Sorry to burst your bubble in that respect. But you will always be dependent on land for equipment. The only way you could get around this is to build the boat out of wood that you saw yourself. And even then, you still need that anchor. You would have to grow some hemp amd make rope. Go ashore to build a DIY kiln and try to make an anchor if you can find the metal.

All in all it cannot work. It is actually impossible to remove yourself completely from society.

However, you can stay out for a very long amount of time. In modern days, The food will be the first thing to run out. That is the one to solve. Also you don’t want to eat boring things and you don’t want to deprive yourself of nutrition because you’re going to die early. Or just be very sick all the time. So it’s quite important to get fresh vegetables, fruit, etc.

When it comes to water, we now have water makers and enough solar to run them. Lithium batteries. If you bring a duplicate water maker you might be out there for a decade without having to come back. For water anyway.

But there is yet another way to do all of this.

Low tech and simple. Water tanks. Rain catchment. Bleach. Proper filtration. Foot pumps. Or just no running water at all and you get it out of a spigot on the tank.

These types of primitive set ups last forever.

I keep meaning to get my water maker going. What I have right now is just a 50 gallon water tank and a foot pump that goes through a carbon filter. It’s fantastic. When I want hot water? I put a pot on the stove.

This is because my boat is not complete. I am still building it.

However, if I just left it as it is, it would work forever. Until that foot pump broke. But they seem to last decades.

My point is if you have a pressurized water system you will need to carry spare pumps because pumps go bad.

There is a lot to think and dream about. The more complicated you make it, the more it will break and the more you will need land. That is the golden rule. Even though you will have all of that equipment aboard, (the electronics), you will not want complexity in the rest of your boat if you can help it. Otherwise you will have to keep returning to land for parts. When things break.

Thank you for starting this thread. I haven’t finished the inside of my boat yet and it’s reminding me to keep things simple. Can’t wait to see where the thread goes. This is a very interesting topic to me.

[Adelie]

Welcome to CruisersForum!

I would suggest updating your profile with your general location and your boat make & model or “Looking” in the "Boat" category. This info shows up under your UserName in every post in the web view. Many questions are boat and/or location dependent and having these tidbits under your UserName saves answering those questions repeatedly. If you need help setting up your profile then click on this link: https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums...ml#post3308797

I would happily help more if the link above is not enough.

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by ScienceSailor

I just realized this subforum existed and thought it would be polite to say 'Hi!'

I'm 45 yo, I have experience in sailing monohull and I'm about to embark in a 12 month training exercise to learn on cats more advanced courses, with the view to end up in as close to 'autonomy' as possible, at sea, no less.

I realize the enormity of the challenge but don't worry, no rogue sailor here, I am doing everything by the book while pushing a few boundaries. From radio licenses to survival training, I even have a couple of doctors looking after me to make sure I'll make it through the journey.

It's a crazy project by most people standards, but it's valuable one. Honestly, you might not realize it because you are all experts out here, but for the average joe, the very idea of even a recreational boat has become a bit outlandish due to the steep learning curve. As for the concept of autonomy at sea, it requires such discipline (rationning food, acquiring skills from plumbing to electricity and electronics, even IT and of course all navigation skills and so on), that it's just 'out there'.

I hope that by demonstrating my commitment to this project and documenting my journey throughout, even if it ends in failure (ie, no go, as don't worry, I'm not to undertake any unnecessary risks), it would be motivational for many people out there who have considered the idea only to shake their heads and go back to their 9-5 .

Anyways, glad meeting everyone, and I run a small telegram group if you want to help like-minded people participate in this adventure virtually

Cheers!

I have a great little book in pdf I can send along but it's over 10 megs so pm me your email address anyone that wants the book