Inside Practical Sailor

The gear shift on smaller outboards is typically a stubby little 3-inch lever tucked away on the starboard side. On a tender or skiff,...

Some people are prone to motion sickness while others are not. For those who suffer from this malady, sailing isn’t usually their sport of...

As a young family we had been sailing Dreamer, our O’Day 25, for five years, exploring the fabulous cruising grounds of the Canadian Gulf...

One of the challenges we faced when testing the Chesapeake Anchor, even at the 3-pound scale, was that once any anchor is set to...

Every season, for as long as I’ve owned my current boat, I’ve had people compliment me on my canvas and inquire about who made...

There’s more than a little irony in the need to keep a fiberglass boat away from water. The reason revolves around chemistry and the...

Clip on your safety tether. Far out in the North Pacific, solo sailor John Campbell was about to face the kind of ordeal most...

Everyone hated the first generation of CARB gas cans. While they were intended to reduce volatile emissions by recovering vapors and reducing spills, they...

After nearly three years of sailing the Pacific in the 1980s with my family, land life in British Columbia became a placeholder—by 1999, the...

One of all-chain rodes most popular features among cruising sailors has little to do with anchoring-and everything to do with stowing. With a well-designed bow roller, windlass, hawse hole, and chain locker, your rode and anchor will deploy and stow belowdecks faster and with far less effort than nylon rode requires. But for a smaller boat without a windlass or deep chain locker, an all-chain rode is often impractical. Even cruising sailors who are perfectly equipped for all-chain anchoring often find that their nylon secondary anchor better is suited for some anchoring situations.