seems like a good idea since both threads recieved so much repartee. I will throw a little gas on the fire be recounting a short delivery I helped with from the Great South Bay to Yonkers, NY, on a MacGregor 26S (not X or M) last year. I brought my handheld GPS 76 and the South Shore chartbook as this was my first trip on the ocean in a sailboat I had no experience on. My old friend and merchant mariner bought it on ebay and we planned to take it back by water while his wife took the trailer back to Yonkers (great Admiral, by the way). We took his 15 year old son too. The morning we wanted to set out was quite foggy being June 28th so we blew it off. This was not because we had no radar, GPS chartplotter or other equipment because we did not have any of these. It was because we knew we did not want to be out on an unfamiliar boat on the ocean in fog. We spent a rainy night in Babylon, LI with the boat set up in a backyard canal ready to go. A local powerboater had helped us with accommodations and advice about the inlet we planned to go through. He scared me a little with his talk of big, steep surf at the inlet and mentioned Thumb Nail Cove on Fire Island as a place to seek refuge. I had planned a few transits around Manhattan using the Eldridge Tide & Pilot book and thought I could figure out a reasonable window for us to get through Fire Island Inlet. I reasoned that in the East River you want to follow the tide and so you would at Fire Island Inlet as well. I learned quite a bit on this delivery that no electric component or tide and pilot book could tell me. My old friend and new owner of a Mac 26S had been across more ocean by boat than I could count but on ocean going ships, not 26 footers. We had not done a shakedown cruise in the bay before setting out so we just set out. My friend was pissed when we unfurled the jib for the first time and he saw how small it was. It was not my boat but I was happy that the jib was a little undersized as it was not anything like my heavy Tartan 27 with its 150% genny. Not having been out on the ocean yet in my boat I was anxious to try it, even on the Mac 26. The GPS came in quite handy as we needed to keep up a 5 knot pace to cover the 50 miles to NYC. As we hit Fire Island Inlet the GPS showed speeds of 8+ knots at times; lots of help from the current as the wind was light from N, NE. The tide had already begun to ebb and we were being pulled out into the ocean. We passed Thumb Nail Cove which was full of power boats who were watching the one mile arc of large breaking waves surrounding the outgoing plume. A tidal race. The ocean swells were hurled up into 10+' breakers with the Great South Bay ebb running into them. There was not enough wind to sail through this chaos so the 8HP outboard pushed us straight out and into the waves towards the channel marker about a mile out. At the peak of each wave the engine would complain and then get back down to business as it re-entered the water. About this time I began to question the intelligence of my decision to help out in this endeavor, then I remembered that my friends 15 year old was aboard and was roused from the cabin by the boats boisterous movements. There were a few white knuckle moments as some of the last of the large waves picked us up and threw us backward with one breaking over the bow. During this time I dont remember looking at the GPS at all but was watching the channel marker buoys to guage our progress towards the end of the field of dangerous waves. Once we passed the channel markers and headed east the ocean calmed down considerably and the Macgregor 26S glided comfortably over the 4' swells. If I had been at the helm for that stretch I would have been tempted to head more W-SW when I saw that field of breaking waves but the channel markers are nearly due S-SE. That would have been a bad choice as the depth is shallower. The local mariner had told my friend to head for the channel markers and he did. We survived. There is, of course, a CG station right there in Fire Island Inlet and I was practising the call I was going to make to them in my head on channel 16. We all had lifejackets on for this rough spot. It was local knowledge that helped us navigate through this even though we had never done it before. No Loran, GPS chart plotter, Eldridge, Radar, charts or sextant could have helped us navigate this spot more than local knowledge. One day I really do want all of the most high and low tech devices available to me but for now when I navigate local waters common sense and an idea of what the tides and currents can stir up for me are the most important. A working depthsounder would be nice also! The Mac 26S motorsailed nicely then the wind picked up and we sailed in 15 kt. winds off of south Brooklyn doing better than 6 knots. A bit of weather helm and I was quite happy that the jib was as small as it was as was it's new owner finally. We sailed under the Verazzano Narrows and passed Fleet Week Navy ships in NY Harbor and stopped in at Liberty Landing for the night at 1630, just before sunset. The handheld GPS had been a great tool for monitoring our speed over ground(SOG) and we needed to keep a steady speed of 5 kts. to do the 50 miles. The chart book was good to use as a tool to calm the other side of the brain that we were where we thought we were (even though we both grew up on LI and knew its south shore beaches. And yes, we kept in sight of land at all times as the Macgregor 26S is not a blue water boat but a well timed jaunt into the ocean was not impossible if the stars were in your favor. It is fun to test your limits but it is not fun to fail. We were lucky but I cannot see how all the high tech equipment in the world would have made my experience any safer (except possibly a life raft which we did not have). Every inlet tells a story.
