On the Wind Sailing

#29. Welcome back! This week is a seminar Andy recorded at the Cruiser's University in Annapolis during the Spring Sailboat Show. People talk endlessly about preparing their boats to go offshore, but what about their brains? Andy spends over an hour going through the stages of a voyage, from preparation through to landfall, and discusses the common anxieties, what to expect, and how to keep it all...

#28. Erik de Jong was one of Andy's favorite guests on the podcast, and spoke at length on Episode 15. This one is a bit shorter. Andy & Erik talked via Skype last Saturday, the day before Erik was set to depart Halifax bound for Greenland in his custom steel 50-footer Bagheera, which Erik designed and built himself (he's a professional ship designer, so he can do that sort of thing!). Andy & Erik...

#27. Ben & Teresa Carey Return! Andy spoke with Ben & Teresa from his couch in Lancaster PA. No, they were not on the couch - they were in Maine! In a sweet little cafe while their new boat was anchored offshore1 And that's much of what this episode is about - their new-to-them Norseman 447, how they decided on buying it, what it was like getting down to Panama (the country!) to bring her home, an...

#26. You might not recognize their names, but Jean-Charles & Antoine have been at the top of the multihull game for some time, and I had the chance to chat with them in Bermuda during the ARC Europe stopover. Both guys are French through and through (and I love their accents), and the French are nuts about multihulls. They were commercial mariners and fisherman, respectively, but got invited to jo...

#25. Paul & Sheryl Shard are well known to many sailors for their Distant Shores TV series and DVD collection. They've been sailing for over 25 years on three boats now, and Andy sat down to Skype with them and talk about it! A very sailorly episode, this one was recorded in Bermuda (where Andy was), while the Shard's were aboard their Southerly 49 in Georgetown, Exuma, Bahamas, actually anchored...

#24. Magnus Olsson was on the Two Inspired Guys podcast a while back, and I'm relaunching this episode now on 59º North. I interviewed Magnus in downtown Stockholm, at the 'Sprit Museet' (Alcohol Museum) on Djurgården. Our boat Arcturus was tied up in the harbor there after we'd sailed her across the North Sea. Magnus and his partner Vica cycled down to the harbor and had coffee with us on Arcturu...

#23 is Patrick Shaughnessy, President of Farr Yacht Design. Andy spoke to Patrick in his office in Annapolis, Maryland, where he grew up sailing and worked his way up from the 'basement' of the famous design office to the top dog. They talked about the Kiwi Spirit project and Stanley Paris' record attempt, Patrick's sailing history, yacht design (obviously), and spent a lot of time towards the end...

#22. Ashley Rogers is an old friend of mine from my Broadreach  days, when I worked out of St. Martin on liveaboard sail-and dive-training expeditions. Ashley was a SCUBA instructor and we got to know each other at Broadreach's 'Pad' during the 2009 summer. Though she was living and teaching diving aboard sailing boats - and actually sailing between isalnds and dive sites - she hated it! Originall...

#Bonus. Thanks to Weems & Plath  for sponsoring this episode of the podcast! Matt Rutherford joins the show once again to discuss his imminent departure for Japan and the whirlwind of a time he's had in California for the past fortnight getting the boat ready. Matt and Nicole Trenholm arrived at the WD Schock facility on April 1 to find their loaner boat, hull #1 of the new Harbor 29, still in the...

#20. Andy chatted with Nicole Trenholm last week just before she and Matt Rutherford departed for California, the Strictly Sail Oakland boat show, and their voyage across the Pacific to Japan. Nicole talked a lot about her life before the Ocean Research Project, how she got into sailing, what it was like working on a tall ship and later as a scientist for NOAA, and finally, how she met Matt and go...

#19.  Etienne Giroire! Andy and friend Billy Rudek (the third voice you'll hear) sat down with Etienne in his home in Ft. Lauderdale on their way to Marsh Harbor to deliver a sailboat back to Annapolis. Etienne is most know for his namesake sailing company, ATN Inc. (get it?), which produces spinnaker sleeves, trampolines for catamarans, the 'mast climber' harness system and other bits and bobs. B...

#18. Peter Trogdon. New intro song from the Blaggards, 'Botany Bay'! Andy sat down with Peter in January in Annapolis to talk all about Weems & Plath, Peter's history as a sailor, the history of navigation, and the new exhibit on navigation at the Smithsonian Institute in DC. Peter also discussed some of his other non-sailing hobbies. This episode was sponsored by SpinSheet magazine, and is the fi...

#17. Paul Exner of Modern Geographic sat down with Andy at the Strictly Sail Chicago boat show and recorded the first-ever LIVE 59º North podcast! Andy and Paul talked all things ocean sailing, from boat design and gear selection to how to handle heavy weather offshore. Thanks to everyone who came to the show, and we look forward to doing more of these in the future!

#16. Matt and Andy sat down again on Burnside Street in Annapolis to discuss the Ocean Research Project's upcoming expedition to Japan. Matt and NIcole Trenholm, his scientific partner, will set out from California in a newly built Harbor 29 to do a plastics research voyage in the Pacific. it'll be the longest-ever research trip of that nature (6,500 nautical miles nonstop), in the smallest-ever b...

#15. Erik de Jong designed and built his own 52' steel boat for Arctic expeditions. It's called 'Bagheera' , and you can go sailing with him! Erik was super cool to talk to - he and I have a lot in common, having grown up sailing with our dads. Erik has always known he's wanted to design boats since he was a little kid, and followed that dream. He now lives in Halifax working most of the year for...

#14. John Harries of Attainable Adventure Cruising chatted with Andy to announce news of the 'Adventure 40' ocean sailing yacht . John has many, many thousands of miles crossing oceans (most recently in his 56' McCurdy & Rhodes aluminum cutte r), mostly in the far North Atlantic and high latitudes of the Arctic. That experience led him to believe that the ideal ocean going production sailing yacht...

#13. I had some fun with this one. We recorded this at the  Caribbean 1500  start in Portsmouth, VA back in November (and frankly, I'd forgotten I had the file, or I'd have posted it sooner!). It's my seminar on crossing the Gulf Stream, as told to the 2013 Carib1500 skippers. Yes, we're missing some of the visual aids I used (though you can see some of them online at 59-north.com), and at times i...

#12. Andy talked to Tom & Susie from the ARC yacht Adina about just what makes the ARC rally so special. For 27 years now, the event has attracted upwards of 200 boats. And 2013 marks the first-ever ARC+, that saw 43 boats head to the Cape Verdes before continuing across the Atlantic. Tom & Susie offered some excellent insight into just what it takes to complete such an audacious undertaking, and...

#11. Andy takes a look at breakages in the ARC this year and how crews coped with them. He spent some time on the docks interviewing sailors as they made their repairs. The story appears on the ARC website as one of this week's feature, and we've decided to turn it into a podcast episode as well. So here it is, with the full audio from the sailors on the docks. Thanks for listening!

#10. Russ & Laurie Owen sat down with me on their catamaran 'Nexus' in Tortola last week. They had just completed the Caribbean 1500, and are on their way to St. Lucia now to sail around the world with World ARC. I warmed to Russ & Laurie straightaway in Portsmouth at the start of the rally - they're just genuine, nice people! Russ is very proud of the refit he's done on the boat - he's an aerospa...

#9. Andre and Marie-Claude sailed in the Caribbean 1500 two years ago aboard their Moody 'Dancing Lizard.' This was a conversation I had with them over good French coffee and scrambled eggs aboard their boat in Hampton, VA before the start of the rally. Andre and Marie-Claude were two of my favorite folks in that event, and I see them popping up here and there on Facebook, cheering on their French...

#8. Joe Elder and his wife Alison own and run Skipjack Nautical in Portsmouth, VA. it's one of the few places like it in the USA - a treasure trove of nautical artifacts and artwork stretched throughout a beautiful gallery overlookin the Elizabeth River in Portsmouth. Joe and I talked about how he got involved starting the business, his career as a professional diver and underwater archaeologist,...

#7. The LEGENDARY Donald Street in person! I first met Don at the Annapolis Sailboat Show in 2010 when Mia and I had Arcturus on display with Colligo Marine. Don gave me some pointers on the yawl rig, and we hit it off right from the start. He's been the biggest influence on my sailing life since I started reading his books as a kid. Don and I sat down in the small apartment above the Weems & Plat...

#6. Mia and I met Christian in the Aland Islands this past summer. Christian and his wife Annette run the guest harbor at Rodhamn, a beautiful, small island about 10 miles south of Mariehamn, the capital of Aland. The island has some pretty interesting history, having served as the radio station during the wars. The old station remains as a museum, and in the summertime, Christian and Annette actu...

#5. Jim Carrier is a contributing editor for Cruising World magazine, and a fellow Allied Seabreeze owner! His boat, a yawl like Arcturus, is called Ranger. Jim sailed it across the Atlantic with ARC Europe several years back, and his experience with the boat on that long ocean passage convinced Andy & Mia to buy their Seabreeze. Andy and Jim discuss sailing the Seabreeze and Jim's career as a wri...