On Sun, 29 Jan 2006 20:40:52 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

Five sailors would be a reasonable and safe crew, with each person
standing a six hour watch and another person "up" to spell the
watchstander and help out with any sudden adjustments of sails. It could
be done with a smaller crew, but then the voyage becomes more of a
challenge and less of a pleasure

It could be done with 5, but 6 is a better number on a 40 footer in my
experience. Typically we would stand three 4 hour watches at night
and two 6 hour watches during the day. Three people on watch gives
you enough to rotate jobs, cook, cleanup, get weather reports,
navigate, etc.

With the boat set up properly, experienced people and a good auto
pilot, you could make a reasonable argument for a crew of two but that
is really stretching things very thin.