T&T: Circumnavigation Lawrence Zeitlin lrzeitlin@aol.com Sun Oct 9 15:44:41 EDT 2005 Since the Noah like deluge that has drowned the East Coast the past week has interrupted my weekend boating plans, I have taken this opportunity to answer a question that has been sitting in my in-box for several days. Please chime in if you can offer more cogent advice. QUESTION: <<I know that you own a Willard. I'd like to know what your thoughts would be on a circumnavigation with a 30' Willard Horizon. It looks like a very seaworthy small boat. I've found one for sale and it is a reasonable price. Just wanted your thoughts. >> ANSWER: It is theoretically possible to make a circumnavigation under power in a well found stock Willard, even though the nominal range is only 1000 NM. If you follow the coastline of the major land masses in the Northern hemisphere, the longest open patch of water is about 700 NM. Starting from the East Coast, you would work up to Newfoundland then make the passage to the tip of Greenland. The longest stretch is to Iceland, about 600 NM. From there travel to Scotland and work down the European coast to the Mediterranean. Bask in the sunshine as a relief from the cold as you cruise to Egypt and the Suez Canal. That will take you to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. Follow the coastline of the Arabian Sea around the Indian subcontinent, across the Bay of Bengal. After you round the tip of the Malay Peninsula, cross the Gulf of Siam and head north up the South China sea, past Taiwan and to the Japanese Coast. Stop in Japan for R&R and a good meal of sushi, then continue up the coast past the Kuril Islands to the Kamchatka Peninsula. It is a short but stormy hop over the Bering Sea to the Aleutian Islands. Wait for good weather before this portion of the trip. You are now back in the USA but your voyage is far from over. Work south down the coast of Alaska and Canada toward Vancouver. The Alaskan Inside Passage will make this part of the trip a piece of cake if you avoid floating logs and Orca whales. Skip out to the Pacific at Victoria and continue south along the Washington, Oregon and California coasts. You might want to stop at Willard's plant and say hello. Then on to Mexico skirting the Baja Peninsula. Cruise past a whole series of small Central American countries, trying to avoid revolutions, and you will eventually end up at the Panama Canal. Once through the canal, it is back up the Central American coastline to the Yucatan Peninsula. From there a relatively short open water passage takes you to Cuba. You should be all right with US authorities if you don't spend any money there. And of course from Cuba it is only 80 miles to Florida. Sail up the ICW to your point of departure and you have completed a circumnavigation. The trip will be a bit over 40,000 miles depending on how many detours you make. If you go day and night without stops, you can make the trip in less than a year, 278 days to be exact. But I suspect that you would want to pause and rest a while at several places so I would at least double the trip duration. You will put on at least 6600 hours of engine time. Carry an ample stock of spare parts. Since you will stop in Japan about 2/3 of the way through the trip, that might be a good time for an engine rebuild. Fuel consumption will be about 5500 gallons at a cruising speed of 6 kts, based on the experience of Willard owners. So much for the big picture. The Willard 30 is a particularly seaworthy small boat so it will probably survive the trip if you choose your weather windows carefully. That is if you avoid icebergs, hurricanes, pirates, and getting caught up in various armed conflicts. You may have a more difficult job personally. The Willard is a tiny boat for so long a voyage and you must be the type of person who doesn't mind cramped accomodations. There are a couple of other possibilities but many would consider them cheating. A circumnavigation is usually defined as a voyage covering 360 degrees of longitude and crossing the line of departure. The closer to the poles you go, the shorter the trip. You could start at the southern tip of South America and follow the whaler's route eastward past the Falklands and S. Georgia Island to Capetown, South Africa. Cross from there to Australia and eventually follow the southern shoreline. When you have engough of Foster's beer and shrimp on the barbie, make the passage to New Zealand. At that point you could island hop across the Pacific. Head for Tahiti and loll a while in this tropic paradise, then proceed to Easter Island and eventually the South American coast and back to the starting point. This trip would only be about 20,000 NM. The excitment of the Southern Ocean would keep you from being bored. You certainly would want to add an extra fuel tank to your Willard since some of the legs are considerably longer than the boat's 1000 mile range. The final possibility is to head as far north up the Greenland coast as you can go and freeze the boat into the polar ice cap the way Roald Amundsen did in the Gjoa in 1906. The westward drift of the polar ice should take you around the pole in about 2 years. Of course you would have to love the cold and keep polar bears off the deck. Weather gurus predict that in a few years the Polar sea will be ice free during the summer months, so if you want to wait a few decades you could make a legal circumnavigation by traveling just a few miles. You could probably do it next year if you were willing to pick your way between ice floes. The fact that your Willard would be a Horizon with SAILS makes routes with longer legs practical. Judicious use of sails permits you to more than double the cruising range, even when motorsailing. Of course you have to follow the old windjammer routes and keep the wind abeam or astern most of the time. Within 30 degrees of the equator the trade winds blow from east to west so a west bound near equatorial circumnavigation is the easiest. Start from California to Hawaii and continue in that direction. The longest continuous passage is about 2600 miles. Under sail the Willard Horizon is mostly pulled along by the large Genoa jib so the winds on that leg are in a favorable direction. When making long motorsailing passages on the Atlantic coast we generally keep the engine ticking over at about 1000 to 1200 rpm. This negates the drag of the large prop and adds a couple of knots to boat speed. Sails also help minimise the dreaded Willard roll. If you choose the shorter route, skirting Cape Horn and the Cape of Good Hope, the winds blow from west to east so a route heading east is in order. Although the Willard Horizon is an indifferent sailboat, the additional power of the engine makes it perform much better. Fuel consumption drops to very low levels. With a full 120 gallons of diesel, you might just make it to Hawaii, although I personally would add another 100 gallons of tankage. You will probably need to make full use of engine power through the doldrums. No point drifting like a painted ship on a painted ocean. If you do seriously contemplate making the trip, check the rigging carefully. A weak spot in the Horizon design is the attachment of the chain plates. An additional set of shrouds and an inner forestay wouldn't hurt, especially for offshore use. My own Horizon has a 70 gallon fresh water capacity. At 1/2 gallon of drinking water per person per day, that should be sufficient for the longest trip leg. No fresh water showers though. So the answer to your question is a qualified aye. A Willard Horizon in tip top shape would be capable of a circumnavigation. If you choose the right course and the weather is favorable, the use of sails significantly extends the cruising range. You would even have get home ability if mechanical catastrophe ensues. Look what Captain Bligh did with an open boat smaller than the Willard 30. As you can see, I have planned these trips carefully and I intend to start on one of them if I get released from the mental hospital in time. Regards, Larry Z --- The above was recently posted on Trawlers & Trawlering List http://lists.samurai.com/mailman/listinfo/trawlers-and-trawlering