The secrets of skippering a successful cruise

Setting off on a cruise is easy, but planning a route that keeps your options open and ensures the enjoyment of all on board is more of an art

- Justin Morton

When planning more than a few days out it is rare that the navigation and weather stars align, allowing you to choose your destination, the time to leave and also the time to arrive and have a successful trip. If you think about why a trip hasn’t gone so well you were probably trying to choose more than one of these parameters. You can always choose one. Choose two and you can quickly make problems for yourself. Try for all three and you are very lucky if your plan survives at all.

In the UK, I think weather is always the biggest factor but there are many others we can consider when deciding where we want to go and how to get there. In reality, many of the skippering decisions we can make that will ultimately affect the success of a trip happen long before we start entering our waypoints into our chartplotters. These decisions we make (or our chartplotters make for us), become our routing strategy.

Some may think strategy is something only racers should concern themselves with, but in many ways, cruisers have just as much or more to gain from good routing strategy. Both groups are trying to get to their destinations quickly and efficiently but in general, those on cruising yachts usually sail short-handed and with crew of mixed sailing ability. Trying to do too much, worsening conditions or a lengthy delay will wear far more heavily on those cruising than on a fully crewed racing yacht.