Chuck Gould wrote in
ups.com:

Under you standard, almost nobody old enough to be retired would be
allowed to go boating without a babysitter?


I sail offshore on an Amel 41 ketch. Cap'n Geoffrey is around 70. It's
his boat. I must admit we HAVE sailed offshore of Florida, just the two
of us, between Ft Lauderdale and Ponce Inlet, S of Daytona Beach.
Weather was perfect or we wouldn't have gone.

Neither one of us are "disabled" and either one of us can sail her safely
for a day, maybe two. But, neither one of us will go offshore over 2 in
our condition, which isn't really that bad, but we DO GET OVERTIRED IN 2
DAYS....too tired for safe sailing in a squall condition, which happens
often, here.

Our "crew" is SIX sailors, sometimes EIGHT, for passages Charleston to
FL, for example. Everyone gets SLEEP, noone gets DEAD. All hands are
available, including ours, in bad situations. The other four are late
20's to mid 40's, experienced sailors, physically fit. And we STILL have
been beaten up to exhaustion a few times offshore of Georgia.

I cannot imagine how an 80-year-old goat and his 78-year-old wife can be
called "fit" to sail a 38' boat under those circumstances...I just can't!

Larry
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