How Crossing The Gulfstream Has Changed With The Coming Of The Digital Age.

I first crossed the gulf stream on a small sailboat back in 1979. I was on a sailboat that my good friend and I had just bought a few weeks before. My partner and I had named the boat the “Impossible”, as we thought it was impossible for a couple of guys like us to have such a fine sailing vessel. It was equipped with all the modern navigation instruments available at the time, a compass and large hat to shade your eyes!

It was my first time leaving the boundaries of land and sailing away to the Bahamas that I had only dreamed about. Crossing the gulf stream accurately on a boat only going five miles an hour with the entire body of water traveling north at three miles per hour was and still is a challenge to your navigation or “dead reckoning” skills. My friend had sailed across the gulf stream several times before with his father and I had put my faith in his ability to navigate. We managed to make landfall in West End Grand Bahamas, which was where we were aiming which was very gratifying. I was hooked as a sailor from that point on by the seemingly magical appearance of a spot of land on the horizon that was indeed our destination.

Last year I had sailed my boat to Florida after many years in the Bahamas to do some long overdue maintenance to the boat after being damaged in several hurricanes that had swept through the Bahamas the previous year. While in Florida I had added a new auto-pilot,
xm radio, stereo and speaker system, and global positioning satellite or GPS systems.

In the middle of the gulf stream I was laying back having lunch when I realized just how much modern navigation had changed in only 25 years since my first trip across the stream. I thought if I just had a remote control for my auto-pilot, I could cross the stream without even having to get up to check the charts. The satellite radio was on my favorite jazz channel, I had just talked to my wife on my new digital telephone, The gps units were both showing the exact position. The only thing left to do was put out a couple fishing lines to catch a tuna for dinner. Times certainly have changed.
Happy Trails,
Capt. Buck

By: Capt. Buck

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Ken Rissler has been sailing and traveling world wide for many years and currently operates the web sites Itraveltomuch.com and bahamasbyowner.info