Jim

Great attempt to get some activity in this section of our site. I wish I could give you some input here, unfortunatly I have not had any 24 hour sails. Even motoring 18 hours was my longest leg.

I am truely excited to see what data you collect. But once again urge you to at least ask what kind of prop was installed during the 24 hour run as the word prop for some reason motivates our members.

Ok, I guess I am going to be the first one here to give some data. I do not have my charts home with me but I have left our slip in Whitehall, Mi. Motored 6 miles out to Lake Michigan and sailed north to Charlevoix, Mi. That for me is 23 hours. is what I figure with good wind.

I asked a buddy I had lunch with today and he said he thought it was 184 NM to Charlevoix. I have done this twice now with our 36 doing an over niter to Charlevoix. When I had the Catalina 30 I could do that same leg in 27 hours. Next week when I go and get the pictures for the lights I will grab my charts so I can get an exact NM.

Usually a lot of us on Lake Mi. usually go by how may hours it takes to get to the ports we have on the lake. For a crossing I usually plan on 10 hours.
Randy

Here in Punta Gorda, Florida many of us sail down to the Dry Tortugas, Key West and other ports of the Keys in the Gulf of Mexico. From my house, Caprice is docked behind my house, it is a little less than 150 miles. Going strait to Key West on an overnight sail it takes on average about 30 hours which is an average of five statue miles an hour. When under sail on any long trip, if I drop to less that 4 knots I turn on the iron genny and motor sail. In planning a trip I compute my estamated time of arrival at five statue miles an hour. This gives me a little cushin when sailing at my lowest acceptable speed of four knots.

When going to the Keys, if I sail only during the day light it takes four days unless my wife is with me then it takes five or six days. She is a heck of a good navigator, she reads charts and even knows how to use a sextant. However, her motto is, "Don't pass any yacht club without stopping to say hello, staying for dinner and having a liesurely breakfast." That's what sailing is all about to her. She is the Commodore of our yacht club and Admiral of Caprice of course. Being Commodore of our Yacht Club she knows somebody at every club in the 37 yacht clubs that make up the Florida Council of Yacht Clubs. My wife says if we wanted to get there fast we should take up flying.

Hi
We've just returned from a trip to Tonga from New Zealand. (10 days sailing plus a couple of nights at Minerva reef) We allowed 110 Nm per day, and it worked out about right in varying conditions. We would rather sail at 3 knots in gentle conditions than motor. Tacking is not counted, just distance made good. Sailing into 25 knots we get bounced around and make 6 knots or so (with just a staysail on our removable inner stay) but only on a close reach. We get 6.5 knots with a triple reefed main in the same conditions...
Our best ever day is 140Nm with 25 knots from behind, then the quarter, then close reach. Motoring we make about 4.5 to 5 knots if there is no great opposing sea. We are pretty conservative, though.

Rob Kyles

NOAA has some nice online charts I peek at occaisionally in the off months ([url]http://www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/mcd/OnLineViewer.html[/url]).

One enhancement I'd really like to see is a mouse-guided distance calculator of some sort. Until that happens, they have a pdf file of distances between US Ports I find handy for my snow bound planning of potential summer trips ([url]http://www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/nsd/distances-ports/distances.pdf[/url]).

Randy- White Lake to Charlevoix shows as 167 statute miles, so about 145 nm (not counting the 5 to White Lake channel).

Tom Quinn
PENTE #1897

Tom:

Thank you for the web site and correcting me for the distance. Each time that I had done that leg we had winds pushing us up all the way which was a rush to sail so much at one time. That distance calculates out to 6.25 knots of speed as I went back in my log and we were doing a lot of 7.5's for hours.

I am lost with out my laptop and the TIKI Nav software that I ran on the boat. Soon though it will be replaced.

Randy

For planning, both SeaClear and the trial version of Rosepoint Coastal Explorer let you use NOAA downloaded charts and allow you to build routes. You can even export from Coastal Explorer to Garmin (and probably others).

[url]http://www.sping.com/seaclear/[/url]
[url]http://rosepointnav.com/CoastalExplorer/default.htm[/url]

Craig

Jim: My first 24hr+ offshore trip on my C36 will be next fall, but I operate similar to most other folks. i.e. when sog drops below 4kts my engine comes into play. Burning .4gph doesn't bother me at all especially when I am looking at covering a few hundred miles. Of course I carry some jerry cans with extra fuel, but if we get any decent sailing over 3-4 days, my fuel capacity shouldn't be a problem. I have made the trip from Beaufort, NC inlet to Spanish Cay (Abacos) in 4 days while motor sailing about 24 hours. On the trip back (Morgan 41) we had a 198 mile day but we were in the gulf stream and got a nice push from the current. For nav purposes, I love my Offshore Navigator which does about everything you need including an electronic log that updates automatically. Distance from A-B is a matter of click and drag. Trip planning is a piece of cake.
Owen Smith
Changes In Attitude
Hull #415

Well, I have a 1985 c36 MK I. I've logged many 24 hour non stop sails in. The fastest I've ever been per my GPS going up hill in Southern California from San Diego to Ventura is 10.5 mph per my handheld garmin gps. This was in about 55 knots of wind with all sail out. I.E., Furler and Main with no reefs in it. The boat was wild and crazy but she handled it. Infact, when I tried to reduce sail, per my gps, I wasn't even moving even though I was registering 8.5 mph per the gps. This was due to the fierce sea state at the time. Now, on the return tripp I motorsailed the entire way which was down hill. No tacking involved here. Running at about 1800 RPM with my Universal M25 and averaging around 6.5 knots going down hill it took me 24 hours from Channel Islands harbor rounding Point Loma and ending in South Bay San Diego.... The distance is 190 miles. So, my average speed was 6.8 knots per hour down hill with the current.

We're in the same town as Mike on Caprice, with the same destinations - except for the Yacht Clubs :).

Our longest overnight passage so far was 32 hours from the Dry Tortugas to Punta Gorda (about 145nm direct, but we had to tack making our sailed miles about 172nm). It took us 32 hours of pinching with a low-power engine assist for a maximum of 2 hours. After we were two hours out, the engine overheated and the sea state was too rough (25-30+ kts, 6-8 ft short-period waves) to want to diagnose the problem. We hand wind to sail, so we did. I just wish it had been a broad reach instead of close-hauled.

That passage, with a Genoa sheet parting like a rifle shot at 0230 (it was bouncing off the shroud when we pinched to high) and the heavy seas taught me a lot. I have been in higher waves in deep ocean water, but that is nothing compared to shallow water, closely spaced waves.

I will be making the same trip on April 4th that Duane describes above, but in the opposite direction. My start will be from a point at the Boca Grande Pass at the lower end of our pristine harbor. The trip will be in a Yacht Club race to Marker "I" at the Dry Tortugas which cuts the total straight line distance of the race down to 119.6 K/M.

I hope the wind is from the same direction that Duane encountered for our race so I will make good time. BTW Caprice is the only Catalina in this PHRF race. Lets hope that we do well and hold up the Catalina honor. It will be interesting to compare our trips.

Duane you made good time considering the wind and wave direction slowing you down. I know how bad the Gulf of Mexico can get some time. I crossed the Gulf going West one time in my Buddy's 45 foot Yawl. It was a nice three day cruise to Mexico. On the way back it was like you described. It took five days tacking into the wind and I was sea sick after the first day and stayed that way for the whole time. I still had to take my turn at the wheel because there was only three of us aboard and the owner was more sea sick that me. I swore I was going to sell Caprice when I got home and move to Arizona away from salt water. But. as soon as I stepped onto the dock we all started smiling and laughing about the whole episode and foregot about moving away.

That's one great trait I am blessed with - the ability to let the bad times fade away while the good parts stay with me. Works in all kinds of situations.

I plan for an average of 5 statute MPH, which works always works until you get good winds and arrive at your destination before daybreak. Nothing like shooting into a busy harbor approach at 4:30 am