Engine-less Cruising

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by Jammer Six

That's pretty much the response I expected.

So, I'll step up to the plate:

Jammer, I'm not sure what you mean by a citation, but in their early books involving their travels in Serafyn (sp?), they do mention being towed into places several times when either lack of wind or other circumstances inhibited their ability to sail in.

I don't own those books, and am not about to spend the time in the library to satisfy your request.

Jim

[TacomaSailor]

I am currently trying to help a new owner get their Stewart Knockabout 28 from Newport Beach, California to Shelter Island in San Diego bay. That is a 66 mile, mostly downwind, trip.

No engine, no cabin, no head, no lights - but a fast responsive light air boat and it is really fun to sail.

First day we sailed we made it 2 miles thru Newport harbor and about 1/2 mile out into the choppy, rolly Pacific Ocean. We bobbed around for a while then decided to return to the free dock we had left four hours earlier.

Several days later we got a good forecast for NW 10 to 15 and 3' NW swell with 2' W wind waves. We made it 14 miles to Dana Point when we were caught by a small front that brought an hour of heavy rain and dying winds.

Took an hour to sail 3/4 mile up the channel between two jettys as we tried to reach the guest dock that was dead upwind. Wind died completely 1/4 mile from the guest dock we had been assigned. We glided into an empty guest slip in 0.00 wind.

The owner is now paying $35 / night as we wait for another weather window for the 29 mile trip down the coast to Oceanside, CA which is the next possible harbor. There are NO, NONE places to safely anchor along the way.

The three days after we made it to Dana Pt were variable winds less than 5 knots so the boat sits in Dana Pt guest dock at $35 / night.

The boat does not carry a dinghy so there is no way to anchor anywhere. Additionally, most of the SoCal free anchorages have very short time limits, e.g. 3 to 5 days.

Sailable daylight is about 11 hours here this time of the year so we need to be able to average 3 knots to make it from Dana Pt to Oceanside.

The boat is 28' long and 6' 6" wind and displaces 4400 pounds. We can paddle slowly and inefficiently and have no pretensions that we can paddle less than 1/2 mile and certainly can not paddle into any kind of current.

Engineless cruising is possible but requires a lot of time and patience if you are really going somewhere, i.e. from port to port.

And - all those old time explorers that moved with no engines did have large crews who rowed 30' boats to tow the engineless sailboat.

Those old time sailors had human powered auxiliary motors.

[Custom30]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

So, I'll step up to the plate:

Jammer, I'm not sure what you mean by a citation, but in their early books involving their travels in Serafyn (sp?), they do mention being towed into places several times when either lack of wind or other circumstances inhibited their ability to sail in.

I don't own those books, and am not about to spend the time in the library to satisfy your request.

Jim

In addition to the occasional (and rare) tow into a harbor, Seraffyn was outfitted with a sculling oar, effectively making Larry an engine.

The story where a big wind shift and increase left Seraffyn by a lee shore in the middle of the night comes to mind in this discussion. Sculling was not an option under those conditions. The only option was to row the dinghy into the teeth of the blow to set a kedge anchor, winch the boat up and repeat.

Of course it can be done by elite cruisers like Lin and Larry Pardey.

The real questions are;

Can you row your dinghy into 35 knots with an angry chop?

Do you have the stamina to do it for extended periods broken up only by setting and retrieving an anchor from a dinghy?

Can you do all of this after you are already tired and asleep?

Do you carry sufficient warps aboard to set multiple kedges on extended rodes to make this work effectively?

Will your boat sail to windward in any conditions?

If you can't answer a confident yes to each of these, you will eventually be in real trouble, without a powerful engine.


I have 5 capable anchors, 6+ warps 200-300' long, a good rowing dinghy, plenty of stamina, and have kedged off many soft groundings. Whether I can complete this complicated maneuver in the dark, with rain stinging my face and eyes, cold and wet, half asleep, without any mistakes, is questionable. One mistake and you lose the boat (home), and maybe worse. You could be swept to sea on an unexpected current in a stirred up harbor.


Believe me, all of these discussions are close to home for me. When I bought the current boat, good friends and excellent sailors pointed out that she is grossly underpowered (9 tons, 12hp 1cyl Yanmar). My answer was that she must be sailed as if she has no engine, and we do. The little one lung is fine for motoring in benign conditions, but will not push the boat out of the above described situation, nor off a lee shore when things turn quickly. She will go to windward happily in just about any conditions, else I wouldn't have considered her, but that doesn't help you out of a windward, angry, narrow, harbor entrance. You are literally betting the farm.

A powerful engine is more than a convenience, it may well be essential safety equipment if your boat will not point in a serious blow.

For master cruisers like the Pardeys, lack of an engine means more room and less weight aboard. It mean no money spent on fuel or parts or maintainence.

For most sailors on the water today, lack of an engine will spell disaster in no time.


'

[frank_f]

Ok, personally, I love the Pardeys. They have shown what can be done if you put your mind to it. They are the reason I got into sailing. They proved to me that anyone with a bit of focus could do this, not just the rich fun-boys. They are 'master sailors' simply because they got out and did it instead of analysing the heck out of a situation from arms length.

Their longest engine-less boat to date to my knowledge is Taleisin at 29'-9". I think Larry would agree that that is the maximum length of boat he would like to scull or row. Yes, I know, once you get it going, it's easy (in theory at least).

And all this is great when that's what you cut your sailing teeth on and did in your 20's and 30's. For those of us in our 50's, 60's and beyond who never did this sort of thing, this really isn't the place to start. For us, and the weekend warriors, motors make sense. I live by the Great Lakes which means I have about a 5 month sailing window. I sail on weekends (about 20 not including family events and birthdays (why are so many kids born in the summer?)) and the occasional vacation week. For me, a good weekend weather window is when the sun is up.

Jim and Ann Cate's boat is 46' long. That's a third again as long as Taleisin. You honestly think you would like to row that in slack tide with no wind let alone in any 'conditions'?

If I was retired and had nothing to do and all day to do it in, I would be engine-less as well. I can't stand the noise, maintainence and the constant thought at the back of my mind that it could stall and I could be on the rocks before I got the main back up.

Of course, that's just me. YMMV.

[JPA Cate]

Originally Posted by Jammer Six

That's pretty much the response I expected.

FWIW, if the citation requested was relative to the Pardeys being towed in repeatedly by others (obviously the folks who towed them used their motors) is available by reading their books.

If it is relative to sculling, we have friends who I have seen sculling boats.

Sorry for the delay in response.

Ann

[nimblemotors]

Not sure what the point is to not have an engine on a boat.
Sounds like some kind of fundamentalist religion thing. Why not a boat without anchors?

[Schooner Chandlery]

Interesting, long topic here. A couple thoughts while reading it--there are, indeed, still folks around sailing w/o an engine. One fellow, Don Mullet (formerly SV Princess, a 36' boat) has been doing so, off and on for...30 or 40 years? Including sailing the South Pacific, parts of New Zealand, back up to Hawaii, and along the Pacific Coast of California (where we met him). Don is an excellent sailor but over the years lost two boats--one to water ingress on the open ocean and insufficient (manual) pumping capabilities, the second due to solo sailing and the need to sleep. In both cases, having a second person aboard would have made all the difference in the world. No publicity stunts or anything--just a regular guy cruising a regular boat.

An engine helps when there is insufficient crew aboard to row/kedge/manage in tight quarters or when pumping or other power is needed aboard.

We have an engine aboard our 54' 30T boat--but the previous owner to us did not have one for 20 years and would tow the boat (by rowing) from his slip out to clear water in the still hours of the night so that he could anchor and be ready for the winds when they came in the morning. I wouldn't want to do that, but he did it all the time.

Kedging w/no engine? hummm...

Two months ago we had one of those frightful "get up in the night and row your dingy out to kedge in 35 knots of wind moments" because, in a tight anchorage behind an island in a narrow slough, our main anchor which had been set for over a week in the same spot was likely not ever properly set and decided to drag in the sudden wind storm and then fouled--and as we dragged backwards our loose stern anchor line wrapped the prop rending the engine (and the now cut away stern anchor) useless.

The incident is one that hubby and I refer to as one of our successful Laurel and Hardy routines. Bottom line was the engine was unusable and we were dragging quickly onto a (hopefully not rocky) lee shore behind us. While the electric windlass slowly hauled in the fouled 105# anchor on one roller, Hubby rowed out our 400' of kedge line (always kept at the ready on deck and attached to an anchor) and a different 120# anchor off the other bow roller. It is no cake-walk to lower such a heavy anchor into the dingy, btw. He dropped the anchor off the back of the dingy and I winched in the 400 ft of rode tight on the capstan and had reset the first anchor (now clean) on a questionably short scope while hubby was rowing out the kedge. I then pulled out the dive light, the hooka line and a mask, handed it down to hubby in the dingy, he dove to the prop, untangled the cut stern anchor line, he then swam to the nearby stern anchor marker buoy/trip line and dove in the shallow water to collect the stern anchor rode so I could winch it in on a sheet winch to re-deploy.

Once it was in, we decided we were too close to the lee shore (less than 50' at that point) so we might as well either kedge forward or reset in a slightly different spot. We decided we didn't need the "practice" of kedging forward as we were both shivering in our bedclothes, covered in mud and seagrass, as was the deck of the boat and the dingy, so we started the engine and moved the boat to a different location where we set the all chain rode on the primary anchor and hubby then rowed out the kedge line again to set a second anchor cleated to the stern.

It took 90 minutes all in all.

All in the dark, all in 30 knots of wind, all w/o a motor on the rowing dingy and the important parts of initially resetting anchors done w/o an engine. Tiresome.

I'm 50 and hubby is 52. Moving around anchors all between 95 and 120 lbs, swimming and finding things underwater in the dark. Too much work for an average day. Would we sail this boat all the time w/o an engine--no way. It takes too long to set sail and sailing off the anchor is always "interesting" for us, to say the least. Would we sail a smaller boat w/o an engine--maybe but it is highly unlikely.

About the Pardeys getting tows into port: It is my understanding from talking with senior sailors (folks in their 80's and older) that it was very, very common for a boat coming into port in the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's to be met by a yacht club member, harbor master/employee, or fisherman and given a tow into the marina/dock/mooring field--or even if the sailboat had a motor, often the larger boats were tended into their tight berths. It seems this wasn't uncommon back thenwhile today we expect each boat to self sufficiently do it all. We have towed engine-less cruisers out of tight quarters to clear water/winds and we have had the pleasure of being tended into tight quarters at one yacht club and I must say it was much less worrisome that wondering if our bowsprit was going to spear someone standing on the quay.

Engine or no engine? Who cares. I could care less that some cruisers motor everywhere. It's their dime/ their diesel/their business and I'm just happy that they're out there doing their thing. The same for cruisers w/o an engine. The bottom line is--just do it. Go sailing, go cruising, help your fellow cruiser if s/he needs it and enjoy the life.

Fair winds,

[Viking Sailor]

Originally Posted by redbopeep

Engine or no engine? Who cares. I could care less that some cruisers motor everywhere. It's their dime/ their diesel/their business and I'm just happy that they're out there doing their thing. The same for cruisers w/o an engine. The bottom line is--just do it. Go sailing, go cruising, help your fellow cruiser if s/he needs it and enjoy the life.

Fair winds,

+1

[LBW399]

Originally Posted by nimblemotors

Not sure what the point is to not have an engine on a boat.
Sounds like some kind of fundamentalist religion thing. Why not a boat without anchors?

Not sure what the point is to have sails on a boat if you have a motor? Sounds like some kind of fundamentalist religion thing.

[Coops]

There was lady back in the seventies who wanted a boat of her own. She went to a welding class, then proceeded to build a 30' flush deck steel yacht all by herself. She could not afford/did not want an engine, I cannot remember now, and sailed it up the east coast of Australia to Sydney. I actually met her there, in the marina where I was living on a Colvin Gazelle, but for the life of me cannot remember her name. She then sailed it round the world, still engineless, including a few canal trips. It can be done, but not for this little black duck.

Much admiration for her though.

Coops.

[Jim Cate]

Coops, was that Jill from s/v Jeshan? Met her long ago in Middle Harbour... quite an impressive CV she had!

Jim

[Coops]

Yes, that is where I met her, Cammeray marina. She hooked up with a guy who built Colvin boats, he had a three masted junk at the time and I think that they went off together in her boat but it did not last, the relationship, not the boat.

Coops.

[Jammer Six]

Originally Posted by highseas

Capt. Cook didn't have to dodge ships on collision course at 25knots.

Didn't he write the Law of Tonnage? I'm sure he wasn't bound by any COLREGS.

[Jammer Six]

Originally Posted by Ann T. Cate

FWIW, if the citation requested was relative to the Pardeys being towed in repeatedly by others (obviously the folks who towed them used their motors) is available by reading their books.

I've read their books, without noticing any such reference. That could, of course, be me.

Your response is not a citation, Ann, but I thank you for it.

I have their books here, and if you give me a citation, I can look at it quickly.

Do you have a citation?

[Jammer Six]

Originally Posted by frank_f

And all this is great when that's what you cut your sailing teeth on and did in your 20's and 30's.

Yup. In my teens, we went out on Lake Washington in small boats, got really wet in November, came back in and made pizza and whoopee in the clubhouse.

We did a lot of things, like running up stairs two at a time or carrying sacks of sand on each shoulder that I wouldn't do today.

Today I hire people to do everything but the whoopee.

On second thought, I wonder, if I hired someone to make whoopee with me...

But I digress.