| Author | Message | ||
     Ted Lavino Senior Member Username: Tlavino Post Number: 261 Registered: 01-2004 |
Greetings folks, for those interested I'd like to extend Cheree's discussion format to another topic that should be near and dear to your hearts as skippers-to-be: voyage planning. I'll use her question format to generate discussion and encourage you to think about some important issues surrounding this topic. The questions are desgined to be very open ended and to generate discussion rather than have a right or wrong answer... Lets assume for the purposes of this discussion we are heading out of Dana Point for a longer cruise-our destination being the town of Sausalito in the San Francisco bay. What kind of information do you need to plan this type of voyage, and where might you find it? How long in terms of nautical miles is the total voyage? How long in terms of hours on the water? When would you like to leave, and what information is going into this decision? Assuming you aren't planning to sail this voyage all at once, optimally how long might be a daily run be, and what kinds of things are you thinking about when making this decision? Overall, how many days do you anticipate spending on this voyage? Where would you find information regarding prevailing winds and currents you may experience during this voyage? How about current and forecast weather during the voyage itself? Where would you find information regarding suggested routes and suitable anchorages and/or marinas along the way? Where would you find information regarding hazards to navigation? Special navigation regulations that you might need to be aware of? Where would you find information regarding suggestions for sight-seeing along the way? Locations in which to provision and fill your water tanks? Empty your holding tanks? How many crew would you feel comfortable with? What types of skills should they have? What sources would you use for weather information in your planning stage? During the voyage itself? What would be your provisioning strategies and what information is going into this decision? Where might you reprovision Lets assume for the moment that instead of heading North, we are heading South for Cabo San Lucas, Mexic. In addition to the information gathered above specific to that country, what information would we need to venture to a foreign country and back again, and where would we find it? What are the health, immigration and customs regulations we would need to be aware of and where might we find th is information? What bouyage system is used in this country? Are the navigation aids well maintained and considered reliable? Where might we find this information? What licenses do we need in terms of any electronics you have on board (VHF, EPIRB, RADAR, HF, etc.)? Where might we find this information? Will your vessel and/or health insurance cover this voyage? What currency will be used? What are the best places to change money? What is the current exchange rate? Where might you find this information? What charts and navigation publications are available? Where would you find this information? How would you choose among different sources of charts? If your head is spinning at this point, not to worry. This is meant to be a learning experience discussing what kinds of things you might want to think about. I will be posting some resources in the near future to help kick start the process for you... |
