Long Distant Voyaging

If you are tough enough you can cross in a rowboat.

I dont recomend it.

40 footers are the common tool for normal folks.

Even at 40 ft , sailing across oceans is physically demanding.

You better have your wits about you and have plenty of energy

 

"you've obviously not spent days in a small boat, on a big sea without any letup, "

Trust me , an aircraft carrier is a small boat when the seas get a big breeze for a number of days.

 

So how big was your boat? I've never completed a 'rounding, but have may plenty of crossings. I've also ridden 5 hurricanes that tried their best to drown me (nearly did once). There's a huge difference between making a passage and crossing the oceans in a camp cruiser. Sure some have done it, but it's not a comfortable thing and why I tell folks to take a Catalina 22 and go play in the breakers, if only to get an idea of what you'll experience.

 

Why is thread reminding me of the heliocopter navigator's banter from The Hunt For Red October?

 

"Sure some have done it, but it's not a comfortable thing"
I absolutely agree with that, I just object to call all small-boat-long-distance-cruisers "nuts"! For many it's "small boat, or no boat at all". I sure would be loath to deny that comfort & seaworthiness are in direct proportion to length (all other things being equal of course!!!)

 

Agreed, the blanket statement isn't necessarily appropriate, but there are minimum sizes, that most feel are generally too small, again for comfort and seaworthiness. We get quite a few posts each year, about folks looking to cross the Atlantic their West Wight Potter (as an example) and maybe some cynicalness has crept into my replies as a result. My apologies if you were offended. You see, in my view, anyone thinking about this just needs a good spanking and riding a 10' rubber raft in the breaker down at the beach is a great way to demonstrate what happens, preferably after having just eaten a fully dressed Italian sub.

What size boat did you use on your 'roundings? My last ride across the puddle was on a Swan 40 (Frers).

 

first time a selfbuilt 34' wharram cat ("comfort" comaparable maybe with a 22' mono), second & third time around a 37' french aluminium keeler drawing 7'
nice one, btw, the Frers Swan 40...

 

A very pleasant and fast ride the last time over, but I've also done it in a pig too, though large enough to be tolerable, a slow, wet slosh across.

 

Coastal cruisers are different from ocean crossing boats. Coastal cruisers need good performance at all points of sail , particularly upwind, plus significant load carring ability...water, fuel, anchors, tenders...... They tend to be moderate to heavy displacement .

Oceanic boats need speed . You always cross the ocean on a reach.

The safe way to cross an ocean is fast. Light displacement, very powerful sailplan, optimized for reaching .

If you were crossing the atlantic today, you would be broad reaching in 10 to 15 knots. A heavy all puropse cruiser would be floundering and rolling around on a broad reach with 8 knots of apparent wind ...probably motor sailing...not having much fun.

Only a light powerful boat can get on with sailing in typical oceanic crossing conditions.,

 

"...You always cross the ocean on a reach..."
ever been up the Red Sea on your rtw-trip??? or cruised the western S-Pacific?
I agree with the desireability of a (reasonably) fast boat, but upwindcapability should not be forgotten

 

Yeah, I agree, it all depends on your course. It seems for me I'm always on the nose when entering an unknown cove, anchorage or harbor, usually when I'm tired and night is about to fall. Also as an example if arriving in the USA today, on th east coast between Daytona and Charleston, NC, the last 200 miles will be uphill.

 

All the small boats I met passage making across the Pacific were crewed by single males (often starting off as a couple). The boats were usually badly overloaded and the owners very appreciative of fuel, water, tools and company.

I've cruised in Cats, Mono Performance cruisers and heavy displacement cruisers. You usually want a different boat at some time in the cruise to the one you have whatever craft you are sailing.

Unless passing through with the trades, Pacific cruising from Australia and NZ often requires windward passages. Sometimes a week or two unrelenting off the bow. Most heavy boats will plod along upwind or downwind and do it a little less intolerably in the boisterous cross seas that the Pacific can produce at times.

Neither is a heavy boat necessarily slow in light air, that depends entirely on the hullform and the sail area ratios. But it will rate slow in a race which I suspect is where a lot of opinions stem about heavy boats being slow.

 

The problem with a heavy boat is the high loading all gear is subject to. To make way a heavy boat needs substantial sail area. Big overlapping genoas for instance.

A light boat can make its speed with much lower power...less stress on gear.

Upwind ability offshore is not so important...offshore I hold the favoured tack and rarely change tack.

Inshore, because of obstructions, I may tack ten or twenty times a day. A boat that cant efficiently make way to windward must motor.


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again lets not compare apples & pears:
THE boat-determining parameter for 99,9% of us are the costs! for the same money the heavier boat will be more expensive = shorter/smaller (of course not when we start getting into exotic materials!). in light conditions frictional drag is the main drag, so the boat with less wetted surface area/sailarea-ratio will be faster - very often the heavier boat (despite being shorter [for the same money])

 

The reason to choose a heavy boat is load carring abilty. Each sailor must decide how much junk they need . Typically the coastal sailor has a ton of junk ...plus half a dozen kids. The offshore sailor typically Only has his trusty shipmate and a few cans of tuna.

Modern designers try to hit the middle ground with displacement . Dual purpose boats. They work well .