Save the Date
Imagine an elaborate black and white movie transition sequence. From a time before computer enhancement, when high-end special effects were multiple films manually superimposed in a cutting room, ankle-deep with scraps of cellulose film. The Paris scene ends with the couple walking hand in hand out of their favorite little cafe on the Seine, a…
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The Block
Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast I sit in a Paris apartment, stymied. While it’s not the dirt-cheap garret apartment that a Lost Generation bohemian would have rented, it’s romantic nonetheless. Hemingway offers me comfort that I can organize my 52-card pickup of…
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Good-Bye, And Keep Cold
When I was a child, my family had a little cottage on the shores of Chautauqua Lake in Western New York—a three-hour drive from our home outside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (It’s of course the same lake and cottage that figures so prominently in Heeling is Healing.) A polite person might have called the cottage “rustic.” (It…
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Fortepiano
In 1698 and while employed by the Medici family in Florence Italy, musical instrument technician and builder Bartolomeo Cristofori created the precursor to today’s piano. What made the instrument revolutionary—compared to the other popular keyboard instruments of the time (the clavichord, harpsichord, and pipe organ)—is that the musician could control the volume of each note…
Keep reading“Piano Piano”
Said slowly and with a distinct Italian accent so it sounds to my American ear as, PEE-ah-no PEE-ah-no. Like all good Italian phrases, it comes with its own hand gesture: both palms facing the listener and angled slightly forward, the hands pressing down twice, gently and in time with the words. It’s 3:30 a.m. and…
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If History is Written by the Winners?…
I have this sneaking suspicion that maybe…just maybe…I went too far with the “honesty thing” in my last blog post. “Why?” you ask, “Dan, what clue led to your ‘sneaking suspicion’?” It started yesterday afternoon Mediterranean time (US morning time). Rhett, Sunny, and I are hanging out on Hazel James and Rhett gets a video…
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Is Heeling Healing?
Perhaps you’re thinking that this post will be a shameless promotion of our book Heeling is Healing (available now at a finer blog site near you!)—but it’s not. This post’s title is an honest question that I’ve been wrestling with lately: is heeling (sailing), really healing (good for me, good for Rhett, good for our…
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Unmoored
unmoored /ˌənˈmo͝ord/ /ˌənˈmʊrd/ ADJECTIVE 1. (of a vessel) not or no longer attached to a mooring.2. (of a person) insecure, confused, or lacking contact with reality. Oh there are so many titles I could have chosen for this post: “Question: How Bad is It? Answer: Uhhhh,” or “The Gale,” or “Swab the Decks,” or “Three Trips…
Keep readingQuick Post Birthday Update
Good morning! After a wonderful 58th birthday yesterday Celebrated in Santa Eulalia, Ibiza, we’re off this morning on a 100 nautical mile sail (about 24 hours) bound for Pollensa, Majorca. Both our current port and port-of-call are in the Islas Baleares, a semi-autonomous Spanish archipelago in the Mediterranean. I’m working on a comprehensive post to…
Keep readingThe Rain in Spain?
If “the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain” then we certainly haven’t found the elusive plain because we haven’t seen a drop in our 2 1/2 weeks in the country. However, it feels like we have had a significant portion of the Sahara Desert fall on Hazel. In hosing her down today in…
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A Myriad of Iberia
As our departure from the Iberian Peninsula draws near, these are some of our favorite memories… Fishy Communists Our first port-of-call south of Lisbon was the half industrial, half fishing, and half tourist Portuguese town of Sines. To get there, we had to first round Cabo Espichel and then it was a straight 35 nautical…
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About a Weak Back
(Author’s Note: I started writing this post almost a month ago, soon after I had completed the transatlantic sail and shortly after Rhett had arrived in Portugal. However, sailing, sightseeing, and spotty internet connectivity conspired to keep me from finishing and publishing it. Bottom-line, excuse any odd timing references.) “So, when did you get to…
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Quick Update with Forever Implications
Hi! Sorry about the recent radio silence but a lot going on aboard Hazel James and coordinating internet connectivity with my availability to write has been a bit of a challenge. From a sailing perspective, we are on the move again! After 11 nights in the Oeiras Marina on the River Tagus (between Lisbon and…
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Rewind to Sao Miguel
“Editor’s” Note: I started this post last night (Sunday, July 10). However, I’ve found that the most consistent thing about marina internet (regardless of the marina) is its inconsistency. Midway through drafting the post, the internet went dark and I went to bed. Therefore, I’m finishing the post on Monday morning and a careful reader…
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Puck Drop! / Making Our Mark
Any sailor whose been to Horta or anyone who has researched sailing there has seen or heard of the tradition of painting a mural on the seawall in Horta Harbor celebrating the accomplishment. Frankly, being a singlehander with lots going on, I wasn’t motivated to do it. It seemed like one more thing that someone…
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Game 5
I’m a big hockey fan and there’s a pretty good—but not perfect—analogy to my current situation. If a solo crossing of the Atlantic is my Lord Stanley’s Cup, I’m preparing for game five of the best-of-seven series. I’ve got what sportscasters might say is a “comfortable” 3-to-1 lead and I just need to win one…
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So High School
It’s the evening before Hazel and I are to depart on 18 days of sailing, give or take. I’m sitting in the saloon on her starboard setee with the dining table pulled out and typing out this post. There’s very little movement of the wind and water in St. George’s Harbour—hopefully, midday tomorrow we should…
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Bermuda Shorts
My time in Bermuda is coming to a close. In talking to my weather router on the high frequency radio and looking at the forecasts myself, I’ll likely be departing tomorrow (Wednesday, May 25), a day earlier than reported previously. Flexibility is key in this game. I’ve throughly enjoyed my stay in Bermuda. The islands…
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Quick Update from Bermuda
An upper level TROF is favored to persist near the Azores with RIDGING along or offshore the E US through June 1. The TROF near the Azores supports a few low pressure systems which essentially act as a roadblock for Trades N of about 20N or 25N. The RIDGING off the E US prevents significant…
Keep readingA Thousand More Words
Sailing is a long lesson in patience.Bernard Moitessier, The Long Way While Lil’ Dinghy is launched and I’m anxious to get on land in Bermuda and see the islands, and also get some things done (provisions on/garbage off, propane, a good restaurant meal, couple new lines and fittings, etc.), this morning’s weather is conspiring against…
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Worth 1,000 Words
I fully believe in both, in the poetry and in the dissection.Ralph Waldo Emerson, “The Naturalist,” 1834 If a picture is truly worth 1,000 words then this post will roughly equal the 85,000-word Heeling is Healing in value. Given my internet/satellite connectivity situation, allow me present a whole series pictures from our Ft. Lauderdale to…
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Departing in the Next 30 Hours
Destiny deals the cards, but we play them.Solo circumnavigator Bernard Moitessier, The Long Way Good morning! I’ll keep this quick… All indications are that Hazel and I will be departing Cooley’s Landing Marina in Ft. Lauderdale sometime tomorrow. Getting from the marina to the ocean is a little tricky given that New River is narrow…
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Refreshed hjsailing.blog Home Page
Good morning! After getting some feedback from blog followers and thinking about the number of satellite posts that I hope to be making to my PredictWind satellite tracker during my transatlantic attempt, I put my nose to the grindstone and figured out how to embed the satellite tracker into the hjsailing home page. Please check…
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Announcing the Release of “Heeling is Healing”
While I’m happy and proud to have gotten to this point with the project, I couldn’t have done it without the support and encouragement of all of you. Thank you. Although I haven’t yet received substantive interest from publishers or agents, there’s magic in momentum and I have that magic now, and I want to…
Keep readingThe Death of Each Day’s Life
I’m on my back and my field of vision is framed by Hazel James’s bow hatch. It occurs to me that I’m actually seeing (as opposed to dreaming that I’m seeing). As my eyelids close and reopen in a soft but long blink, I feel the slight crust of sleep around my lashes. My hands…
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The Ambivalence of “Left or Right?”
Yikes! From a writing perspective, I’m seeing that we’re a quarter of the way into 2022 and I’ve only done two hjsailing posts for this year—way off my pace of other years. However (and in my defense), while Rhett, Sunny, Hazel James, and I were on our Bahamian voyage earlier this year I was relatively…
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A False Bottom
Although we are at 26 degrees 50 minutes north latitude—between Miami and Bimini—it’s cold on this January night. The waning gibbous moon that emerged out of the ocean in front of us (and shortly after sunset) is now climbing well above the horizon. There’s already enough moonlight that I could almost read by it. I’m…
Keep reading2022 Plans and Goals
[Written January 2, 2022] Two big things happened today: the Christmas tree came down in Rhett’s house, and the two of us sat down and seriously discussed the final things we need to do to embark on our 2022 voyaging (hopefully) the week of January 10. I was hoping we could leave sooner but some…
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