Indholdsfortegnelse for September 2019 i PassageMaker

It has been said that feet are the most important part of a runner’s body. Our feet transfer the energy of our muscles into the ground. Weak feet, poor alignment, and wear and tear can do a runner in. Your boat’s engine runs on a similar principle: The power the engine creates must be transferred to the boat. In most cases, this transfer takes place through the engine mounts. These mounts must be strong enough to withstand the weight of the engine and transmission, as well as the shear loads created as the propeller pushes against the shaft and engine. On the other hand, the mounts must be soft enough to minimize the transfer of sound and vibration to the hull and accommodations areas. The softer the rubber (lower durometer…

I was in my late 20s, working in book publishing and broker than broke, when I first dove into the Caribbean. Mexico’s Isla Mujeres, Cozumel and Playa del Carmen were sleepier then than they are now, and I had never seen water so turquoise, strolled sand so soft, or quaffed beer so deliciously cold. Each day, I baked on the beach, cooled off in the sea and read a whole book. Each night, I ordered a lightly charred fish with a squeeze of lime and at least one ice-cold, perfect margarita. This was heaven—I was sure of it. Soon, I learned that this was only one version of the many heavens the Caribbean has to offer. Off the top of my head (and I’m sure I’m forgetting a place or…

The first time I ate “fire engine,” I nearly fell out of my helm chair. Don’t get me wrong: I love spicy food. I just wasn’t expecting it at 7 a.m. The Bahamian breakfast staple—consisting of corned beef and corn served over a bed of grits—seems innocent until the chef tosses in a handful of locally grown goat peppers. Then, it’s every man for himself. In retrospect, such an eye-popping experience shouldn’t have been a surprise. Epicurean flair runs the gamut in the Caribbean, where sensual cooking aromas from simple to sophisticated can pervade entire neighborhoods. From the local classics made with cassava and bacalhau to pepper-pot soup and spit-roasted pork, quintessential island cuisine provides simple nourishment with rich surprises. This galley-friendly, traditional Caribbean pork recipe meets that description, and…

MARY SOUTH A midlife crisis caused Mary South to run away to sea and write the nautical memoir The Cure For Anything Is Salt Water. A founding editor of Riverhead Books, she is also a graduate of Chapman School of Seamanship. A former editor-in-chief of Soundings and Yachting magazines, South’s grueling journalism career has led her to sail around Cape Horn, up the Amazon and to the distilleries of the Inner Hebrides. page 28 and 44 KIM KAVIN Kim Kavin has been messing around in boats since she was a baby at her grandfather’s summer house on New Jersey’s Culver Lake. She has cruised aboard everything from bareboat trawlers to America’s Cup sailing yachts to superyachts, visiting more than 50 nations and islands. When she’s not cruising, she’s writing with…

Yacht design and engineering usually evolve slowly, with most new yachts having a lot in common with those that preceded them. Which is not necessarily a bad thing, as it minimizes the number of supposed innovations that turn out to be disastrous failures. Occasionally, however, a yacht emerges with a seriously eye-raising feature that warrants special notice. The E4 and E6 models from Elling Yachts are just such examples, designed to be self-righting: that is, to return upright from a 180-degree inversion. Yes, you read that right. With broad-beamed hulls and generous freeboard carried right aft by an almost dead-straight sheer, and with stout-looking low deckhouses, the Dutch builder’s E4 and E6 present as handsome open-water cruising vessels. But behind the initial impression, the ability for each model to right…

Boatbuilders and designers are always trying to get more out of a design. Consumers have high expectations for looks, performance, comfort and quality. With the Hardy 65, all of those things are present, and more. This trawler yacht has a British feel. It comes from the drawing board of Andrew Wolstenholme in England, and it combines traditional attributes with good looks and performance—including being able to reach 30 knots on a seaworthy, semi-displacement hull. True, that’s with the optional 1,200-horsepower MAN diesels, but the standard twin 800-hp units get the boat close to 25 knots, which should be more than fast enough for comfortable cruising. And comfort is at the heart of this design. Nothing feels crowded on board, and with three en-suite, double-berth staterooms, there is space aplenty, particularly…

With so many alluring ports of call at your disposal, planning an extended Caribbean cruising itinerary can seem intimidating. The relatively close proximity of the islands that comprise the Windward and Leeward island chains makes the region well situated for island-hopping. For example, you can go from snorkeling off Anguilla one day to enjoying French cuisine on St. Barts the next. We asked dozens of experienced cruisers about their favorite Caribbean destinations. From iconic, paradisiacal backdrops to far-flung secret anchorages, here’s the Passagemaker-approved 2019 Caribbean wanderlist. ST. LUCIA Few Caribbean islands are as photogenic as St. Lucia, where the towering Pitons, a jagged pair of volcanic peaks, are instantly recognizable. Ashore, the island offers golden-sand beaches, prized hiking trails and rainforest excursions. Lively reefs are just offshore. Marigot Bay is…

They put-putted to and fro through the anchorage, sometimes eight to a boat, butts on identical gray Hypalon tubes, feet planted on identical white fiberglass soles, their delighted movements testimony to the inflatable RIB’s notable buoyancy. As it happened, the RIB riders were nearly all charter boat customers, who, like us, had chosen Anegada for the night. The location itself was incidental, however; the same scene was being echoed in a dozen anchorages throughout the British Virgin Islands. My mission was to gauge how well the BVI marine infrastructure had recovered since September 6, 2017, the day Hurricane Irma (followed by her handmaiden, Maria) rolled through the islands, causing utter devastation. “In the days after Irma, apocalyptic images of the boats in Paraquita Bay circulated on social media and in…

Sometimes, the stars align in your favor. While working for Jack Hargrave’s design studio years ago, three of my projects—a small, interisland cargo ship, a high-speed ferry and a 120-foot motoryacht—happened to coincide in place and time. The place was the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the time was during Carnival on St. Thomas. The situation had all the makings of the best business trip ever, but when a small “problem” arose, things got even better. Because of the number of tourists who would be packing the islands for the festivities, all the hotels were booked. The yacht would be anchored near Red Hook, so her owner kindly suggested that I add a few days to my trip, bring my auburn-haired sweetheart along, and stay aboard as his guests. (Clients don’t…

Nordhavn 41 Unveiled Pacific Asian Enterprises, Inc. has announced its newest model, the Nordhavn 41. It replaces the retired Nordhavn 40 model and was redesigned with a new hull form, in collaboration with Dutch naval architecture firm Vripack. According to the builder, the N41’s deliberately low profile provides a stable and comfortable ride, and the new hull design is CE Certified Category A Ocean for offshore conditions. The N41 is offered in a single- or double-stateroom layout. Double side decks allow for moving around the boat when docking or mooring. Deck space accommodates up to a 12-foot tender plus an 800-pound davit for launching and retrieval. Standard power is twin 75-horsepower Kubota diesels. With 900 gallons of fuel and a cruising speed of 9.5 knots, the builder estimates a range…

A ship’s captain recounted to me a story of coming onto the bridge at sea: “I have a vessel two miles ahead, sir,” said the second mate on watch. “Oh yes, that’s a yacht,” the captain said. “How do you know it’s a yacht, sir?” the second mate asked. “Because I am looking out the window,” the captain said. The Automatic Identification System (AIS) seems to solve so many problems when you are navigating in poor visibility or at night. Your onboard unit will tell you where all the other vessels are and show their heading and speed. With the information displayed on your radar and/or chart plotter, it looks like you know everything that is going on around you. I find that AIS gives you such a positive presentation…

On June 8, the historic schooner No. 5 Elbe collided with the Cypriot container ship Astrosprinter in the Elbe River just outside of Hamburg, Germany, and became an instant YouTube sensation (the video can be viewed at passagemaker.com/technical/MasterandCommander). Ich spreche überhaupt kein Deutsch, so I am not certain what is being said in the video, and the best local reporting I’ve found on the incident, I’ve read only as mangled through Google Translate. Nonetheless, there are lessons to be learned from the information we already have. Based on early reports, the container ship was following the dredged river channel, as close to the starboard side of the channel as was safe given her draft. Some minutes before the incident, another vessel had attempted to contact No. 5 Elbe because the…

In the eyes of many, the Abacos embody all that’s great about cruising in the Bahamas. The water is, in a word, stunning. On sunny days, you’d be hard-pressed to find a more breathtaking kaleidoscope of vibrant blues in most swimming pools, with views all the way to the white, sandy seafloor. The beaches and snorkeling are second to none, with rich coral and abundant marine life in every direction. The villages are quaint, the locals treat you like family, and the conch is, well, conch, which I can’t seem to stuff into my mouth fast enough. While I’ve been to the Abacos many times, among my top visits has to be my most recent one. I joined the owner of Krogen Express, John Tegtmeyer, his wife, Betsie, and their…