Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2019 i Soundings

Spring is here, which means it’s time for my annual bout of wanderlust. As the weather warms, I get antsy to cast off lines and cruise somewhere off the grid. But if commitments at home or work make it difficult to put a solid travel plan into action, I find pleasure living vicariously through the saltwater adventures of others. Romy Olaisen is one person who inspires me. She recently told me about the incredible journey she took with her husband, Keith, last year aboard their 47-foot Nordhavn, Roam. They left their home in Vero Beach, Florida, last spring and did the passage to Bermuda. Then, they crossed back over the Atlantic to make their way up the East Coast, where they traveled through New England and eventually up into Canada.…

Hard-core anglers, take note: Viking Yachts, the New Jersey builder of sportfishing convertibles and motoryachts from 37 to 93 feet, has announced a new brand of luxury center consoles called Valhalla Boatworks. The builder will produce the high-performance, outboard-powered open boats at its Mullica, New Jersey, factory. Debut models are expected to include 33-, 37- and 41-foot iterations with deep-V, twin-step hulls by Michael Peters Yacht Design. According to Viking, the stepped-V ventilated tunnel running surface will reduce drag while increasing speed, stability and efficiency. “The twin steps and tunnel not only give you fast and efficient performance, but also precise handling and a very stable ride,” says Viking Design Manager David Wilson. The project’s origins go back 17 years, according to Chris Landry, director of communications. “This is when…

Nearly 20 years ago, autumn was settling over the long, sloping fields that line the Chester River on Maryland’s upper Eastern Shore. The crew of the schooner Sultana, based in Chestertown, Maryland, had an idea: Why not mark the end of a successful season by asking the tall ship across the bay, the Pride of Baltimore II, to come on over for a party? The crews could swap tales and the ships could sail side-by-side just when the leaves were turning gold, the wind was crisp and the rockfish were running. “When we did that, it was almost like this magical thing happened,” says Chris Cerino, vice president of the Sultana Education Foundation, which creates educational programs about the Chesapeake Bay. “The two ships looked so great together on the…

LOA: 34’6” Beam: 10’6” Fuel: 275gals. Water: 30 gals. Displ.: 15,000 lbs. Power: 2 or 3 outboards up to 1,200 hp max Customization is a point of pride for Intrepid Powerboats, which is why the company says no two models are built alike. The same will most likely be true of the new 345 Nomad, a center console that fills the gap between the Intrepid 327 and 375. It’s designed to give owners the option of setting it up for day cruising, fishing or both. One of the most important features to select is at the helm. You can order a composite hardtop, which allows side entry into the helm console, where there’s a head, shower, sink and 6 feet, 2 inches of headroom. Or, you can choose an aluminum…

The best of the old and the best of the new: It’s a formula that works well in boatbuilding. The combination of traditional aesthetics and cutting-edge technology makes for a boat that appeals to the old-school eye and provides contemporary performance, comfort and safety. That’s the story of the Thomas Point 43. Her Downeast workboat lines hide a wholly modern cruising powerboat. Mike Kaufman of Annapolis, Maryland, designed this twin-diesel powerboat, and Mast & Mallet Boatworks built her in Edgewater, Maryland. Kaufman, whose work includes several designs for Albin, started with a hull shape based on the New England lobster boat and the Chesapeake Bay deadrise workboat, with a touch of Carolina style. The ride was designed for rough water, with a deep-V forefoot for a soft entry and bow…

Mike Arieta doesn’t like to sit still. Rather than talk in a conference room, he asks if we can chat while we tour the Hinckley Company’s Trenton, Maine, boatbuilding facilities. A recent snowstorm has made walking between the sheds icy and precarious, but Hinckley’s new president is undeterred. As we make our way, Arieta is reluctant to talk about himself. “I’m the son of a coach and two teachers,” he says. “It’s not about me. It’s about the boats and the people who build them.” The trade workers started at 5:30 a.m. Despite the activity, the work spaces in the metal sheds are quiet and clean. And even though epoxy is everywhere, the usual chemical smell is barely noticeable. Many of the workers are old hands. Composites Manager Barry Archilles…

Ron “Pipp” Rhodes calls it a Golden Age: the 1960s and 1970s, when he was going out with his father and brothers, fishing along the New Jersey coast. “Fishing was my life as a youngster,” says the 75-year-old retired New York City policeman. “I grew up on Staten Island, and I started out by ferrying people to their moorings in a rowboat with a three-hp Evinrude, doing it for tips.” Jobs on a party boat and at a marina followed. In 1971, when Rhodes was 28, he and his fellow anglers from the Staten Island Tuna Club competed in the United States Atlantic Tuna Tournament—and won it. “That was the height of my fishing career,” Rhodes says. “I tell my son that it was like winning the World Series.” As…

MARIO VITTTONE A retired USCG helicopter swimmer, the Lifelines author is a leading expert on survival and safety at sea. He is a recipient of the Alex Haley Award for Journalism. CAPT. PAT MUNDUS Our Seamanship columnist, who lives in Montauk, New York, was an oil tanker deck officer and has run ships throughout North America and the Middle East. MICHAEL CEVOLI A commercial and documentary photographer based in southern New England, Mike exhibits internationally. His work illustrates our story on Hinckley Yachts. KIM KAVIN The New Jersey native has been writing about boats and yachts since 2000. Her news stories are featured in the Dispatches and Focus sections in this issue.…

Francophiles and sailors, rejoice. The Moorings celebrates its 50th anniversary with plans to open a base in Martinique for the 2019 winter season. This is good news for those who like to combine their cruising with all things French. Located in the heart of the Lesser Antilles’ Windward Islands between Dominica and St. Lucia, the volcanic-formed mountainous island of Martinique is a mecca for French-Caribbean culture, maritime history and sailing. Martinique has safe anchorages, steady trade winds, hiking trails and snorkeling spots. The Moorings base at La Marina du Marin will feature Beneteau monohulls, sailing catamarans and its flagship 514 Power Catamaran. The new location is so loaded with facilities you may never leave the dock. It features a supermarket, bakery, laundry, post office, tobacco shop, currency exchange office, medical…

I knew a North Carolina highway patrol officer who once told me, “I’ve never unbuckled a dead man.” His point was that wearing a seat belt makes all the difference in highway safety. Then he asked, “Kind of like life jackets, right?” I didn’t hold back the bad news. “Oh no, sir. People drown wearing life jackets all the time, every year.” Boaters frequently don’t survive accidents because safety gear failed or wasn’t used correctly. A life jacket is not a seat belt. If you want to decrease your chances of living through a boating accident, buy the best survival gear, stow it on your vessel and leave it there. With the exception of closed-cell-foam-type life preservers and ring buoys, modern survival gear is complicated equipment that requires your attention.…

When I first started cruising—before GPS—my brother bought an inexpensive, plastic sextant. Soon after, I decided I should learn how to use it. So, in a flat calm, I took a noon sighting of the sun, marked our latitude and longitude on a chart, and learned that we were in Summit, New Jersey. There were only a few problems. Summit is landlocked. It’s 9 miles from the nearest body of navigable water and 25 miles to the northwest of Sandy Hook, New Jersey, where we were anchored. I’d like to blame the cheap sextant, or our timepiece, but the experience made it very clear to me that it wasn’t easy to use a sextant. So, imagine sailing around the world with just a sextant, a chronometer and paper charts on…

LOA: 45’7” Beam: 14’2” Draft: 3’10” Fuel: 343 gals. Water: 105 gals. Power: (2) 435-hp Volvo Penta IPS600s There comes a time when a boatbuilder has to retire a popular model from its line, as Fairline did a few years ago with its Targa 43. The English manufacturer, which had produced about 300 of the express cruisers over eight years, tapped Italian yacht designer Alberto Mancini to dream up a replacement, following his work on Fairline’s Targa 63 GTO. The result is the new Targa 43 Open, with a hardtop and a centerline, powered canvas top that opens to create an indoor-outdoor experience on the main deck. The boat’s other features also aim to connect passengers with nature. “This new 43 maximizes its day-boat credentials with a big tender garage…

A significant portion of my childhood was spent having my lower back realigned by my father’s all-weather boating mantra and the genuinely awful ride of Old Greenie, our family’s beat-up, 12-foot, Sears, Roebuck and Co. Ted Williams Gamefisher skiff. If it was a weekend and the crabs or fish were biting, we were going out, 25-knot winds and rain be damned. Maybe that wasn’t the smartest thing to do in such a small boat, but there are some good memories scattered among my terrorized recollections of shooting 4-foot standing waves in Indian River Inlet, Delaware, or of Old Greenie nearly splitting in half on the Severn River near Annapolis, Maryland. These experiences left my father and I attuned to the nuances of the way boats ride, and we spent the…

My wife, Nancy, and I had always treated Newfoundland as one of those places to see while on the way to somewhere else. For years, we had cruised along the west coast of Newfoundland aboard our Mason 44 Frances B, sticking to the western side of the island as we headed for the shores of Greenland or Labrador. To us, the Newfoundland route was like a scenic highway. There were great views, but we’d never taken the time to head off at an exit and see what else lay beyond. By the time we left our homeport in Savannah, Georgia, last May for our annual summer cruise, we’d done Greenland three times and Labrador eight. We needed a new adventure. Newfoundland’s total coastline, if you count all the bays and…

JOHN BENCHIMOL Harborside Marina We tell our customers to wax the boat at least every year. You can use any boat wax over the polymer; wax horizontal surfaces often, or any surface that gets a lot of sun. Keeping the salt off is also important. If the shine is gone from gelcoat, the only way to get it back is to compound off the chalked surface and then rebuild it with polish and wax. If the chalking is bad, you might have to wet-sand, but that’s for professionals. Same with stains. If soap won’t remove them, try Magic Eraser. Use On & Off Hull Cleaner on waterline stains, but use it only on the fiberglass hull. MARGARITA XISTRIS Nautical Details Wash your boat weekly with boat soap, and remove stains…

While shooting images around Chesapeake Bay for his first book, Working the Water, Annapolis-based photographer Jay Fleming developed a deep fascination with Tangier and Smith islands, and the people who live and work there. Smith and Tangier are two of the last inhabited islands on the bay. Primarily accessible by private boat or commercial ferry, the islands are less than 20 miles from the mainland, and yet far off the grid. The inhabitants—who travel by boat and golf cart, rather than car—are isolated in a way most people can’t understand, Fleming says. “That’s what makes the place and the people so unique,” he says. “That isolation has shaped the way they live, and to me, there is something really special about that.” His curiosity piqued, Fleming began compiling photos for…

Imagine a force field surrounding your boat, programmed to prevent impact with objects in close proximity—say, a dock, piling or other boat. This is the promise of assisted docking technology that Raymarine is developing. The system is intended to lower the captain’s performance anxiety when docking. Boaters should be able to get the technology in a few years, after costs are reduced and components are cleanly integrated. For now, the Raymarine DockSense demo is being done with Mercury Joystick Piloting for Outboards on a Boston Whaler 330 Outrage with a pair of Verados. (Raymarine is also testing DockSense on a larger boat powered by Volvo Penta IPS pod drives.) The Whaler has five FLIR stereo cameras that capture a 360-degree, 3-D view around the boat, and that can identify any…

WHAT WE’RE WATCHING SAMPSON BOAT CO. ON YOUTUBE Leo Goolden is on a mission to rebuild the 109-year-old English sailing yacht Tally Ho. Designed by Albert Strange in 1909, she is a historically important vessel, but was left to rot for decades in the Pacific Northwest. Goolden bought her and moved her to the Olympic Peninsula, where he films the work of restoring her from the keel up. Whether you want to learn about the lofting process or crafting double-sawn frames by hand, Goolden’s YouTube channel, Sampson Boat Co., is a great place to learn traditional boatbuilding. Each week finds Goolden working on another piece of Tally Ho’s refit, whether it’s securing lumber or crafting the boat’s new centerline timbers. He hopes to sail Tally Ho back to his United…

A $15 million lawsuit against a boatyard in Maine raises questions for all boat owners about how to make sure a vessel is in good hands when it’s taken to any shipyard for work. The lawsuit, filed at the end of January, involves a 95-foot sailing yacht that appeared to need work done on its steering gear. According to the claim, the yacht was put on stands and then fell over, landing on its port side and causing “catastrophic structural damage.” An attorney for the shipyard told Soundings Trade Only, a sister publication of Soundings, that the yard had “coordinated a complicated effort to stabilize and secure the damaged vessel.” With the lawsuit pending, more details are still to come in that particular case, but the incident raises the immediate,…

A clipper ship sailing before the wind, out in the immensity of the ocean. This is a painting that resonates with the sound of the sea untrammeled. Or, as artist Christopher Blossom says of this oil-on-canvas work, it shows “the constant movement of thousands of tons of water relentlessly rolling on with only the sound of the wind and the occasional rushing tumble of a collapsing wave crest.” Blossom, whose grandfather Earl and father, David, were both commercial artists, has been painting for most of his 63 years. Informal studies with his father led him to New York’s Parsons School of Design. Then, while attending Robert Bourke’s industrial design studio, Blossom learned to interpret ship blueprints, which enabled him to create maritime scenes with authentic details. As this painting illustrates,…

For those shopping new boats with planing hulls, the sea trial is often more of a ritual than a trial. But the truth is, you should make the time to put a boat through its paces before deciding if it’s the one you want to own. When you get behind the wheel for a run around the bay, consider these things. Start by checking out the boat while the lines are still tied ashore. A planing hull sitting at the dock doesn’t have many challenges, though it can be too narrow and have excessive deadrise, making it tender. If that’s the case, it will be rolling around like it’s half full of water when you step on one side. Away from the dock, a planing boat changes its behavior as…

The last notably expansive oceanfront property in Newport, Rhode Island, Seaward is an extraordinary 45-acre estate on Ocean Drive. The property was previously owned by John Jacob Astor and later by the cofounder of the Tennis Hall of Fame, Jimmy Van Alen. Structures on the estate were completed in 2008 after a four-year period. Extreme attention to detail was paid to every aspect of development, including the use of granite from the property itself to construct the facade of the two homes. Given its size and location, Seaward boasts complete privacy and mesmerizing views. Classic elegance and charm are the hallmarks of this waterfront residence with its striking gated entrance. In addition to the main house, there’s a guest house; both locations offer exceptional views of the Atlantic Ocean and…