Author George Day

Boat Reviews
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Polish-Built Cobra Campione 41 Fly Emphasizes Value and Volume

Here’s a new 41-foot family cruiser from the Polish builder Cobra that packs a huge amount of living space into a family cruiser that is also a great value for money. The Campione sports high topsides, a full-beam salon, an expansive cockpit/swim platform and a full flying bridge that extends aft over the cockpit. The combination provides extra volume in the forward cabins, room to swing a cat in the salon, a real beach-front porch aft and two spacious lounging areas up top. And, then there’s the sunning area on the fore deck. The Flybridge transforms Cobras’ 41 Coupe into…

Cruising Life
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Coast Guard Rescues Two Men from Sinking Sportfishing Boat Off Virgina Beach

Last Thursday at 9:07 am, the Coast Guard Sector Virginia’s Command Center received a distress call from the 57-foot sportfishing boat Turn Me Loose that was sinking 34 miles southeast of Virginia Beach. The two men onboard, 30-year-old Jeffrey Hudson and his 60-year-old father Robert Hudson, said the boat was sinking quickly and they had to deploy their life raft and abandon ship. They said they would switch on their EPIRB. The CG watch standers issued an immediate all-ships distress alert and launched a 45-foot Response boat from Little Creek and a jay Hawk chopper from Air Station Elizabeth City.…

Boat Reviews
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A New Player Enters the Solar-Electric Power Cat Market

The Revolution Marine Group, based in Ft. Lauderdale, announced this week that they were launching a new 60-foot power catamaran that will be electric and solar powered.  This is a market segment long dominated by Silent Yachts, but it looks like the new Oceanwalker S60e, will give them a run for their watts. The S60e will be powered by twin 200-horsepower electric motors that will deliver a top speed of 12 knots and an economical cruising speed of 8 knots.  The motors will be powered by a sophisticated lithium-phosphate battery bank that not only will run the motors but will…

Cruising Life
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Cheoy Lee Yachts Marks 150 Years of Continuous Boatbuilding

In the world of yacht building, Cheoy Lee stands alone as the oldest continuous builder of boats, yachts, ships and working craft. This year, the company, which has been owned and run by the same family since its founding, is celebrating 150 years in business. Now managed by the fourth and fifth generations, the company is marking the anniversary with several striking and innovative new designs.  At Australia’s Sanctuary Cove Boat show in May, the brand new CLB 65 SUV (above) was launched as part of the expanding B Series line of boats. Martin Lo, a fourth-generation director of the…

Cruising Life
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Here’s What Happens When a Ship Loaded with Electric Cars Catches Fire

As far as we can tell, this is the second time this has happened, a ship loaded with electric cars that are powered by lithium batteries caught fire last week and had to be abandoned at sea. On June 3, the car carrier Morning Midas caught fire 220 miles south of Adak, Alasks. The fire appears to have started near the stern and it is highly likely that the cause is the spontaneous combustion of an EV battery. As we have learned, lithium battery fires are very hard to put out and will spread from one battery to the next.…

Boat Reviews
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Meet Composite Yachts, A Custom Builder with a Regional Flare

Around the country the various regions have developed over the generations yacht and boat designs with regional characteristics and builders who specialize in delivering boats of these types. We all know of Down East style yachts in the Hinckley-Sabre-Jarvis Newman style, designs that are famous around the world. But there are also the trawler and tug styles that are popular in the Pacific Northwest and the modern express cruiser designs in the Midwest and Great Lakes. One regional style that may be less well known comes from the Chesapeake Bay and is based on the local working craft that evolved…

Cruising Life
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Can A Greenline 45 Hybrid Truly Run All Night at Anchor on Batteries?

One of the propositions we often hear with modern hybrid diesel-electric mid-range cruisers that are fitted with solar panels is that the boat will, or at least should, operate all electrical functions overnight without the need to run a generator. This “silent mode” is a very attractive idea as none of us enjoys sharing an anchorage with a boat running at genset. But can this really work? And, what size battery bank do you need to achieve such energy independence? It turns out in a real two-day test in Spain aboard a Greenline 45 Fly Hybrid, British yachting journalist Alex…

Cruising Life
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Dismal Swamp Canal Open for ICW Traffic

The Army Corps of Engineers announced in early May that the famous Dismal Swamp Canal had reopened on May 6 after months of maintenance.  The canal is 40 miles long and runs from Chesapeake, Virginia to South Mills, North Carolina. The canal has a controlling depth of only six feet and is only 150 feet wide so larger vessels will have to stay in the ICW to get between the Chesapeake and Albermarle Sound.  Still, most cruising boats will find the canal well worth a transit. The length of the canal is a no-wake zone so it usually takes all…

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