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Old 01-03-2010, 10:49 PM   #21
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If you can find a copy 'Emergency Navigation' by David Burch ( ISBN 0-87742-204-4) it would be worth having on any yacht. Predating GPS - published in 1986 - it tells you how to find your way around without sextant, compass or electronics....

Cheers

Frank

[/quote]

Thanks Frank, I'll get that and as I have a few months before we depart I'll make an effort to learn.
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Old 01-04-2010, 02:40 AM   #22
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I remember shortly after GPS was first available to recreational vessels back in the late 80s or early 90s (shrug, hard to remember nowadays), we got one (Peter was so interested in anything to make navigating easier). Old habits die hard, and for passages we continued to maintain an hourly log, updated position on our paper charts (no chartplotters back then, except for military), and updated rhumb line. Not too long after that, we were sailing down the Pacific coasts of Costa Rica and Panama, and heard a couple boats talking on the VHF about losing a GPS signal. One or two of them sounded very upset, almost panicky. It turned out that the US military was fiddling with the satellites, and (memory is foggy here) shutting down the system in order to reprogram the various satellites. It could have been more than that, but that was the explanation given to the general public. The US didn't leave people completely in the lurch - there was a published schedule of when a signal would be available (sent to the GPS receiver when the signal came back up). I hopped on the VHF to tell the boats how to find the notice, and what the schedule was (once I figured it out). The second or third day I was politely thanked, but they weren't going anywhere until the GPS was back up reliably.

I was puzzled - GPS had not been available for very long, I couldn't understand how these people had gotten so far without learning the basics of navigation. I still don't. Maybe they bought the first ones, at the impossibly exhorbitant prices they asked back then, and rather than learn navigation basics, they learned only GPS navigation. or whatever.

I'm not sure of the moral of this story is. Peter and I were a tad too smug, joking between ourselves about their panic over such a minor glitch, though I hope that I didn't convey our bad attitude over the radio. It frightened us then, and it frightens us now, that some people substitute gadgets for knowledge and experience.

Most of us don't bring lots of years of experience to our first years of cruising. Some of us compensate by working very hard to learn as much as possible about the hard parts of cruising. Some of us put our trust into gadgets and gewgaws to keep us safe. And when we get it right we might be just a bit too impressed with ourselves. Fortunately (some might say unfortunately) we haven't gone too long feeling self-satisfied when something happens to shake us up before we become insufferable. Doing something stupid, or even just careless, that could cost us our boat helps keep us humble. But not too humble .

I've been fiddling with computers and many other electronic gadgets for all my adult life, and one thing I know. There is not yet any device that is as smart, inventive, adaptive, or creative, as the human brain. It only needs a little education and information and it can do wondrous things. I'm not sure I want to try to take a sight on a heaving deck, but ZI'm not sure that I want to put my faith in just one gadget, either.

It's late.

Fair winds

J
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Old 01-04-2010, 09:52 AM   #23
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IF you know of any more travel diaries like this please advise.
Try this: http://blog.mailasail.com/

There are some rather interesting stories, and also some blogs which only note position.

One of the circumnavigators is Hollinsclough. It is happening right now. Much better than Onedin Line
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Old 01-04-2010, 11:09 AM   #24
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IF you know of any more travel diaries like this please advise.
The collection of good Cruising Blogs and Narratives on the World Cruising Wiki will keep you busy reading for months - HERE.
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Old 01-08-2010, 10:40 PM   #25
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I'm beginning to see two types of sailors that set off on a blue water adventure. Ones that prepare and learn and ramp up over the years, and ones that just throw caution to the wind and just go ahead, make a lot of mistakes, and (hopefully) come out the other end with lots of good stories.

Some good stories:

Mike Harker interview with Furled Sail (podcast) http://www.furledsails.com/article.php3?article=767

Mike learns to sail by himself (not knowing how to tack until he reaches Mexico), does a trans-atlantic crossing by himself because there was no crew to be found, they had all left it was the start of hurricane season. Mike's on his second circumnavigation now.

Paul Lotus' "Confessions of a long distance sailor" (free downloaded book) http://www.arachnoid.com/lutusp/sailbook.html

Paul buys a little PS31 Mariah, kits it out and learns to sail in the first year, then sails it around the world.

...not that I'm recommending the "hell, just do it" approach. Just saying it's possible, and as the sailor in the boat across from me says "your boat is never ready".

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Old 01-13-2010, 08:11 PM   #26
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That's about 10 times the amount of replies I was expecting for such a short amount of time. I m impressed to see that there's a real active community existing in the domain of advising people on sailing.

First, thank you for your advices. I read them all, and if I correctly understood them, the general facts are:

1) Sailing isn't like learning to drive a bicycle, you need skills that are not quickly acquired.

How long does one need to practice sailing before being ready for major weather situations and the kind of stuff you'd face out there around the globe?

2) 1 year is considered racing competition more than a cruise. Then I guess I can extend to 1,5 years, maybe 2 top.

The thing is that part of the reason for this journey is to unplug myself from everyday life, from the society, to have time to open books in something else than what I study at university, to stop thinking about a career, and to force myself to stop taking onto projects while thinking " after this one, I stop " which never happens and educate myself into fields I've tackled and liked, but never had time to turn my attention to with the pressure of everyday life ( cinema, litterature & languages, philosophy, etc. ).

I would like to sail to the most interesting parts of the world, and not inspect the globe with a magnifying glass. The longest stop would probably be europe, and will probably not top two months. Then just peeks of the most famous places of the world, stops here and there for a week, then move on.

In this way I will be able to " see " some of the world, but leave some for next time ( because I do not believe that if I find a way to do this once, I will not repeat it later, may it be when I m 65 ).

3) 100 000$ for two years worth of spending including boat purchase must be available ( I have a Canadian passport, I believe that health insurance is supplied for free. Any Canadians in the room that could confirm that? )

From Project Blue Sphere, there was the interesting idea of picking small jobs at your various destinations. That will however probably seriously limit freedom of travel, but it's an alternative to having the necessary money from end to end for the travel. A question to the experienced sailors in the room:

If I carry all necessary tools with me, could car fixing bring some money, and if so, where? ( I m sure you can't start fixing cars this way in Germany, or whole Europe probably, but perhaps it could be a honest way to earn a few bucks in the Latin America countries without working at a McDo's. Have you ever seen someone else do anything of the sort? By car fixing, I mean any sort, from basic repairs to engine tuning. Could this earn at least on par of let's say, work at the local fast-food? )

4) I found a good ( mind you, from the point of view of someone who has never had any sort of education in the field of sailing and boats ) beginner's book on the Iphone / Itouch. It covers from basics of what a boat is ( construction materials, hull designs, types of boats, advantages and disadvantages of each choice, some basic formulas of velocity, sailing techniques, rules and regulations in major parts of the world, and much more. It's almost 2000 pages in total, and from what I've seen so far, it's worth the 5$ by far and large, especially if you're always on the run. It's called Boater's Pocket Reference.

5) It's a good idea to learn to sail with the stars. That's a great idea, plus I've always liked to learn the ways of the past. You're always surprised to see how complicated the world used to be before technology solved all our brain efforts for us, and much you're actually capable of achieving without technology. Plus just the saying " Sailing With The Stars sounds so... romantic... " Yap, I'll deffinitly learn that.

6) Weapons are useless. Do not carry them. Alright. I'm still not comfortable with that idea, but I suppose you're right.

Does anyone know anything about sponsorship? So far the money requierment is the steepest hill, it shoots the possibility of the travel at least a few years into the future, with a grain of optimism.
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Old 01-13-2010, 09:12 PM   #27
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Alex,

I commend you on the reasons to sail. Some things came to me while reading your post.

You could start off, quite immediately and without much stress, by crewing a passage for a boat, many of the larger boats need a decent crew (for insurance reason amongst others). I started off from zero in 2008, absolute zero. While I was travelling (as well as looking at boats) in Thailand, I joined a sailing school, and ended up crewing for the school boat for 2 weeks of racing a big budget boat regatta. Then before I got home I was asked to crew for a captain I had met back home, he wanted crew for a long open ended trip from NZ to Europe. I crew with the boat for 1 month from NZ and on to cruising the southern archipelago of Vanuatu. I nearly bought a PSC 31 Mariah from an American in Port Vila but it fell through, then with a friend I met, we decided to sail back via New Caledonia on a gaff rigged tall ship. When I got home, I bought the captain's old boat, and am learning lots, and am planning my own blue water passage.

If you are unattached and willing to rough it without the psychological net of knowing your floating home is always there, I think you could start off in a similar fashion, even to travel the world, and be open about buying a boat along the way as the random world of possibilities presents you with options. Flights back home to pack the rest of your essentials to live on your new boat, or alternatively escape the horror reality of the sailing life is a great modern luxury we have.

On (1), I don't think you'll be ready until you ride out your first storm. I've never been in one, but I get the feel you wont be prepped till you experience it. Just make sure you're in a solid seaworthy boat when it happens.

(6) I'm out to court on weapons, I doubt I'd carry one myself, but in Confessions of a Long Distance Sailor, Paul writes about being nearly boarded by fishermen/pirates. He pointed his shotgun at them as they were about to board and shook his head at them, and concluded without the gun, they would have come onboard and thrown him overboard to take his boat. Then there's the story of Sir Peter Blake in his environmental expedition, who when below and started exchanging fire with bandits in South America and got himself killed.
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Old 01-14-2010, 12:36 AM   #28
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Pirates who are going to throw him off his boat? In his dreams. One more story. He had no reason to believe the guys were pirates. If they were, and were armed, they would have shot him.

Nuts.
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Old 01-14-2010, 03:34 AM   #29
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Sounded like they had machettes, most pirates in Asia are opportunists, fishermen by day, pirates at night.

Have a read... under October 10, Day 5

http://www.arachnoid.com/sailbook/Chapter_..._Sri_Lanka.html

There's a rumor whispered among the Malaysian merchant marine that the Malaysian Navy is Navy by day, Pirates at night. Nice.
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Old 01-14-2010, 01:12 PM   #30
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Sounded like they had machettes, most pirates in Asia are opportunists, fishermen by day, pirates at night.

Have a read... under October 10, Day 5

http://www.arachnoid.com/sailbook/Chapter_..._Sri_Lanka.html

There's a rumor whispered among the Malaysian merchant marine that the Malaysian Navy is Navy by day, Pirates at night. Nice.
Oh, Frank, where are you?

Bah! again. First, there were no machetes mentioned in the link you provided, nor in the earlier one of a "suspicious boat" in the Gulf of Carpentaria/Torres Strait. Not a place rampant with pirates. This fellow was obsessed with pirates, seeing them when all there was were fishermen in a ROWING dinghy. Sailing towards him. And his speculations were absurd under the circumstances, there were no threats whatsoever. Gad, we invited such fellows on our boat dozens of times. Many dozens, and never once was there any overtures except courtesy and friendly.

We spent years in SE Asia, sailing up and down both coasts of peninsular Malaysia, and over to Borneo twice. We never saw a hint of a "pirate". We knew that there were pirates, primarily Indonesians, boarding and robbing or hijacking big ships, but in the five or six years we were bumbling around the area there were no reports of any such problems for yachts.

We lived in Boston for many years. Not a place that is ashamed of its murder rate, but certainly had lots and lots of street crime, as most cities do. We have always been vigilant, but with one exception (and they were harmless) we never met anybody on the high seas or in port that we were concerned about. We probably went to more places that exposed us to potential bad guys than the average ten cruising boats combined, and what few, very few, problems we encountered were minor and never threatening to life or limb, though an outboard was stolen from the boat while we were asleep. Theft in Sibu, Borneo Our logs are full of some of the remote and lawless places we've visited, and the great people we met there.

Drama. Such narrations get attention, but speculation over such innocent overtures is about as valid as my planning to spend the millions of money I'm going to win from that lottery ticket I bought. Bah! again.

I'm sorry to be so snarly, the world isn't soft and fuzzy everywhere, but it also isn't this dangerous place filled with monsters just waiting to get you! Now, here's one of two of our logs about piracy. Reported Pirate attack in Indonesia And, at the bottom of this log is an entry regarding Piracy General Bits and Pieces Personally, I think that the Drunk Driving or the Volcano entries are more entertaining.

Be safe, but don't be afraid of the monsters in your childhood's closet.

Jeanne
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Old 01-14-2010, 10:23 PM   #31
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Jeanne you meet kind people only because you treat them kindly.

If you would be a bit more agressive to people you meet, you could tell a lot of horror stories first hand.

What an opportunity
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Old 01-15-2010, 12:51 AM   #32
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Magwas, thank you for the kind words, though after that rant of mine, I don't think I deserve it. Not that I will take anything that I said back, I'm afraid, but I could have been a bit softer in how I said it.

Fair winds,

J
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Old 01-21-2010, 08:17 AM   #33
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Maybe I should have started a new thread for this:

In our country no one should go further from the shore than 12m without a certificate equivalent to RYA coastal skipper, which includes celestial navigation. We don't have any sea though

I would like to hear opininons about whether celestial navigation is necessary today.

I think that if one have a backup GPS, not much to worry about.

Others say that GPS can go offline like in the time of gulf war, and this is why all serious skippers should know celestial navigation. Well, I think that given the probability it is enough to know how to proceed in the case.

I would navigate by DR if offshore, and would try to hit land in an easy spot at daytime, then proceed with coastal navigation practices. So it would be a pita only if I would be en route to an offshore island.

However I think that sextant is a lot of fun, so I am learning celestial navigation anyway.
On the basis of keeping things as simple to learn as possible, you could have a look at one of the software packages for doing your sextant calcs, such as WinAstro (www.winastro.co.uk). Although obviously the downside is you need a computer for this.

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Old 01-21-2010, 10:14 AM   #34
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Hi folks,

I have this dream of buying a yatch and setting off for one year to see the world.

I want this trip to be the trip of my life, to come back from it, and to come back from it changed, wise like the rest of you. I do not want this to be a 5 star cruise and see the world like through a TV. I want there to be adrenaline. Lots of it. I suppose both of us will need to be able to sail the boat alone, both of us will need to swim ( she needs to learn ). Anything else?

Pain builds character. I want this trip to educate me, to make of me a man that has seen danger, that knows what a serious situation is. I want to be one of you, sailors. I want to see the world, I want to to gaze upon the beauty of mother nature. And I want to bring back my lady alive and well.

Alex
Alex here is some pain :-

Learn how to spell "Yacht"

Go and get a job that allows you to save money

Join a sailing club

Practice swimming in ice cold water

Buy a boat

Head off into the wild blue yonder

When you return safely ask your lady to join you for the next episode.
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Old 01-21-2010, 09:23 PM   #35
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Hi, Alex,

I'd avoided reading your post "Sail around the world!" because I've become a bit tired of all these folks who want to..."sail around the world" in a very short period of time--see everything, get the adrenalin rushes, get someone else to pay for it, and so forth.

I finally read your post. You are yet another of these folks. I am truly sorry.

You state you want to travel and see many places quickly/once over lightly and you also are seeking time off from your life--you want to engage in activities/hobbies/music/whatever that you haven't had time to do because you're so busy. Living aboard a sailboat is BUSY, BUSY, BUSY. Just sailing to-and-from all these great places is going to take all your time, energy, and attention. You will not have time to kick back and learn a new language or read countless books which have nothing to do with your endeavor of sailing and arriving alive!

If you want to travel and want adventure in a year's time--backpack around the globe--take trains/planes/other people's free rides/other people's boats. But don't waste your time sailing around because you don't have time for it.

If you want an adrenalin rush--you don't need to sail around the world to get it. Pick a location that you think will be both lovely and exiting and go there. What flavor of adrenalin do you desire? Pirates--head for the coast of Somalia, I hear they have a special on pirates there. Weather? head for the Southern Ocean, or better yet--set yourself up to round Cape Horn or do the Northwest Passage--those things have not only Weather challenges, but somewhat of a prestige to them to boot. Oh, well, since I put all people who say they want to "sail around the world" or "circumnavigate" into the bucket of folks who want prestige, I thought I'd bring that up.

If cold weather isn't for you--well, just make sure you're in the right places during hurricane or cyclone seasons--afterall, you'll be moving so fast around the world to see all the great places that I'm pretty sure you'll be stuck at the wrong place in the wrong weather window--ah, but for the adrenalin seeker, that's the RIGHT time! and oh, such a rush! if you survive, of course.

The statements that you've made about ruining things by preparing too much for them...clearly you've not been sailing at all or you wouldn't be saying that one. I wouldn't call "unprepared-ness" a good way to get an adrenalin rush, but yet that seems to be what you're after as well.

Now after picking on you, and your dream, I will get a little serious here--there is no reason that you can't enjoy some lovely sailing in lovely places and have it be as exciting as you wish. Voyaging via sailboat is a lifestyle more so than a means for having year's worth of fun, though. I'd suggest you look at yourself and whether it is a lifestyle you want to get into--if so, GREAT! I'd love to see you succeed and get out sailing and having fun ASAP. If you're not interested in the lifestyle--go back to my earlier suggestions of backpacking and using other forms of transportation to have a great sabbatical from your regular life--and enjoy that sabbatical well
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Old 02-01-2010, 07:14 AM   #36
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mmnetsea redbopeep, thank you for reading and for the informative reply. That's sure a direction.

Now to the point.

mmnetsea:

Will do

redbopeep

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I've become a bit tired of all these folks who want to..."sail around the world" in a very short period of time--see everything, get the adrenalin rushes, get someone else to pay for it, and so forth.

I finally read your post. You are yet another of these folks. I am truly sorry.
Of course I am. Who actually isn't? How can you even dream of traveling and not see it this say? Seriously, what will motivate you to even think about it if you see pain / suffering / discouragement / boredom? When you want to try something new, how do you envision it?

To put it through my perspective: Why sail around the world: There are things in this world that happen only once in your life. Some happen truely once, some happen more than once, but even in those that happen more than once, there is the first time, and that first time is unique and stays forever in your memory. All of you in this " room " remember from your first day on your bicycle, to your first road trip, to your first serious car crash, to the birth & death of a relative/friend, to your first kiss and first... complete romance ( you know what I mean ). All these things share a common fact: they changed your life. They also share a second one: their occurance is rather spaced in our lives ( and thank god for some ). Now sorting them between good and bad, I could barely count more than two hands worth of fingers of truely memorable good events.

And still, there is a world out there full of a once-in-your life events. That is the adrenaline I'm after. Not your bungee jumper. Not skydiving either. Just that feeling of being dazzled, almost drunk after you witness / are involved into something much much beyond you ( you know the feeling if you ever climbed a 3km tall mountain or seen the pilar beach ).

Why sail? No backpacking for me, I've done some, it's fun, but I'll go back to it after I'm done with my first sailing.

Why around the world? 50% because you can't spin the globe and stop it at a side you wouldn't want to see, 50% for the record of having done it. Combine the two and you have part of the answer. This message is already WAY too long for me to elaborate.

I get the idea, got the whole thing wrong. But that's pretty much the reason why I'm posting here too, because I know I don't know it, and before I even tackle the subject, instead of buying a pile of books which I will just not have time to read between the piles of books i have to read atm, I though I'd get a few quick advices to draw a list of what I need before even trying to take a step into the project and directing any effort into it.

Now to get to the one year, I got this from the very simple calculation that the earths diameter is 40 000km. Throw in a 50% added route due to the fact that you are not going in a straight line, and establish a base speed of 10km/h for a vessel, which, from what I read, is a very conservative speed for a yacht ( thanks for pointing it out. God damn self-correcting googling ), and the fact that the vessel moves 24h a day when sailing, that gives 250 days worth of travel to go round, leaving 3 months worth of doing everything else but sailing. Now I know it's wrong, as it was pointed out early, that's pretty much racing figures ( did I underestimate the deviations from a straight line? why isn't it 250 days? ). Now I know that. But that's how you see it when you try some simple math.

Sailing is a busy life? Come on! Someone even described it as boring in another thread of this forum.

Once I reach my destination, I'm sure I'll be busy visiting, seeing, wowing, but while you're on the boat... how does one spend his day? Isn't the boat pretty much going on it's own? The wind doesn't change direction every hour in the open sea? I though that these days the boats could pretty much navigate by themselves with radar and GPS. Just how busy is BUSY BUSY BUSY? Not saying here that I want GPS to substitute the requiered skills, but when you cross the atlantic, which is to my guess a good month at open sea doing almost nothing ( because, as you said, I'd take the time to avoid sailing into storms from end to end ), you don't have much to do. Will I have to hold the wheel all day long?

Adrenaline

I'm also not exactly looking for bungee-type of adrenaline, I'm more looking to face a storm at least once in my life. I was never a big fan of extreme adrenaline in perfectly controlled environments, monster house style. Not looking for a hurricane either for kicks or any form of just seeing how long I can pull death by the trench coat before something out of hand happens. If I get into a near-death situation, so be it, but I'm not after it. But sail a storm once... definitely. How can I avoid it? You pretty much assured me I won't ever forget it.

See everything? Deffinitly not. If I did, why would I ever do it again? When I'm 65 ( or rich enough to retire at 45 ), I'll spend the time to count how many ants live on New-Zealand. But I'm 22 atm.

I talked with the department head professor about the idea to go on such a trip, she told me " great idea, I've sailed a lot myself " and she told me I need to either do it before I get into masters studies ideally ( that's in one year ), before I get a stable job in my domain preferably. Now with this information at hand, I need to know what I need to do to set off, and here I am. That's where the hurry to get it done asap comes from.

I would LOVE to have someone else pay for it, but just in case it never happens ( because my familly is lower-middle class, dad probably won't toss me 50 grand ), I need to know what is the route to have the whole thing off the ground with least money. I have a very rare sports car for which I got a terrific deal last spring, and I am restoring it to resell it. That will reach me anywhere between 15 and 25 000 according to the local porsche club head, depending on a bunch of factors. With lots of work ( with the newly-available time I don't spend on restoring it ), I can mass 10 000 for one summer. Ebay sells sailboats of impressive dimentions for under 10 000, and since the boat structure is the only place I can't touch, I can buy one with a trashed interior but good hull and restore it myself for a nominal cost. I will have the boat inspected prior to purchase for structural faults, and if none ( or nothing I can fix myself at least ), well, throw in 10 000 more to get it to shape, and here I am, ready with a boat ( didn't the guy from Project Blue Sphere do exactly that? He sailed off for what? 25 000 everything included iirc? ).

I know you will tell me it doesn't work that way and that there are 10 time more things I need to consider. Sure, but what are they? Because short of details, that's pretty much the plan I am operating on. Once I get 50k under my pillow, the plan will most probably be set in motion. After all, bumfuzzles did it for about 100k with expensive restaurant and health insurance to pay ( I don't have to, in Canada it's supplied by the government ) and the Project Blue Sphere guy did it for 25k. 50k shouldn't be all that bad. That's the kind of math that got me to the conclusion that a 1-year-round-the-world is possible. But hey, you have to start somewhere.

Now if you want to comment the above, I'd be most thankful for your guidance.

Yes, redbopeep, I'm one of them. But so was I once the kid who though he could ride a bicycle just by getting on it and turning the pedals. It didn't happen according to my plan, broke an arm in the process of mastering it, but still, I did it! And I bet that the same rules apply to sailing: know what I have to, then go out and do it.

I believe that all these people you just grouped me with contain a very high percentage of quitters. I bet you a bottle of wine, I won't give up. I'll come and pick it up on the way .

Can one do the travel for 1,5-2 years ( 3 is too much. I'm always flexible, but I need to know what sort of a sail / docked ratio I get here )? Is 20k $ enought for a boat that can get the job done ( consider this as " will 20k get me a good hull / structure / sails ", interior / engine, that's all stuff that will barely cost over the raw material price )? How much time does one need to learn to sail for what I intend to do? Anything else?
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Old 02-01-2010, 10:20 AM   #37
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Can one do the travel for 1,5-2 years YES 2.9 - ratio 3:1( 3 is too much. I'm always flexible, but I need to know what sort of a sail / docked ratio I get here )?

Is 20k $ enought for a boat that can get the job done No not nearly enough( consider this as " will 20k get me a good hull / structure / sails ", interior / engine, that's all stuff that will barely cost over the raw material price )?

How much time does one need to learn to sail for what I intend to do? Some will always do it faster than others - some will take more time.

Anything else? Nothing else
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Old 02-01-2010, 03:23 PM   #38
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2,9 years? So it's really 3 years no matter what... Hummm that sheds a different light on the dream. Well, I'll look for that laps of time once I have the money. In a few words, what dimentions / sort of hull material am I after? How do you tell apart the boats that can serve this purpose from those that aren't built for that? Learning to sail: is it a matter of days or week or months ( general idea of how long, on average )?
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Old 02-02-2010, 01:25 AM   #39
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In a few words, what dimentions / sort of hull material am I after?

In a few words :- Only you know what you are after

How do you tell apart the boats that can serve this purpose from those that aren't built for that?

1. Read and 2. Before purchase have it surveyed for the purpose.

Learning to sail: is it a matter of days or week or months ( general idea of how long, on average )? On the one hand it depends on the learning ability of the learner, and on the other it depends on the teaching ability of the teacher. eg.. one person takes 3 years, the second person takes 3 months :- average = near enough 1 year, 7 months and 15 days
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Old 02-02-2010, 08:07 AM   #40
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Like a pilot's license, you need to log sea time.
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