Category Archives: GENERAL

Sailing As a Spectator Sport – the effect of sponsorship

The Sydney Hobart Race – sorry, the Rolex Sydney Hobart Race – starts in just over a week. My friend Jim Murrant, author of the Boating Bible Manual of Seamanship and a man who used to compete in the race … Continue reading

Posted in EVENTS, GENERAL, MONEY | Leave a comment

Cold Water Boot Camp

In about 1970 I read about a study by the Royal Navy (without ever seeing the original, so I may have been misinformed) which concluded that people who fell overboard in the English Channel died of hypothermia, not drowning. It … Continue reading

Posted in EQUIPMENT, GENERAL, SEAMANSHIP | Leave a comment

Brittany Storm – Raz de Sein in December 2007

As a child, I used to travel to and from east Africa via the Bay of Biscay and Capes Finisterre (Spain) and Finistère (Brittany), so I know the sea often gets rough around that part of the world. Like Cornwall, … Continue reading

Posted in GENERAL, PLACES | Leave a comment

Can too much adventure really harm teenage psychological development?

A year ago, Dutch courts put Laura Dekker under the control of child care services while they assessed her physical and mental fitness for the risks involved in her proposed multi-stage 2-year singlehanded voyage around the world. I think they … Continue reading

Posted in GENERAL, PEOPLE | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Teamsurv – community-sourcing comes to the boating world

New technologies often lead to developments that weren’t foreseen in their early days. One that is becoming more and more common with the growth of the Internet and mobile phone networks is  ‘community-sourcing’, where groups with a common interest pool … Continue reading

Posted in EQUIPMENT, GENERAL, WEB | Tagged | Leave a comment