Monica's Excellent Adventure
Sail with Capt. Marc
Capt. Marc, veteran of multiple ocean crossings, and instructional pro, invites you to join him for lessons and/or excursions under sail. By special arrangement only.
- Up to six sailors aboard J/42, Songline
- Develop skills and confidence
- Offshore passage-making opportunities
- Performance sailing for speed and safety
- Skippered charters in exotic locations
- Shakedown on your boat
- Deliveries
All Stories and Articles
Blowback 5 – In the Middle
We landed in Saint George Harbor, Bermuda, in late May of 2002 after a boisterous and eventful five-day crossing from Norfolk, Virginia. There we met the crews of other eastbound sailing vessels, all closely monitoring daily weather forecasts. Every afternoon we gathered in a little waterside pub to talk about the 1800 miles of... »
High Anxiety Docking
As a sailing instructor, my favorite teaching topics include all things having to do with handling boats under sail. Auxillary engines and motors were a rarity on most of the boats I operated as a youth. Even when I operated vessels with an engine, I never really expected them to work when I most needed them. ... »
Running the Bar at Bahia Jiquilisco
Most cruising guides tell you that stopping in El Salvador is not a very good idea. They say that the place has no safe harbors and has been at war for a long, long time. But we’d been at sea for almost five days, including the night we spent hove-to off the entrance to... »
Can you water ski behind a sailboat?
Last week a sailing student of mine asked the question, “Can you water ski behind a sailboat?” If you want to water ski”, I replied, “you’d probably be better off getting a powerboat”. I stand corrected. Here’s proof that, when it comes to scurfing (and water skiing I suppose), a big, high performance trimaran will... »
Santa Cruz Island DVD Backstory
What drove us to do something as crazy as making a sailing DVD? Here’s the backstory. Click here to purchase the whole DVD In late 2004, we returned to Santa Cruz, California after a six-year voyage that took our family through the Panama Canal, across the Atlantic, around the Mediterranean, and home again. Once returned,... »
Blowback 3 – Entropy Rules
We achieved escape velocity on a foggy September morning. Songline, ship-shape and bristling with new boating gadgets, loped southward on a light westerly. Over the days and weeks that followed we grew accustomed to the rhythms and routines of voyaging. For the first month life seemed idyllic. Then the Second Law of Thermodynamics (Entropy)... »
Santa Cruz Island DVD Backstory
What drove us to do something as crazy as making a sailing DVD? Here’s the backstory. Click here to purchase the whole DVD In late 2004, we returned to Santa Cruz, California after a six-year voyage that took our family through the Panama Canal, across the Atlantic, around the Mediterranean, and home again. Once returned,... »
Blowback 2 – The Trip Takes Us
Like you, the idea of voyaging under sail infected me at an early age. I don’t think I took it seriously. It was a fantasy. People who actually did push-off were wild-eyed adventures or rich jet-setters. The reality of voyaging crept up on me slowly after years of day sailing, racing, and weekend cruises. One day... »
The Rules
The Skipper always makes the RULES. The Rules are subject to change at any time without prior notice. No Crew can possibly know all the RULES. If the Skipper suspects that the Crew knows all the RULES, the Skipper must immediately change some or all of them. The Skipper is never wrong. If the... »
Blowback 1 – Coming Home
Blowback is the unanticipated consequences of your actions. Everything you do produces some blowback. Sometimes blowback can get serious. This is the story of some serious blowback from living the dream of sailing away. Stories about the trials of voyaging in small boats usually contain hair-raising accounts of life-threatening adventures and heroic deeds. Crews... »