All I Need is Wind in My Sails

Sailboat stuff. Photos. Musings. All that.

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The results of a lot of sweat, contortions, sunburn, and probably more than a little blood poisoning: A freshly painted, and much slicker looking bottom

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The price of owning a boat is not only paid in cash. There's plenty of sweat as well. Scraping the bottom of my O'Day 22, Gossamer Penguin. 

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Halyards and various trim lines on my friend's Hunter 335.

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J/22 racers prepping for the Wednesday night regatta at Riverton Yacht Club. Watching the prep and launch routine for these folks is pretty fascinating. People are climbing up and down the boats and doing rigging on the concrete pad. Then they pull the boat on the trailer over to a crane which lifts the boat away from the trailer, and swings them out over the river to be lowered.  These boats don't have any kind of motor, so they are entirely dependent on their sailing prowess for launching and recovery.

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A crowded deck on Gazela, during a training sail on the Delaware River. Looking aft from the galley. In this photo, you can see the (leftmost, moving aft) main stay, main, and mizzen sails.

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New Jersey's official tall ship, AJ Meerwald, on the Delaware River. She was visiting the annual wooden boat festival at Penn's Landing in Philadelphia. Shot from the deck of Gazela.

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There is nothing – absolutely nothing – half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.

Kenneth Grahame

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Passing under the Benjamin Franklin Bridge on the Delaware River on Gazela, looking toward New Jersey. To the right is Campbell's Field, where the Camden Riversharks play.

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Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.

Syrus Publilius

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A fiery sunset over the Pennsylvania shore of the Delaware River, shot from Shadowfax.

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He who lets the sea lull him into a sense of security is in very grave danger.

Hammond Ines

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Sunset over the Delaware River, shot from Shadowfax, a very swift J/29 racing yacht, moored at the Riverton Yacht Club.

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Men in a ship are always looking up, and men ashore are usually looking down.

John Masefield

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My 14-foot O'day Javelin, tied up on the shore of the Cooper River. I had to make a hasty retreat from the water as a thunder storm rolled through. 

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If a man is to be obsessed by something, I suppose a boat is as good as anything, perhaps a bit better than most.

E. B. White

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Lazily cruising down the Cooper River in my O'Day Javelin. Yes, my shoes are weird. Yes, they're great for sailing.

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Out of sight of land the sailor feels safe. It is the beach that worries him.

Charles C. Davis