Cruising Grounds

Port of Call: Penn Cove, Washington

by David Schmidt, Posted October 31, 2011

While Pacific Northwesteners are a laid-back lot, some things are sacrosanct. Take seafood. Sure, we might roll into the marina in an aging Subaru wearing worn-out Birkenstocks, battle-scarred jeans and an old regatta T-shirt, but you can bet your last roll of duct tape we don’t tolerate inferior seafood. Why should we?

Sailing Superior

by Charles Scott, Posted October 31, 2011

Sailors on the lower Great Lakes regard Lake Superior with a mixture of awe, respect and—frankly—fear. Tales of cold and fog, shipwrecks and wind keep most of us from exploring Superior’s shores. But there is another side to this greatest of the Great Lakes, and I found it on a summer cruise aboard my Westsail 32, Antares.

From Summit to Sea Level

by Stuart Belbas, Posted October 31, 2011

When it comes to my passions, I’d be hard-pressed to choose between sailing and skiing. That’s how I found myself standing on the snow-covered runway of Troms airport, the northernmost city in the world, ski gear in one bag, sailing gear in the other.

Chesapeake Bay: A love story

by Wendy Costa, Posted June 8, 2009

Is it a love story when a widow and a widower fall in love—not with each other, but with the Chesapeake Bay? Two years ago, at the age of 55, I became a widow and got my U.S. Coast Guard license to operate a 50-ton vessel. Herb, 81, recently widowed, and once an expert sailor on Canada’s Georgian Bay, moved aboard Ticketoo II, a 34-foot Catalina, on the Chesapeake

The Gold Coast

by David W. Shaw, Posted June 15, 2009

The Throgs Neck Bridge cast a shadow over the East River off the bow of StewardShip, my friend Dave Steward’s C&C 29 MK II, a fast-yet-comfortable cruiser. A stiff southerly breeze bearing funky scents of the Big Apple filled the sails, speeding us along.Standing at the wheel, I glanced up at the underside of the span, experiencing the usual trick of the eye

Soul Sailing

by Wally Moran, Posted July 30, 2009

There are sailors who have spent over twenty summers cruising Lake Huron’s North Channel. They’ll tell you it is always fascinating, still surprising, and still, unceasingly, continues to feed their souls. My first week-long cruise was in 1978, and I now spend up to 10 weeks each summer in the North Channel working as a charter skipper for the Canadian Yacht Charter fleet,

Barnegat Bay

by David W. Shaw, Posted August 18, 2009

A gentle west wind rippled the placid waters of Silver Bay, glistening in the light of a full moon that truly did make the bay look silvery. I was sitting alone in the cockpit, a cold beer in hand. Beads of condensation from the bottle dampened my palm. It was after Labor Day and the anchorage was deserted, except for me and my two Elizabeths.A flash of light caught my

Getting away from it all on Lake Michigan

by Fred Bagley, Posted September 3, 2009

Every time my wife Jennifer and I sail to the Beaver Islands, something goes wrong. So why do we keep going there? Initially it was because of where they are, but now it’s because of what they are.First, the “where” part. The Beavers are a dozen islands in northern Lake Michigan, 30 miles from Michigan sailing centers like Mackinac Island, Harbor Springs and Charlevoix.

Valley Boy

by Sail Staff, Posted April 29, 2010

The early morning air was redolent with the tang of low tide on the Hudson River as I steered upriver, bound for Lake Ontario via the Erie and Oswego canals. I’d gotten underway shortly after dawn to ride the flood tide north. The Manhattan skyline towered above me to starboard. Behind me the green-hued Statue of Liberty looked grand in the soft sunlight. The sounds of bustling Manhattan and

It's the End of the World

by David W. Shaw, Posted June 14, 2010

The sun shone a milky white. Its weak rays were barely able to drive off the damp chill of the early afternoon as we made our way eastward in the Deer Isle Thorofare, a passage snaking between Deer Isle and the beautiful smaller islands of Merchant Row in Down East Maine. I carefully checked the chart against the red and green buoys marking the channel, mindful that straying off course could mean