Someone once said “the best hot dogs are the ones with a baseball game in front of them”.  I’ve had a few of those and, admittedly, they were pretty darn good.  Most people would be surprised to learn that I have literally had only three or four hot dogs at only two or three major […]

We had the wind and current with us as we sailed from Branford to Stonington.  Nine hours later we were comfortably secured to a great mooring at Dodson’s Boatyard.  Sitting in the cockpit while watching the sun setting is simply the best!  We are looking forward to our next venture this season.

We keep Blue Mind at Dutch Wharf Marina on the Branford river for the summer.  The last couple of years we have moved the boat to Herrington Harbour North which is south of Annapolis because our son has a rigging business their. We spend the month of November on the boat and then leave the […]

In our beginning courses, we are happy just to get the boat to move. As we get more experience we might notice that other boats are sailing better than us. Some people say that if there are two sailboats in sight of each other they are racing even if one of them doesn’t know it. […]

Many beginning sailors dream of someday sailing the world. If that is your dream you are going to want to know what countries to go to and in what order and at what time of the year. “World Cruising Routes”  by Jimmy Cornell is the defacto place to start your research.

How to trim Sails with Carol Hasse

In our ASA classes we practice several COB sailing techniques. We learn how to get the boat back to the person in the water. The next step is how to get the person out of the water and back on the boat. This guy Duncan Wells has some ideas. Check out his website. http://moblifesavers.com/

Besides classes on the school boat, we really have a lot of fun helping new boat owners figure out their boat and learn how to rig and sail it better. Sometimes the boat is big like this Maple Leaf 60 and sometimes it is a family boat for someone to have fun on the weekends […]

Sailing is my peace. Luckily, I have had the opportunity to share this with my children. After my boys (10 and 12) completed their distance learning, we set sail on New Dawn to spend the afternoon replenishing our souls. Sailing provides a refuge from wearing a mask outside, from having to think about COVID19, from […]

Because I spend so many days teaching sailing, I don’t get to charter as often as I would like. In the summer of 2018, my wife and I decided to take a charter someplace exotic for our anniversary. We have chartered in the BVI and USVI before and wanted to go somewhere different. We settled […]