Totally not true. http://www.snopes.com/autos/techno/cruise.aspThis reminds me of an incident that happened here in Nevada about 40 years ago. A man bought a new Winnebago motor home and was driving it down from St. George Utah. He put the vehicle on cruise control got out of the drivers seat and went back to make a sandwich. The thing ended up in the desert and luckily he wasn't killed. When asked about why he did it he explained he thought it was an automatic pilot. Could have been a candidate for Darwin Award.I swear it actually happened!!
Notwithstanding that...
When we do fog runs, we tend to put the actual mark in the GPS, as opposed to some point away from the mark. This is because we want to get a visual on that mark before going further. In racing, it is required that skipper/crew get a visual on all government marks that are rounded. So yeah sometimes you have to go right up to them.
Of course Maine doesn't get the kind of traffic that other areas do. And whenever we get close to a mark we listen around for boat traffic.
The scariest encounter we even had (and I've shared this before so if you've heard it, please disregard) was with a big white Carver-type of boat coming out of Portland (ME) Harbor heading toward a bar on one of the islands. No one at the helm, and he was crossing a busy harbor that included a line of race boats coming toward the finish line. It was a clear day so we didn't have the horn right handy, but thankfully, my husband can whistle. We saw a guy pop into view, and the sudden turn he made to avoid us put green water over our foredeck, it was that close.