Wow, you're wayyyy off base here booby, you're losing your grip ...
are you seriously claiming you're a braver sailor because you stay
close to your slip where all sorts of bozos keep hitting things?


Capt. Rob wrote:
As many folks here with little real world sailing experience keep
getting things wrong, here's another fact for you...
Sailing offshore or in less protected waters is the safest lowest risk
sailing you can do. Period. Almost all boating accidents happen in
crowded areas and the worst of them are within easy swimming distance
of land. If even a short squall hits, you're also at a far higher risk
when close to land.

Certainly bumping into other boats (a major cause of small boat
accidents) happens where the are more boats. And since most accidents
happen to small boats, they're most like to happen in areas where
there are a lot of small boats. Of course, a large number of
drownings are related to canoes, kayaks, etc. often when no one is
around to rescue.

Sailing deeper into the sound there are far fewer bad pilots to contend
with and more room to navigate than putzing about on a daysail near our
home.

Whoa! Deep into the sound? Isn't that where all the scary monsters
are??? Isn't this where Jax had to call the CG because the engine on
his sailboat was running a little hot? Just how "deep into the sound"
are we talking here - 5 miles? 6?

Continue to sail in your own crowded waters and the chance of
some nut smashing into you or a squall playing pinball with you only
increases.

Gee, do you think most of the posters here stay in crowded inner
harbors all the time?

After learning this, we generally sailed out beyond Execution Rock,
both for the better air and room to day or night sail with lower risks.

Wow, you travel a whole 3 miles from your slip? I take back
everything I said, you are a true bluewater sailor! (At this point I
check the headers because it sounds more like a Gilly parody than a
rational discussion.)

The very idea that Jeff, Doug and others continue to talk about sailing
distances as a measure of bravado, shows how unaware and unsafe they
really are.

Total nonsense. I don't think anyone actually likes coastal cruising
because its "more dangerous" than harbor daysailing. I certainly
don't measure the quality of a trip by how much danger we faced.
Cruising has to do with competence and self-reliance in many aspects
of sailing, in finding enjoyment without air conditioning, TV's, and 3
zone hifi's.

I'll leave it for someone more eloquent than I to extol the pleasures
of cruising.


Sailing offshore is ULTRA safe by comparison.

No, I'll bet statistically speaking offshore sailing is more dangerous
when measured trip for trip. Mile for mile it may be safer. I've
heard it claimed the 10% of Pacific Island cruisers end up being lost
on rocks, a record only exceeded around City Island.

Offshore
sailing has just one problematic requirement that keeps most from
enjoying it.....time.

True offshore sailing, that is, 200 miles or more offshore, is a
totally different endeavor from coastal cruising. Some people love
it, others don't, but it relates to coastal cruising like mountain
climbing relates to hiking. I sort of liked it, but mostly found it
boring, except when it wasn't. I much prefer doing 50 miles, hanging
out for a few days; do another 50, hangout. By then we might in in
Maine, where the next beautiful anchorage in only 5 miles away (but
through fog and pots). Do that for a month or so and you'll stop
equating sailing with A/C and TV.

Seriously, Bob, there's no reason why you can't do that. You'll have
a nurse on board and you can get med-evac'd from anywhere you're
likely to go. You're kid is still young enough that he doesn't need
friends or civilization on a daily basis (this will change in a few
years). And for all my ragging your bendy is probably up to it, if
you don't mind roughing it a bit.



Capt Robert B
35s5....an inland sailboat faster than some!
NY

P.S. "Near Coastal" means 10 miles out in the ocean - you do want to
go there in your bendy. Leave that to the real cruising boats like mine.