Starboard and Port tacks?

[6string]

Originally Posted by sailaway21

6string,
Your crew has "rights"? You better reconsider that one, son. You start granting your crew rights and the only sailing destinations you'll be seeking will be antique shops. While you're out spreading coco-bean mulch, the rest of us will be out sailing. You keep them crew rights over on the western shores of Lake Michigan. "Rights", well I never.....

The rights granted to my crew (wife) is to serve me my Mount Gay and Tonic and pour one for herself. Preferably doubles. She has the right to remain silent .... even if I am making a poor tack. She also has the right to claim bragging rights for us when we do well in the race.

Jeff

[6string]

Originally Posted by SEMIJim

I was wondering if somehow I'd missed a bit of nautical jargon, and was about to ask what those where, when it hit me: You mean tell-tales (or telltales). The little bits of yarn or whatever on the sails, to help tell when they're flying right, right?

Jim

That would be the correct spelling. After a long day on the lake sailing, judging and drinking Leinenkugels on the deck my spelling took a stumble.

Thanks for the correction Jim.

Jeff

[Giulietta]

Guys, go easy on the guy...he is not "that" wrong....wrong, but not tottaly.

But there is some truth in what he says, at least for us Portuguese, WHEN WE RELATE TO PORTUGUESE WORDS.

In the Maritime Museum of Lisbon, (Museu da marinha) there are old books about sailing, written by some of the navigators of then, dated back to the 1450's that say (by the way, Val did you see ths books??), that the Sailors started calling the Port side BOMBORDO, which in Portuguese means "good side", because they would see the land when going South (off course only valid when going down, not up), on that side, and because their chances of returning were pretty slim...

Also there are mentions to the ESTIBORDO, (starbord) in the books and they relate that to the fact they really called the side of the water, when going down the coast of Africa, the side where the stars were. Many historians here have proved that. Estibordo is a decay in the word Estrela (star) bordo (board).

Of course I have no idea how much that might have influenced the words in English, and the explanations I rread about the Vikings wording might be true. If not entirely true.

Looks like we might have paralell naming here. The Anglo Saxons on one side, the Portuguese on the other, both corrct in my opinion. At least ours I know it is as it is written in the books.

Now...the fact is...when the Portuguese (and the Spanish, because they did it too), started sailing, the English, French, Dutch etc. wer still not so much into sailing, so which words came first?????

The Vikings were also sailing pretty soon, but they were not masters at writting, and mostly, very few returned, as their boats would only sail downwind, going back with oars only.

I know that they are now showing evidence of the Vikings being what is now Northern Canada, and an expeditions that came all the way down as New England, but.....their problem is they never returned to the Mother land..

So this is an ambiguous debate.

In my Country, Bombordo (porbord) is because of the sailors sailing South, Estibordo (starboard) is because that was where the stars were, because when you look West, from my coast at night all you see ar ethe stars, really...



Yotphix, Board in Portuguese means "placa" but "placa is board like a ply wood board. Board in this case is "bordo", wich also means the side of the boat.

[SEMIJim]

Originally Posted by 6string

That would be the correct spelling. After a long day on the lake sailing, judging and drinking Leinenkugels on the deck my spelling took a stumble.

Sounds like it was a good day

Originally Posted by 6string

Thanks for the correction Jim.

Wasn't meant to be a spelling correction, Jeff, really. More to relate something funny and make sure I had it right. I'm in no position to be correcting anybody. Not yet, anyway. Trust me. It's not for nothing I gave myself the user title I did

Jim

[sevseasail]

Originally Posted by sailingdog

The reason Starboard is called that is because on older sailing vessel, that predated having a tiller, they used a steering oar to steer the boat. The steering oar or steering board was kept on the right-hand side of the ship, which meant that the dock was most easily accessed if it was on the left side of the ship. The left side eventually became known as port—where the dock and port was, and the right was starboard, where the steering board or st'ar board was.

Another way to remember it is that you're on a boat, sailing across the water, you left port...

Thank you SD!!! I only remembered half of it.

[ImASonOfaSailor]

Everyone has the right to become smarter and learn more. If you do not know something then it is always good to put that infront. Just so everyone around you knows what you know. If you act like you know it all and it turns out that you do not know what it is that you are pretending to know then you could be putting people around you in harms way!

These people are normally named dicks, but we don't like to say that to often!