Celestial Navigation for the Complete Idiot by Gene Grossman

Author:Gene Grossman [Grossman, Gene]
Language: eng
Format: epub

CHAPTER 13 - BUT WILL IT WORK?

Here’s a dreaded phrase you probably haven’t heard in a long time: “Now we’re going to have a surprise test that will affect your final grade in this class.”

The good news is that there is no grade, and this is an open-book adventure in navigation.

I’d like to create a fictional voyage from Marina del Rey to Hawaii [I’m calling it fictional, created solely for the purpose of this book, but you can either believe that or not] and throw in a few variables to make it interesting – and along the way we’ll see how the information in this book hopefully helps to show how the things you’ve been reading about ‘come together,’ to help you find your position and destination.

Right around Thanksgiving in 2009 we get an invitation to be the guests of some of our rich friends at the Lahaina Yacht Club’s Christmas party on Maui: other than the possibility of some free food, here are some of the thoughts going through my mind:

 My sailboat might average about 5 knots, so we’ll probably do around 125 miles a day (giving us a little extra benefit once we hit the ‘trades’);

 Going down to Cabo san Lucas (southern tip of Baja) and then making a right turn will make our total distance to Maui more than 3,000 miles;

 Sailing directly from MdR to Maui is about 500 miles less (2506 miles), because the hypotenuse of a triangle us always less than the sum of any two sides; [I don’t need Cliff Clavin for this one]

 The best route for us to get there in time for the free food and drink would be to sail directly from MdR, and forget about Cabo;

 The trip should take us 20 days, so we’ll provision for 25;

 If we leave on the first day of December, we should get to Maui with a day or two to spare before the Christmas party.

The boat is all provisioned, the crew is all set, and we cast off for Maui in at 7 in the morning on the 1st day of December, going under power until the wind picks up around noon. It’s a little overcast, so we head out on a course of 241° (after making proper allowances for variation and deviation) and get ready for some beating and tacking to weather for at least the first week or so, until the trade winds get behind us.

By the third day out, we’ve gone over 200 miles and are now fortunate enough to have enough wind to sail on a broad reach. Also, the sun has just peeked out from behind the clouds so I’m sitting out on deck with one arm around the mast, getting ready to do a noon shot and start tracking our position on the chart.

Surprise: the battery on my quartz watch has passed away, and no crew member has a timepiece. Ordinarily this would bother me, but because the result of this unfortunate

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