Go Fish in the York
As a professional mariner, I regret to report I don’t know much about fish. Growing up, my mother served a lot of TV dinners. I thought fish sticks peculiar because I couldn’t understand how they could swim efficiently. When I secured my USCG captain’s license, I had to jump through 49 certifications for the […]
Top Sailing Movies
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyPMrR2XR6o Sailing movies are hard to produce, difficult to write, and often bomb at the box office. One weird exception is “What About Bob?” a black comedy from 1991 starring Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfuss. Murray is his usual cultish self, as honed in “Ground Hog Day.” He is one-dimensional, boorish and unfunny. He plays […]
Top Speed
Note: Sailing charters resume in Virginia on June 10 when the lockdown is lifted. Longtime student and friend Corinna Caldwell joined a couple from Connecticut on perhaps the last day of summer as a cold front moved in for autumn. They had a day of sailing at top speed. Bob and Gail Sokolowski were in […]
Learning to Sail
A Richmond area couple drove down to the York River to learn how to sail. Kate Riley sailed a Sunfish once and wanted to try a bigger boat. She got the full experience in a steady breeze of 10 mph that enabled us to sail under the Coleman Bridge to see the Navy submarine still […]
Splash into Season 8
After a week of refurbishing at the yard of York River Yacht Haven, Let’s Go Sail returned to the waters of the York River with a Splash into Season 8. The work consisted of three things that can only be done on the hards: wax the hull, paint the prop, paint the bottom. The work […]
Sailing Key West
A trip to Key West proved useful yet frustrating to research three things for Let’s Go Sail. But the scenery and the culture are Paradise as advertised. We found all manner of weirdness in architecture, restaurants, animals and of course boats. The biggest boats are the cruise ships, in this case the Seven Seas Explorer, […]
New Look at Old Shipwrecks
UPDATE: Sept. 20, 2020: News Release by JRS Explorations Survey of New Wreck Completed During Sept. 13-18, 2020, JRS Explorations Inc. conducted an extensive shipwreck survey within the Yorktown Shipwrecks National Register District, thanks to the efforts of experienced researchers. The goals were to survey and map “Wreck 11,” a recently discovered wreck in the […]
Summer of Dolphins
There are two upsides to Global Warming. First, it has extended the sailing season from April 1 to Thanksgiving as the waters of the York River remain warmer longer into the year. Second, it has led to more dolphins arriving earlier and staying later. The first pod visible this year showed up in mid-May, and […]
Sailing Lake Superior
A couple from Northern Virginia just bought a summer home in nearby Kilmarnock and took their friends sailing on the York River. Pat Tracey worked all over the world with the US Navy and retired as a lieutenant commander. “But I never got to captain a ship because I was the last of the women […]
Pets Go Sailing
Two cousins who’ve known each other for decades took a therapeutic sail on the York River with a family holding two dogs. Ellie McCulloch arranged the cruise with Debbie Anderson, whose husband died a month ago. Debbie lives far up the York River, near West Point. She asked for a life preserver and held […]
Sailing with Dogs
By Erin Carey, Sailing Magazine The cruising life is difficult enough, with confined space and endless maintenance. Throw an animal into the mix aboard a sailboat and cruisers are presented with a whole raft of additional challenges. Litter trays and fur balls, seasickness and vet bills; these are just some of the obstacles pet owners […]
Big Ship
A US Navy Support cargo ship pulled into Yorktown Naval Weapons Station and left just a few days later. USNS Medgar Evers is 689 feet long and has a crew of 123 civilians and 36 Navy personnel, some of whom deal with two helicopters on board. The cargo hold can take 783,000 cubic feet. It […]
Romantic Sail
A Richmond gal named Paula rented a stretch limo to take her boyfriend Christopher sailing as a surprise birthday gift. He got out of the limo and exclaimed, “Wow!” I took one look at the limo and said likewise. “My family has a house in Weems on the Corratoman River,” Chris said. “We have motorboats, […]
Read about Tacky’s Revolt
The British brought 2,000 “free” slaves to Yorktown in 1781. Then they left them to fend for themselves in no-man’s land. Years earlier, slaves revolted with great consequences. Harvard historian Vincent Brown’s latest book is Tacky’s Revolt: The Story of an Atlantic Slave War.” It tells the story of the largest slave revolt 1760–61). He […]
Sailboat Swimming
Hot Days When guests go swimming in the York River, it’s on a hot day and the wind is flat. This is a great way to cool off in a expansive setting of genuine adventure. Typically, July and August are best for swimming. We simply stop the boat with a hove-to maneuver and then pull […]
Why Boats Sink
UPDATE – York River Yacht Haven moved quickly to remove the boat before any oil or fuel could leak into the water. Fellows at the marina yard think the bow went under in high winds and the bowrail got caught at low tide under a finger pier on G Dock. That drove the bow down […]
Sailing Annapolis
On an annual Christmas stopover before St. Michaels, we walked around the port of Annapolis to check out boats and boat names as if we were Sailing Annapolis. The imagination runs wild. Across from town, Eastport formed its own “island nation” and there is where many of these boats are berthed. They recently celebrated 150 […]
Sailing into History
A young man from Prescott AZ (originally Baltimore) brought his wife to Williamsburg for an annual trip they’ve done for years. They wanted the History Cruise, so I dived deeply in the 1781 Battle of the Capes and the Siege of Yorktown that effectively ended the Revolutionary War. They had some history of their own. […]
November Sail
A couple from Venezuela celebrated her 50th birthday by taking their children sailing on a brisk November day. Vanessa Martinez and Tony Torrealba moved here 20 years ago and live in Northern Virginia. Vanessa wanted to learn how to sail, and she did great on all three reaches. They got delayed crossing the Coleman Bridge […]
Sub Exits York
Two couples and a solo sailor chased a Navy submarine for much of the afternoon. It was overcast and still, so we motored under the Coleman Bridge to the Yorktown Naval Weapons Station so they could see a sub in port. It was the third time this season that a sub arrived, which is very […]