A good way for little ones to have fun on a hot day of sailing: Put up
the bimini, stop up the cockpit drains and flood the cockpit with about
1.5" water. The little ones splash around and have a ball. It keeps
your feet cool too.

Jeff wrote:
Larry W4CSC wrote:

And how long should they wait before bringing a baby home to a
normal
house? Right outside the door are dangerous roads and highways!

What's this? Denial?

Being on a boat is much more dangerous, especially to a defenseless
infant,
than riding in a carseat.

Denial? Maybe not. The CG Accident reports started reporting "AGE
OF
INJURED VICTIM BY TYPE OF VESSEL" in the last two reports. The total

number of injuries for children under 12 in auxiliary sailboats in
2002 and 2003 is one. They don't have the same breakdown in previous

years, but the rough evidence implies this is not an anomaly.
(Especially if you don't count the two children that drowned in a Mac

26x rollover 4 years ago.) Infants don't belong on jetskis, but I'm
not sure you can make a case that a well handled larger sailboat is
that dangerous.

http://www.uscgboating.org/statistic...stics_2003.pdf

BTW, shortly before leaving on our trip our 4 year old daughter hit a

post running into the day care center. We spent a morning in the ER
having here forehead superglued together. This was worse than any
injury on our year long cruise. In fact, since I got out of dinghy
sailing, there's never been an injury on any kind in any of my boats.

However, several months after returning from the trip, my wife blew

out her Achilles playing soccer. I'm not at all convinced cruising
is
more dangerous than being on land, especially if appropriate care is
taken.