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Author Archives: Tony Johnson
A Look Back on My Time at Tradewinds
I’m cutting back my teaching schedule, and thought it might be time to reminisce a bit about my experience at this club. When I first came to Tradewinds over three decades ago, all I was looking for was another outdoor … Continue reading
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Nautical Terminator – Capes & Points
Does it bother you that Cape Mendocino, which looks like a point, is called a “cape,” while Point Reyes, which looks like a cape, is called a “point”? Cape Hatteras is more of a bump but still gets the title … Continue reading
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Nautical Terminator – Animals!
You can’t help but notice how common it is that things related to seafaring are named after animals. In a house you’ll find a table, chair, bed, cupboard, bookcase, rafter, gable, and joist. But aboard a ship in the great … Continue reading
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Nautical Terminator – Horse Latitudes (Part 2)
When last I wrote about the Doors’ song, Horse Latitudes, I was skeptical about the practice of jettisoning live horses at sea, or even dead ones, for these reasons: They could be used for food if all provisions had run … Continue reading
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Nautical Terminator – Horse Latitudes (Part 1)
In 1967 The Doors released their second album, Strange Days, which included a creepy song called Horse Latitudes. The song alludes to live horses being “jettisoned” from ships and suffering in “mute nostril agony,” presumably to lighten the load or … Continue reading
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Nautical Terminator – Doldrums
Ever feel like you’re “in the doldrums”— where everything seems bleak and colorless, and there’s nothing you can think of that sounds like fun? Yeah, me neither. The word comes from the old English dol meaning dull. Appended to … Continue reading
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Nautical Terminator – Pesky Sailing Terms
Mastering all those sailing terms can be troublesome. It’s like learning a silly secret language that an exclusive club made up just to befuddle outsiders, or at least that’s what I like about it. But sometimes it seems as though … Continue reading
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Estimating Time Of Arrival
One of the most common calculations you make when cruising, whether it’s a sail on the Bay or island hopping in Greece, is figuring when you’re going to get where you’re going. It’s easy enough to estimate time of … Continue reading
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So You Want To Be A Skipper
The following is an excerpt from my book, “The Captain And Mr. Shrode,” and was written in the harbor of Huatulco in southern Mexico, on the last leg of our circumnavigation. When one undertakes a venture such as … Continue reading
Crew Overboard!
About 30 years ago, the event all of us hope we’ll never face happened to me: my crew was hit by the boom in an accidental jibe and I had a real-life man overboard with an injured victim. Terry Shrode … Continue reading
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