"Dan" wrote in
ups.com:

How? You've just said we're 60 hours away from the nearest thing to
hit! Are you saying the sea state will make the boat fall apart? Are
you saying the masts gonna fall down and break a hole in the hull? How
often have either of these things happened to UKRSers?

You really must watch "The Perfect Storm", the movie. It is a true story
and the swell reality shown pitchpoling the fishing vessel isn't just a
writer's fantasy. I could happen to YOU.


Rule 1 - It is ALWAYS better to be standing on the dock, wishing you
were
at sea....than to be at sea, wishing you were on the dock!

But if you're going to be 60 hours off shore you're gonna have make
sure you're boat is up to anything that might come along and chance the
weather.


There is no boat made that is "up to anything that might come
along".....well, less than maybe an icebreaker and that's iffy. You will
never own a boat that can survive "anything". The sea can take whatever
you buy and just turn it into rubble in a matter of minutes if it feels
like it. One of the greatest feelings of being at sea is the feeling of
total submission to the sea's will.

Wait until you've been sailing in the pitch dark for 11 hours, the sun
rises and you suddenly see some HUGE object just floating by that could
simply smash your hull to bits. I had that feeling coming up from Florida
about 180 miles off the Georgia Coast. We were eating breakfast with the
autopilot steering an Endeavour 35 sloop under sail, the radar watch set.
Just as I opened my mouth to fill it with more eggs benedict, this HUGE
CABLE REEL, made of wood and invisible to the radar, sailed by about 50
yards behind my other friend delivering the boat! It must have been 30'
diameter, 12' wide?...something like that. I went to look at it on the
radar and the 2KW Raymarine never made a blip, as it trailed away behind
us. If we'd hit that at 8 knots in the dark, it would have ripped the
Endeavour's bow clean off in the 6' swells we had the night before.

Been there, done that, had that sickening feeling, got the T-shirt.....

There's plenty to run into in the open ocean....besides those 50' waves
wiping the deck clean of sailing gear....