Innehållsförteckning för Yachting Year från Sailing Today

It’s a far cry from the scene that must have greeted Captain James Cook when he arrived in Tahiti 250 years ago, but given the nature of round-the-world cruising today, a marina-full of sleek-looking plastic and aluminium yachts is hardly an uncommon sight. Marina Vaiare, the only marina on Moorea Island, has been beyond the reach of even the most adventurous bluewater cruisers during the pandemic, but travel is opening up and so is cruising. Here’s to a fair and fresh season in 2022, whether your intended shores lie in Polynesia or Poole Harbour. For all the latest cruising news, plus advice on handling your yacht, see our sister title Sailing Today with Yachts & Yachting or visit sailingtoday.co.uk…

If 2020 was the wash-out summer and 2021 was a tentative comeback for sailing, then what will 2022 bring, you might wonder? We can only hope that the pandemic is in retreat and that the sun comes out to play, because there are some special events planned, in addition to the usual, very busy regatta schedule worldwide. If all goes according to plan, the year will kick off in the Caribbean this 30 March to 4 April, 2022, with the well-loved Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta, which has been the victim of the pandemic for the last two years running. See antiguaclassics.com. In the Med, the usual series of big regattas including Les Voiles de Saint-Tropez will play out throughout the summer. In Britain, at least two greats of sailing will…

Ah, remember the days when a 40’ yacht was considered large? If you’re under 30 years old, probably not. The economies of scale have essentially ensured that the sub 40’ cruising yacht has become something of an endangered species in recent years. One large manufacturer I interrogated about this admitted that it simply wasn’t economical to make a boat under 35’. Yet lately it seems that manufacturers have also come to see that if they don’t make boats that are at least vaguely affordable, then they sever the supply line of younger sailors buying yachts and falling in love with sailing. It’s the boatbuilding equivalent of sitting on a branch and sawing it off near the tree trunk I suppose. It is therefore heartening that this year has seen the…

My wife Susie and I had become Day Skippers with ‘Sail Ionian’ a family company based in Vlihko on the Island of Lefkada in Greece, then having completed my Coastal Skipper practical course with ‘First Sailing’ we felt confident enough to take family with us. We had enjoyed several holidays with Sail Ionian, exploring many of the places visited when training and we were now joined by our two eldest grandchildren, Sofia 12, and Zahra 9, with their parents Juliet, Susie’s eldest daughter and her husband Ouadah. Late September 2019, on a 38’ Bavaria, with the girls dressed as pirates, we mustered on deck for a crew briefing. They muttered at the need to wear life-jackets and said “Yuk” on how to use the ‘heads’, followed by “Uurrrrghs” with the…

“TWO-six, heave!” A group of 11-year-olds are putting their backs into hauling up the topsail on the 1906 Thames barge, Thalatta. “That’s it, get her up,” calls skipper Cyril Varley from the helm. “We need to push on a bit.” He glances off to starboard. A mud bank is emerging from the falling Orford tide. “Come on, guys!” exhorts Rosie, one of the 11-year-olds, to her schoolmates. “Two-six…HEAVE!” they bellow in unison. The children are from the Norwich School and their parents have chartered Thalatta for the week, under the watchful eye of two of the school’s teachers. This morning the group has enjoyed a trip to Orford Castle, chatting noisily about the experience on the tender ride back to the boat. Once on board, the kids set about stowing…

The J-Class Topaz was the largest entry at the 2021 Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup at Porto Cervo in September 2021, where she enjoyed a magnificent duel with fellow ‘J’ Velsheda, narrowly losing out, but the rivalry continued later that month in Saint-Tropez, where Topaz got the upper hand. Topaz was designed by Frank C Paine in 1935 and first launched in 2015. Velsheda, a Nicholson design, dates from 1933. For more incredible stories and photos featuring the great boats of yachting’s past, try Classic Boat magazine each month or visit classicboat.co.uk…

For followers of sailboat racing, it was a year of getting up early or staying up late – to watch the Vendée Globe finishes, the America’s Cup and then the Olympics. But sailors are used to early starts. And the action on the water in each of those events was worth it – spectacular moments that in some cases changed the sport of sailing for good. As event organisers juggled ever-changing restrictions, there was a full domestic racing calendar from July and cruising sailors enjoyed much-awaited time afloat, if not the best weather. Post-Brexit rules governing cross-Channel sailing and cruising in European countries gave the authorities a headache, but given the ongoing travel restrictions, not many people were sailing cross-Channel anyway. Some of the post-Brexit wrangles have been sorted out…

RORC CARIBBEAN 600 22 FEBRUARY, Antigua Early indications denote a bumper year for the RORC Caribbean 600, which brings together professional racers, passionate Corinthians and classic yachts for a 600-mile race around 11 of the beautiful Leeward Islands. A powerful pack of multihulls will be ripping through the course, including the race record holder Maserati, the Multi70 skippered by Giovanni Soldini, and 2020 line honours winner, Peter Cunningham’s MOD70 PowerPlay, skippered by Ned Collier Wakefield. Favourite for monohull line honours is the 100ft Supermaxi Comanche, skippered by Australian Mitch Booth. British interest in the 2022 RORC Caribbean 600 is strong, with several top boats making their race debut, including overall winner of the 2021 Rolex Fastnet Race, Tom Kneen’s JPK 1180 Sunrise. Lombard 46 Pata Negra will defend her IRC…

Three restored sailing yachts designed by Captain Nathanael G Herreshoff and built at the Herreshoff Manufacturing Company in Bristol, RI, were showcased at an event marking the golden jubilee of the Herreshoff Marine Museum. Held at New York Yacht Club’s Harbour Court in Newport on June 24, 2021, the waterfront reception featured three of the club’s iconic one-design classes—the New York 30 Amorita, the New York 40 Marilee, and the lone remaining New York 50 Spartan. Capt Nat Herreshoff was a preferred yacht designer and builder for numerous members of the New York Yacht Club, and he worked closely with the club to produce one-design racing yachts for members to compete against one another. Herreshoff also produced America’s Cup defending yachts between 1893 to 1934 for New York Yacht Club…

When looking for insurance, remember that the value of the yacht itself is a key component of the premium. In most cases, that means the current value, not the as-new replacement value. As a result, you should be prepared to adjust the insured value down each year to reflect the depreciating value of the yacht. “There is no point in over-insuring,” says Greg Hill of Traffords. “If a policy is on an agreed-value basis rather than a market-value basis, the insurers generally have a clause that allows them to replace the craft. If you don’t want the replacement then it brings a negotiation element into play for a cash payment. “The market value basis is left to a surveyor to analyse the market and works exactly like car insurance. “Carefully…

The extensive restoration of a yacht not far short of a hundred years old and a hundred foot long can provide a mighty challenge for any established boatyard, however skilled and experienced its labour force might be. And while the difficulties are on another level altogether when undertaking and completing such a project in a distant country with absolutely no previous history of such work, the 1927 Camper and Nicholson ketch Cynara is clear proof that nothing is impossible. Cynara’s original name was Gwendolen. She was commissioned by HG Nutman who, in 1922, had bought the 1902-built, 92ft (28m) yawl Lady Beatrice, designed by Charles E Nicholson and built at Camper & Nicholsons’ Gosport yard – so it was perhaps natural that he should go to the same designer and…

The world’s best 470 crews battle it out for glory beneath Mount Fuji in the Tokyo Olympic sailing regatta, which took place from 25 July to 4 August 2021. An unseasonal tropical cyclone passed by Japan the week before the Games, playing havoc with the winds and conditions that the sailors had been preparing for since after the Rio Games, but the competition was as intense and emotionally charged as ever. The British Sailing Team finished as top nation with five medals, three of them gold. The regatta took place at Enoshima Yacht Harbour, the host venue of the Tokyo 1964 Olympic sailing competition. For all the latest news and behind-the-scenes stories from the racing world, see our sister title Sailing Today with Yachts & Yachting and visit yachtsandyachting.co.uk…

If 2021 was the year when we cautiously hauled up our anchors and made a tentative coastal cruise, then the year ahead will hopefully allow us to unfurl our sails to a fresh breeze and fix our eye on the distant horizon and all the adventure that goes with a voyage into the relative unknown. Certainly this seems to be a plan very much in the heads of many cruising sailors, who after many months of being effectively neaped by the pandemic are more determined than ever to escape. Boatbuilders are reporting a huge surge in orders with many struggling to keep up with demand. Indeed, British boatbuilder Discovery reported securing two orders at the Southampton Boat Show. The mood is essentially upbeat and, having spoken to a number of…

Think of your standard flotilla and you’ll probably imagine eight to 12 boats crewed by two to four people each, an easy week’s sailing in the placid Med and an engineer, a hostie and a skipper to point you in the right direction and serve up a bowl of punch in an anchorage one night. This was a flotilla with a difference. Held to mark the 50th anniversary of The Moorings, it involved 27 boats, 130 people and seven stops in the British Virgin Islands. The Moorings allocated our journalists’ crew (two American sailors, one French, and me, a Brit) a Robertson and Caine 4500: a 45ft sailing catamaran with four double cabins, all en suite. Provisioning was the easiest it’s ever been – I filled in a form ticking…

‘Family means a lot to me and this boat brings back to life what my ancestors did.’ Wes Wheeler, New York-born in 1956 and now a leading manager in the pharmaceutical industry, is talking about the passion behind his latest entrepreneurial venture: to build and market a boat based on the Playmate 38, a very successful motorboat produced in the 1930s by the shipyard founded by Howard E Wheeler, one of Wes’ ancestors. Specifically, the boat in question is a modern reinterpretation of the legendary Pilar, the fishing boat bought in 1934 by Ernest Hemingway. The Pulitzer and Nobel Prize laureate was famously a great fishing enthusiast, and particularly active between Key West, the Bimini archipelago and Cuba. A trendsetter Pilar was a particularly innovative boat. It is believed to…

Allures 40.9 Larger and therefore more expensive but, as mentioned, there aren’t many yachts available of this type in the sub 40’ bracket. The 40.9 also features an all-aluminium hull and swing keel. allures.com Django 12.7 Another radical French design that offers similar levels of versatility but with a fibreglass hull. This is a somewhat more performance oriented yacht that features the options of either swing, fixed or even twin keels. mareehaute.fr Rustler 37 An different beast but still the sort of boat that sailors with a desire to go blue water adventuring will consider. Robust build and fitted out with as much seamanlike thought as you’d expect. rustleryachts.com…

Dubarry for Tom Leading irish solo offshore sailor Tom Dolan has extended his partnership with Dubarry, and we need no better excuse to feature a pair of the brand’s Palma sailing trainers, probably not what Tom wears offshore, but great for inshore summer racing. Unisex, lightweight, sporty, colourful, grippy. We like. £129 dubarry.com Lewmar Epsilon anchor Billed as a ‘game-changer’ by reviewers, this builds on the tried and tested Delta for fast setting and high holding power. Its weight and genoetry mean it self-rights. The concave fluke and ballast keel are designed to deliver good holding power and rapid setting when compared to market rivals and other modern anchor designs. Sturdy design using manganese steel or 316 stainless steel. lewmar.com Davis Snap Tool Multi-Key This flat, stainless steel, multi-tool gives…

You would be forgiven for thinking that yacht insurance premiums are plummeting after 18 months of stifled sailing activity. But don’t hold your breath. Not all agree, but broker after broker tells me that the industry is still facing catch-up after years of aggressively low premiums, and warns of further ‘corrections’ ahead. For the customer, however, all is not lost and there are ways of finding savings. Generally, rising premiums have been the story of the last few years. Some $215bn of damage inflicted by three hurricanes in 2017 cost the insurance industry around $140bn in cover, and it has been on the back foot ever since. Add to that years of undervaluing risk in order to win prestigious superyacht business, and it all adds up to a nasty mix.…

Every year over 300 cruising boats race across the Atlantic under the auspices of the World Cruising Club’s ARC event. Most of them are cruisers undertaking their first serious bluewater passage in a ‘normal’ sailing boat, although there are some race boats too. They have all had to wrestle with the issue of preparing themselves and their craft for the 2,700-mile crossing, weighing up comfort, safety and the budget. So who better to ask for advice on the key gear than the WCC itself? Comms director Jeremy Wyatt gave us his list of the 10 most important gear decisions to make, and not surprisingly, safety was at the top. “A liferaft and EPIRB – these are the key items on the ARC safety equipment list and should definitely be on…