Boats To Go, History Crusing and sailing Maritime.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cruising by boat is a lifestyle that involves living full-time on a boat while traveling from place to place. Cruising generally refers to trips of a few days or more, and can extend to round-the-world voyages. Cruising is done on both sail and power boats, although sail predominates over longer distances, as ocean-worthy power boats are considerably more expensive.

Many cruisers are "long term" and travel for many years, the most adventurous circling the globe over a period of three to ten years. Many others take a year or two off from work and school for short trips and the chance to experience the cruising lifestyle.

Dinghy sailors may also be "cruisers", and in this case the word refers to someone who sails just for fun, maybe to go from A to B, but equally likely just to sail around for a few hours - in fact, any sailing activity that does not involve racing.

"Cruising" may also refer to trips on cruise ships, and those who take frequent cruise ship vacations (multiple times per year) may be called "cruisers".

History

One of the first people to carry out a long-distance voyage for pleasure, and who inspired many others to follow in his path, was Joshua Slocum, who circumnavigated the world between 1895 and 1898. Despite widespread opinion that such a voyage was impossible and despite being a retired sea captain, Slocum rebuilt a derelict 37-foot sloop Spray and sailed her single-handed around the world. His book Sailing Alone Around the World is still considered a classic adventure, and inspired many others to take to the seas.

Other cruising authors have provided both inspiration and useful instruction to would-be cruisers. Key among these are Lin and Larry Pardey, who in 1969 set off on a short cruise from the USA to Mexico, which turned into a circumnavigation of the world. They wrote a series of books about their voyage, as well as several reference books on cruising, which focus on cruising in small engineless boats. During the 90's and 2000's Evans Starzinger & Beth Leonard have written two more up-to-date books and many magazine articles about world cruising, in addition to completing two circumnavigations.

Techniques
As well as normal sailing and seamanship skills, cruisers use a variety of equipment and techniques to make their voyages possible, or simply more comfortable.

Although most boats can generate power from their inboard engines, and some carry generators, carrying sufficient fuel for these over a long voyage can be a problem; and so many cruising boats are equipped with generating devices such as solar panels, wind turbines, etc.

While it is quite possible (and, until relatively recently, normal) to cruise without long-distance communications equipment, such gear is becoming more common on cruising boats. Many boats are now equipped with satellite telephone systems; however, these systems can be expensive to use, and may operate only in restricted areas. Many cruisers still rely on the older short wave maritime SSB radio standard, which has no running costs, and can (with suitable equipment) allow sending and receiving of email.