Captain's Blog

Sailing is Better than Golf

  Before addressing why sailing is better than golf, another distinction is appropriate. I can often tell if a person plays golf, as opposed to tennis. Golfer have better hands and appreciate the effect that the wind has on their game. Tennis players power through the shot and ignore the wind

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Sail Class Crescendo

  The 16th fall sail class by the Williamsburg Area Learning Tree reached a crescendo Nov. 8 with a straight run out the York River to the edge of the Chesapeake Bay, just south of Mobjack Bay and within sight of Newpoint Comfort. On the return leg, we used a northeast

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Sailing is like Golf

Sailing is like golf in myriad ways. Here are a few. You can meditate while exercising mildly. The wind matters. For racers and golfers, handicap scoring levels the playing field. Three to four hours is plenty of diversion. You can cherish the silence of nature. A cold beer tastes great

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Sailing without Grandchildren

Two couples in their 50s from Southern California went sailing near Williamsburg on a beautiful fall afternoon with an astonishing statistic between them. Patty and Chris Davis have five grandchildren while their friends Sabrina and Dave have ten. “That’s 15 of them, up to age 18,” Sabrina said. “They all

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Sail to Weather

We found out what it’s like to sail to weather. For the 16th year, the fall class of the Williamsburg Area Learning Tree assembled for the three-day “Adventures in Sailing” class. Among the returning alumni is David “Ned” Neidlinger whose career in the Air Force included intensive weather work and data

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Hardy, Williamsburg Charter Sails

Diverse Sailors

Three couples spanning generations from different parts of the country formed diverse sailors on the York River this week. Corinne Casey is an optometrist and Brian Kanhofer is a computer engineer. They drove down from Baltimore and rented a cabin on the York. “It seemed so much more rustic than a hotel

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Sailing to Citizenship

Among all the people to sail with Williamsburg Charter Sails this season, I finally encountered my first naturalized American. It was like sailing to citizenship. Ivan Levy is a Panamanian who grew up in Miami and elsewhere as his parents moved around with the military. He served eight years in the U.S.

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Historic Halloween

If you suspend the disbelief that there was no Halloween in Williamsburg during the 1770s, you will find the presentation by Colonial Williamsburg in the Revolutionary City quadrant of the Historic Area to be quite compelling.  Welcome to “A Haunting on DoG Street: Blackbeard’s Revenge.” It’s designed to draw in more

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Hoffman, Williamsburg Charter Sails

Sitting in the Catbird Seat

  One joyful surprise of a charter sail is the unique experience sitting in the catbird seat on boat of 30 feet or longer. The concept was pioneered by Hunter Sailboats in the early 1980s as twin “stern perch” seats on the aft rail, but the term catbird quickly eclipsed that.

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Runaway Slaves

Runaway slaves found themselves in an unusual situation during the American Revolution. The new republic touted liberty and freedom, but this did not extend to all members of society.  If they escaped the plantation they could gain their freedom from the British, and that factored into Williamsburg and Yorktown. In her

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