Dear Boat Doctor, I own a Caliber 40 and have been working my way down the Windward Islands, planning to spend hurricane season in Grenada. The trip has been great, but we’ve been caught a little o

The college admissions scandal, aside from being distasteful and embarrassing, has taught me a new term. To all of you from nasty northern climates with very short sailing seasons, a snowplow is somet

I had to check the proofs of this page extra carefully, lest some snarky editor garnish this column with the headline, “Ancient mariner goes back to school.” It’s true, I did go back to school,ScheduleSchedule

Features  One love cruising A cruise of Jamaica left a sailor feeling irie The healing power of sailing Warrior Sailing military veterans sail Charleston Race Week A cruiser gets school

When you first look at the profiles of the new Gunfleet 43 and the Allures 40.9 you might peg them as very similar boats. The profiles look very similar and LODs are within a foot. But they are really

This month we have two very similarly sized and styled European production boats and one very unusual training dinghy to review. The Allures 40.9 is a Berret-Racoupeau design. It’s a handsome boat i

The forecast was for 83 degrees with a 12-knot wind. The water was a stunning aqua blue off the St. Thomas Yacht Club on Cowpet Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands, the site of North U’s midwinter racing clini

Seattle resident Paul Souders didn’t start out as a sailor. In fact, he didn’t really start out as a water guy at all; he was simply a professional photographer who had grown dissatisfied with his

In April, Sperry Charleston Race Week drew its second largest ever fleet, with more than 250 entries from across the U.S. and overseas. In the void created by the defunct Key West Race Week, Charlesto

The Hunter design team was listening carefully to what potential buyers had in mind in the late 1990s when it came to building the ideal racer-cruiser, with an emphasis on the latter. The result was t

Beneteau has long had the ability to put the go-fast into sailboats, with many of the boats in its First line winning offshore and inshore races. It even launched the foiling Figaro 3. Cushy comforts

If your boat lies unattended, even for a short time—be it in a marina, (in or out of the water), or on a mooring—it doesn’t take long for it to become grubby, from bird droppings or wind blown d

Dear Boat Doctor, My Selden boom vang doesn’t seem to hold up my boom any more. It was OK before I installed the main, but now the boom just sags. For now, I have resigned myself to holding up the

In our family, every gift-giving opportunity—birthdays, Christmas and Hanukkah, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day—are less about thoughtful and creative generosity, and more about collecting what

A real estate ad I saw recently boasted of properties with a “pond view.”  No kidding. No matter that the pond was a storm water retention basin that was required by the building code

Features  Great small boats for big adventures Small boats with proven pedigrees top our list of boats capable of serious sailing Wooden boats with a side of wine A trio of French da

Who says you need a big boat for a big adventure? Self-sufficient sailors have long turned to sturdy little crafts for passages in challenging waters from lakes to oceans. Not only are small boats sim

Here is a trailerable pocket cruiser that is built in Ventura, California, and designed by Heraldo Ruesch. It’s a lot of boat in 23 feet and has been designed to perform both under sail and with a l