A Dash Of Salt

A fter my recent rant about the weird shapes designers and builders create for the berths aboard our boats, I realized that I’d missed a major point—and something that irks me mightily. The pilot berth is, like the black rhino, going the way of dinosaurs. And the offshore cruising fraternity is the worse for it.

Nostalgia about old boatbuilders, designs and marine shops is a romantic memory for many of us cruisers.

It pays to ignore the accountants and uninitiated who say boating makes no sense.

That’s how I feel after looking at some of today’s design ideas for onboard berths.

There is little we can be certain about when boating. Except for these things.

Keeping your nav skills sharp in the times of modern electronics

Planning to solve all possible onboard problems is part of taking seamanship seriously.

Researchers have built entire careers “discovering” stuff that we boaters already know.

Only those skippers with a taste for misfortune fail to follow boating’s superstitions.

Today’s technology means we’re losing necessary skills that we no longer use.

797.1 is a wonderful place full of fantastic boats and mariners—and enough inspiration to last a lifetime.

I hate to admit it, but I love being up to my ankles in barnacles and wood shavings, reeking of bottom paint, with fingernails that will take a week to clean.

When choosing crew and guests, think about more than who’s fun at the bar.

Like good books, some DIY projects make a weekend aboard the boat even better.

For "A Dash of Salt" columnist Chris Caswell, DIY boat projects conjure memories of doctoring by hook, by crook or by duct tape.

Damn, I like having a captain.

We didn’t know it, but our boats are chanting mantras to us every time we use them.

There’s more to the night sky than just those pinpricks of light.

If you don’t own a pair of oars, then you’re missing out on one of boating’s great pleasures.

We need Tool Amnesty Day for returning all the stuff we borrowed and then accidentally kept.

John Steinbeck knew why we can’t pass a hull without giving it a knock.