# Heading across the Atlantic in July



## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

I have been mulling over the idea of heading to the Med this summer instead of going west, but I cannot find the necessary time off until July, most likely the latter half of it. I've been looking through the wonderful NOAA Historical Hurricane Viewer application and it seems that my chances of getting sideswiped by a major storm once I get more than 300 miles NE of St. Martin are pretty low.
Has anyone here done such a late crossing or have any additional information or comments? I don't have access to the pilots from here so I don't know what the wind patterns are going to be like at that time - perhaps the Azores High is going to be my enemy, not the chances of meeting up with an energetic tropical depression.


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## ughmo2000 (Feb 12, 2003)

Heres a link to the pilot charts,

Maritime Safety Information


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

Thanks!!! I've looked at the charts for July and August from the site and it seems that I would need to go much further north than I had hoped unless I want to cross half the ocean close-hauled


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## Rockter (Sep 11, 2006)

Zan...

We left quite late from Houston to Cork.... about mid July 1992.

There really is a lot of energy in the air and it was not something I would do again. Three hurricanes threatened us... Andrew, Bonnie and Charlie. Andrew was a killing machine, Bonnie plied his trade south of Grand Banks and Charlie came north through the Azores.

Any of them would have sunk us, and easily.

Also, the book tells little of the fact that there is zero wind around them... you are on the motor, trying at 5.5 kt to get away from them, burning your precious fuel.

Trying to avoid Andrew was the most sobering 3 days I have ever spent. We motored through unbelievable calms and heat. The motor did not like it either. We carried fuel for about 500 miles. We culd have used more.

I will never forget the moment when us and hurricane Andrew passed the same longitude. We could expect to be free of him then. It was awful prior to that. He was making 9-12 kt and NW, we were making 5.5 kt, and NE, trying to get to Bermuda.

How we wished it was April, or December.

We quarreled with Bonnie too, or at least the edge of him. Endless hours of easterly winds off Grand Banks. It was a lonely place. I will never forget looking at the clouds scudding across the sky with the moon behind them. We also felt the swell from Charlie when we were north of him....

1992 Atlantic hurricane season - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The most welcome wind of all was a cool northerly for about the last 700 miles on the approach to Ireland. We close hauled, morale high, knowing that there was not enough heat around to generate another hurricane.

Please be very careful, friend.

I would not do it again, not at that time of the year.

Rockter.


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Always nice to hear the voice of experience.

I have yet to do this, but my reading and gut tells me that if I haven't cast off at the latitude of New York by June 30th, I should reconsider going.


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## Rockter (Sep 11, 2006)

Val...

At least you would be starting at a higher latitude.

From my description, I did not include the better moments.

When the wind is right, you fly, and a 36 ft ship will reel of 140 mile days with little trouble. String a bunch of those together, and you are nearly there. The charts, still on board, speak for themselves... "downwind at last", is scribbled on one of them, as the wind, at last, gave us the quartering drive we really wanted.

This pretty lady can move, if the wind plays the game with her...

Image of Loch Oich, Scotland - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

That time of year seemed to lead to unsettled and confused weather. The amount of heat in the air made a nonesense of the prevailing wind charts and it was not unknown to have days of mirror calm, then days of stiff easterlies when you wanted to go west.

What's your ship?

Best wishes.

Rockter.


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

Rockter - thanks for the sobering words. I've got a 43 footer, and although I could leave next week I still need to get the radar and windgenerator installed before leaving. So perhaps I'll just head south after all. The Med isn't that great, after all.


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## Rockter (Sep 11, 2006)

Well, you could come to Scotland, it's closer, 2800 nautical miles to Glasgow from New York, and a 43 footer would certainly do it....

Sail Scotland

We have endless miles of classic cruising islands, in the West, especially.
The wind blows too.
The air is cool and the daylight hours are long and we have no hurricanes, well, not tropical hurricanes, anyway.
I'll buy you a beer, or two.

Rockter.


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

I'd still have to make from the BVI.


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## Rockter (Sep 11, 2006)

Steer roughly NW.

Then watch for a very green island.... that's Ireland.

Stop at Cork, at the pub called "Cronin's".... then 3 days to Fort William, Scotland.

Summers are ace.

Daylight a-plenty.


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

I worked in Dublin for a while and if I stopped on the green island I wouldn't make it to Scotland. Then again, Jameson's is a poor cousin to a fine Islay so I might make it to Scotland after all.

Aaakkk -- just remembered that I'd have to learn about tides for Scotland; the difference between spring and neap in the NE Caribbean might go into the double digits (using centimeters!).

p.s. I wonder what it costs to dock on the Liffey city centre? I only saw a couple of sailboats there and they looked rather run-down...


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## Rockter (Sep 11, 2006)

Those tides can be a huge advantage if you time it right, and they can shift.
Wind over tide can be less pleasant though.


I know little of the Liffey. It should be available on an internet search?


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

I wonder if I could do the BVI/St. Martin to Bremerhaven or UK passage in mid-July after all. Chose the initial weather window and get a lot of northing in early and trust to the cooler higher latitudes for the main part of the crossing...


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Well, that would be my suggestion, uninformed as it might be. If you head due north from the BVIs and keep careful watch of the tropical wave march from Africa, you would essentially ride the Gulf Stream and still able to duck west (under power if necessary) if something nasty is going to overtake you. If you bear NE on a beam or broad reach and keep going north to Newfoundland or east of there, you can continue to Ireland/Scotland and then pick your time to cross Biscay after coasting to Cornwall or some other "hop off" point.

I think the idea is that trading transit time for safer latitudes (45 N or higher) is safer and you'll have more warning than if you tried to go off from 35-38 N on the rhumb line for Portugal/Gib.

My bedtime reading has been the latest Jimmy Cornell "Cruising Routes of the World" and my general impression is that while there are plenty of good times to go in the various favoured sailing routes of the world (save the Three Capes), there are very much times to avoid if at all possible, and high summer in the mid-Atlantic is one of those times.


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## Rockter (Sep 11, 2006)

Yes, and we have cool air that blows about the place, anchorage after anchorage, no tresspass (within reason), and no pirates.

The Royal Navy stopped them a while ago.


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

I am going to have to start reading up on the Caribbean islands south of the hurricane zone, then. I can't get away (well, I am too greedy to give up a well-paying consulting job) until July.


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Timing (and boat speed, and planning your route around hurricane holes) would seem to be everything. You could probably calculate your odds of success...insurance companies do it all the time...but mistakes would be pretty hard on the brightwork.


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

Zan...will you live aboard during hurricane season or will you be storing?
Here's a good link on the Trini Marinas and moorings. 
http://boatersenterprise.com/DT07_whitepages/Boatyard_Chart.pdf
South Shore of Grenada is good too if you can make a run for Trini (80 miles) if the rare hurricane is seen. Don't know that I'd want anything to do with Chavez right now but Curacao Spanish waters is another possibility.


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## sgkuhner (May 5, 2002)

In 1974 we sailed from St Thomas to New York and left at the end of the first week of July. On the 14th we were caught in a hurricane midway between Hatteras and Bermuda and after heaving-to for eight hours and lying ahull for three, we fell off a wave and did a 360. When we righted the water was up to the level of bunks down below. ( I had posted some pictures of the boat the next morning on the thread about running with storms). I don't think you want to chance a hurricane after the first of July. Go south instead and do it next year in May/June.


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

SG, you don't think you can just make a run for Florida these days? The forecasting available to sailors is a lot better now...sailing was half-blind in '74.


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