What Do I Need to Sail Across an Ocean?
I get this question regularly and it is somewhat an impossible question to answer because there are so many variables. But I wanted to write my thoughts on the subject of “What is NEEDED” to safely and more importantly, smartly sail across and ocean.
Experience.
People often write to me telling me they have dreams of sailing off to distant horizons and seeing the exotic places of the world by sail and they usually ask me for advice on a boat or on gear and I always ask them the same question. “Have you done any ocean sailing?” 99% of the time they say no and I tell them to find their way onto a boat that is doing a passage and needs crew.
I have met people who had deep pockets (or where willing to go into deep debt) and were shopping for $200k dollar boats who, after their first ocean sailing experience as crew with a professional captain on a well outfitted boat, swore off ever pushing offshore again as they were so seasick they ended up spending most of the passage in the bunk. Ocean sailing is not for everyone and its far better to know this BEFORE you commit to your “Dreamboat”
There are tons of boats around the world with couples on board that take on crew for ocean passages so they have more hands to sit watch, you can usually find these through Facebook groups for different regions around the world. There are also sailor placement websites like findacrew.com and crewseekers.net (this is how I got on all of my first deliveries)
NOTE: I would advise looking for a boat that is actively cruising and looking for crew for a passage. This should mean the boat is well equipped and that the captain and first mate are experienced and are hopefully sailing in the trade winds and simply need crew.
Volunteering for deliveries is another way to get ocean passage experience but might mean you will have terrible experience that might turn you off to ocean sailing. People hire captains to deliver boats that have just been bought and have probably been sitting for a long time and have a lot of problems to deal with or they hire a delivery skipper and crew to deliver the boat “The Wrong Way” or “Wrong Time of Year”. People tend to sail boats the fun direction to a location and hire people to bring them back home which might be upwind or at the start or middle of winter or hurricane season. Keep all these factors in mind when taking on a position as crew.
If you have the funds to do so, book a berth with 59º North Sailing (https://www.59-north.com/) for proper offshore sail training. The price might seem like a lot when you look at what the berth tickets cost but if you add up all of the costs of a week’s vacation in Europe (Hotel, food, rental car, entertainment) and then consider you will be getting elite one on one training AND a great adventure. The cost is nothing compared to what you are getting if you can afford it.
It also costs a lot less to go sailing with 59º North than it costs to buy a $200k that you will be trying to resell if you discover that you or your partner hate ocean sailing.
There are always dudes who say “Oh It can’t be that hard, I will just figure it out”.
An old salt once told me “When you start sailing you get a full bag of luck and an empty bag of experience, your job is to fill up the experience bag before you luck runs out”
I have met many a fool who has managed to stay alive by chance but there are far more fools I never met, who didn’t manage. The sea CAN and WILL kill you if given the option.
A Boat.
For years people have asked me “How big of a boat do I need” this question usually comes from people with big dreams and small wallets (such as myself). The size of the boat will depend on how much misery you are willing to put up with. People have rowed across vast oceans so that alone should tell you that the size of a vessel can vary greatly.
In 1963 Kenichi Horie sailed his 19ft plywood sailboat from Japan to San Francisco. He was capsized 2 or 3 times but the rig remained in place and he sailed on. His passage took 94 days.
I also usually remind people that technically you CAN go over Niagara Falls in a barrel, but that doesn’t mean it is smart or fun to do so.
More important than size is the quality of the build of the boat and the equipment onboard. These two books are a great place to start when it comes to researching capable vessels.
“Twenty Small Sailboats to Take You Anywhere” by John Vigor
https://www.abebooks.com/9780939837328/Twenty-Small-Sailboats-Take-Anywhere-0939837323/plp
and
“Twenty Affordable Sailboats to Take You Anywhere” By Gregg Nestor
The smaller the boat the more it is thrown around at sea, the more uncomfortable passages are and the slower the boat will go. Everyone has a different level of what they are willing to put up with regarding misery. I am fairly comfortable being uncomfortable and I am so used to the motion of my 30ft boat at sea that I don’t much notice it unless I am in very nasty weather or sea conditions. When I sailed onboard the 65ft Farr, Falken to Greenland and Iceland last year, it honestly did not even feel like ocean sailing to me because the boat was so big and stable. At one point half the crew was bunk ridden with seasickness and to me it felt like a very easy passage because I was used to a boat far smaller with much more violent motion.
Essential Gear.
I am going to boil this down to what I know is just essential gear. This is a list of stuff I would not go on an ocean crossing without.
1. A reliable windvane
2. GPS Puck, iPad for navigation, AIS Receiver
3. Iridium Go / Predict Wind
4. An Epirb
That’s pretty much all you NEED for an ocean crossing as must have gear goes.
I have sailed more than 11k nautical miles with only an iPad and Garmin GPS puck (https://www.garmin.com/en-AU/p/645104 ) and a cheap AIS receiver and have never had any issues. (You of course need spares and redundancies for an ocean going boat, but that’s a whole other subject)
This over simplified list doesn’t include the obvious things a boat would already have such as batteries, a galley, a means of storing enough water, sails and the like.
You don’t need the latest complete package of gadgets from B&G or Raymarine, You don’t need a watermaker, You don’t need all the bells and whistles that keep people locked to the dock saving up for.
The only other thing I would say would be good to have onboard would be a life raft, but unless the boat is sinking out from under you, you are much better staying onboard a disabled boat than getting into a kiddy pool in the middle of the ocean.
All of my heroes were sailing in the 60s and did all of this on small boats with a sextant and sometimes a windvane. The few things I mentioned that I find are essential they did without, but they also would have been happy to have them had they existed.
The most important thing you need to is to be driven and willing to be miserable. But remember, ocean passages only last a few weeks, then you are in paradise.
I hope this helps clear up some of the questions for the dreamers who are working towards making those dreams come true.
James Frederick
Sea Captain, Writer, Vlogger
SV Triteia — 1965 Alberg 30
Circumnavigating — Currently: Australia
http://www.youtube.com/sailorjames
http://www.svtriteia.com
