On Watch with Peter Janssen

Grumpy Takes on the Great Loop – Again

By Peter Janssen on March 10, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

John Hauck, a retired Army Special Forces major and helicopter pilot, doesn’t know when to quit. Not even two years ago, on Aug. 2, 2019, he completed the Great Loop on his 25-foot Rosborough named Grumpy when he was 80 years old. Now he’s at it again. Earlier this week, Hauck loaded Grumpy at the dock behind his lake house in Titus, Alabama (pictured above), and trailered it 125 miles to Demopolis, where he launched it in the Tombigbee River to start the loop one more time. He will turn 82 next month. “You guessed it,” he wrote on his…

Computers Fail: Yacht Crashes into Dock. See Video

By Peter Janssen on March 2, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

With an LOA of 251’ 8” and a displacement of 1,952 tons, Go was the largest yacht ever built by Turquoise Yachts in Turkey when it was launched in 2018. It had a master suite, eight guest cabins, a helipad, gym, Jacuzzi, beach club, sauna, hospital, elevator, swimming pool with a waterfall and a crew of 18. It also had twin 2,570-hp Cat diesels producing a top speed of 17 knots. What it did not have at 10:15 one recent morning, was steering or reverse, and it slowly crashed into a dock, and then another dock, at the Sint Maarten…

New Foiler: Fly Above the Waves at 40 Knots

By Peter Janssen on February 23, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

Foiling hulls, once the province of America’s Cup sailboats and high-speed ferries, are going mainstream. Take a look at the new 32-foot Foiler; it has top speed of 28 knots cruising through the water in traditional boat mode, but it hits 40 knots after it deploys its four spider-like foils and flies above the surface. And once it’s flying, with the hull more than three feet above the water, the ride is smooth, sure and swift. Foiler is made by Enata, a Swiss firm with offices around the world. The first Foiler hull was made out of carbon fiber in…

Merc Unveils Game-Changing 600-hp Outboard

By Peter Janssen on February 12, 2021 Engine Room, On Watch with Peter Janssen

Mercury just introduced its new V12, 600-hp giant outboard, a move that will surely cause more cruising boat owners to choose outboard performance. The world’s first V12, the new Mercury Verado also has the first steerable gearcase on an outboard; it pivots independently underwater while the engine remains fixed, providing more room for multi-engine applications and a wider steering angle for agile maneuvering. Mercury says the gear case rotates 45 degrees side to side, about 15 degrees more than a conventional outboard The 7.6 liter Verado also has the first two-speed automatic transmission on an outboard, optimizing engine rpm depending…

Changing Plans During Covid: A Year on Dirona

By Peter Janssen on February 9, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

If you think the Covid pandemic caused a change of plans in your life last year, consider the cruising life of James and Jennifer Hamilton on their Nordhavn 52 Dirona. They started the year in Amsterdam and planned to go down to the Med, but Covid changed all that. They ended up spending 79 consecutive days on the boat in a harbor in southern Scotland, and finally, almost at the last moment, cruised across the North Sea to spend the winter in Norway. Plans change. In a review of the year, James wrote on their blog, mvdirona.com, that along with…

Cruising Through Covid on “Our Own Little Island”

By Peter Janssen on February 4, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

In a time of Covid, Patrick Schulte and his family seem to have found a good way to cope. They’ve been cruising, on their 1986 Grand Banks 42 named Bumfuzzle, around St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands, and they’re so content that they often don’t leave the boat – or the water – for long periods of time. “All we tend to do is on or in the water,” Schulte wrote on his blog, bumfuzzle.com. He and his wife, Ali, their daughter, Quest, 10, and son, Lowe, 9, have been living aboard Bumfuzzle since they bought it in Florida…

Greenline Launches New Hybrid-Powered 45 Coupe

By Peter Janssen on January 26, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

Greenline just launched its new 45 Coupe, a hybrid cruiser than can run on all-electric or diesel power. It’s the newer version of the 45 Flybridge, with the same easy lines, but with more room on the cabin top for solar panels. All told, the 45 Coupe has eight panels, and they can generate a charge of 15kWh, enough to run the boat with four people on board without having to start the generator. Running on electric power alone, the Greenline 45 has a range of about 30 nm at 5 knots, enough to cruise around nearby coves and harbors…

Fountaine Pajot Plans Entry-Level, 36-Foot Power Cat

By Peter Janssen on January 21, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

Reflecting the growing popularity of power catamarans, Fountaine Pajot just announced that it will build a new 36-footer, the MY 4.S, its entry-level cat aimed at the heart of the U.S. market. The new 36 will replace the Fountaine Pajot 37, the French builder’s first power cat that it launched five years ago. (Almost 100 37s have been sold since then.) “We entered the power catamaran market five years ago, and we continue to invest and innovate in this sector with great potential,” said Romain Motteau, Fountaine Pajot’s general manager. The new 36 does not have a flybridge, but Fountaine…

Volvo Unveils New Assisted Docking System

By Peter Janssen on January 11, 2021 On Watch with Peter Janssen

Volvo Penta just introduced its new Assisted Docking system for IPS boats, and it’s designed to overcome the effects of wind and current while docking. Assisted Docking isn’t guaranteed to eliminate all the fear and stress from docking in adverse conditions, but it certainly comes pretty close. Volvo announced the new system at its virtual booth in the Consumer Electronics Show. It first unveiled the self-docking prototype two years ago. Assisted Docking uses software from Volvo’s GPS-based Dynamic Positioning System to work with the IPS fingertip-controlled joystick. The new package includes a “human-machine interface” (or HMI, as Volvo calls it)…

Lyman-Morse Building New Hood 35 Down East Cruiser

By Peter Janssen on January 5, 2021 Boat Reviews, On Watch with Peter Janssen

Lyman-Morse is building a new Hood 35, named the Hood 35 LM Express Cruiser, and it’s bound to be an instant classic, with simple, elegant, Down East lines and contemporary 38-knot performance from twin 440-hp Yanmar diesels paired with Hamilton waterjets for sporty maneuvering and skinny-water exploring. The 35 is the second collaboration between Lyman-Morse, in Thomaston, Maine, and C.W. Hood, in Marblehead, Massachusetts. Just this fall the companies launched the first C.W. Hood 57, also with Down East lines; it was designed by Chris Hood and Stephens Waring Yacht Design in Belfast, Maine. Hood designed the new 35. Designed…

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