and some more:
"There is nothing -- absolutely nothing -- half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats. In or out of 'em, it doesn't matter. Nothing seems really to matter, that's the charm of it. Whether you get away, or whether you don't; whether you arrive at your destination or whether you reach somewhere else, or whether you never get anywhere at all, you're always busy, and you never do anything in particular; and when you've done it there's always something else to do, and you can do it if you like, but you'd much better not.""
Spoken by Ratty to Mole in Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame (1859-1932).
If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea..."
- Antoine de Saint Exupery
I just thank God I don't live in a trailer.
Jimmy Buffet , Son of a son of a sailor
"Not all who wander are lost."
- JRR Tolkien
The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.
- William Arthur Ward
The house was built on the highest part of the narrow tongue of land between the harbor and the open sea. It had lasted through three hurricanes and it was built solid as a ship.
- Ernest Hemingway
Sailing is just the bottom line, like adding up the score in bridge. My real interest is in the tremendous game of life.
- Dennis Conner
Any fool can carry on, but a wise man knows how to shorten sail in time.
- Joseph Conrad
I cannot not sail.
- E. B. White
There is nothing more enticing, disenchanting, and enslaving than the life at sea.
- Joseph Conrad
The days pass happily with me wherever my ship sails.
- Joshua Slocum
At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much.
- Robin Lee Graham
The cure for anything is saltwater – sweat, tears, or the sea.
- Isak Dinesen
The sea hates a coward.
- Eugene O'Neill
To young men contemplating a voyage I would say go.
- Joshua Slocum
Boats, like whiskey, are all good.
- R. D. Culler
Wind is to us what money is to life on shore.
- Sterling Hayden
I hate storms, but calms undermine my spirits.
- Bernard Moitessier
Being hove to in a long gale is the most boring way of being terrified I know.
- Donald Hamilton
The wind and the waves are always on the side of the ablest navigator.
- Edmund Gibbon
The chance for mistakes is about equal to the number of crew squared.
- Ted Turner
If you are going to do something, do it now. Tomorrow is too late.
- Pete Goss
The goal is not to sail the boat, but rather to help the boat sail herself.
- John Rousmaniere
Prevention is, as in other aspects of seamanship, better than cure.
- Sir Robin Knox-Johnston
If you can't repair it, maybe it shouldn't be on board.
- Lin and Larry Pardey
I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky.
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by.
- John Masefield
Mackerel skies and mares tails, soon will be time to shorten sails.
- Old sailors proverb.
A sailor's joys are as simple as a child's.
- Bernard Moitessier
…surely these victims of the sea…had rushed willingly down the hills to the water, only to find themselves caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Who should judge whether they were there for the wrong reason?
- John Rousmaniere (Fastnet, Force 10)
The planning stage of a cruise is often just as enjoyable as the voyage itself, letting one's imagination loose on all kinds of possibilities. Yet translating dreams into reality means a lot of practical questions have to be answered.
- Jimmy Cornell (World Cruising Handbook)
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
- Mark Twain
If you can't tie a knot, tie a lot.
- Motto of a representative of the Winslow Liferaft Company
There are three sorts of people; those who are alive, those who are dead, and those who are at sea.
- Old Capstan Chantey attributed to Anacharsis, 6th Century BC
Some years ago - never mind how long precisely - having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world.
H. Melville, Opening Line from Moby Dick
Now - bring me that horizon.
The last line from Pirates of the Caribbean:
"He that will not sail till all dangers are over must never put to sea."
- Thomas Fuller .
"Without patience, a sailor I would never be."
-Lee Allred
"The sea finds out everything you did wrong."
- Francis Stokes
"I start from the premise that no object created by man is as satisfying to his body and soul as a proper sailing yacht."
- Arthur Beiser 1978, The Proper Yacht
"He who lets the sea lull him into a sense of security is in very grave danger."
-Hammond Ines
"It's out there at sea that you are really yourself."
-Vito Dumas
"Whenever your preparations for the sea are poor; the sea worms its way in and finds the problems."
- Francis Stokes
"I was born in the breezes, and I had studied the sea as perhaps few men have studied it, neglecting all else."
- Joshua Slocum
"When I forget how talented God is, I look to the sea."
-Whoopi Goldberg
" A tourist remains an outsider throughout his visit; but a sailor is part of the local scene from the moment he arrives."
- Anne Davison
"Men in a ship are always looking up, and men ashore are usually looking down."
- John Masefield
"To young men contemplating a voyage I'd say go."
- Joshua Slocum
"At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much."
-Robin Lee Graham
"A sailor is an artist whose medium is the wind."
-Webb Chiles
"Sailors, with their built in sense of order, service and discipline, should really be running the world."
- Nicholas Monsarrat
"Only fools and passengers drink at sea."
-Allan Villiers
"Out of sight of land the sailor feels safe. It is the beach that worries him."
-Charles C. Davis
On Boats:
"There is little man has made that approaches anything in nature, but a sailing ship does. There is not much man has made that calls to all the best in him, but a sailing ship does." - Allan Villiers
"The perfection of a yacht's beauty is that nothing should be there for only beauty's sake." - John MacGregor
"The desire to build a house is the tired wish of a man content thenceforward with a single anchorage. The desire to build a boat is the desire of youth, unwilling yet to accept the idea of a final resting place." - Arthur Ransome
"There are only two colors to paint a boat, black or white, and only a fool would paint a boat black." - Nathanael G. Herreshoff
"For one thing, I was no longer alone; a man is never alone with the wind-and the boat made three." - Hilaire Belloc
"If you can not arrive in daylight, then stand off well clear, and wait until dawn. After all, that's one of the things God made boats for- to wait in." -Tristan Jones
"There is but a plank between a sailor and eternity." - Thomas Gibbons
"A small craft in an ocean is, or should be, a benevolent dictatorship." -Tristan Jones
On Engines:
"Long ocean passages usually don't require engines; it's the ports and headlands at each end that may demand some expert sailing." - Hal Roth
"At last, the god-damned engine is quiet!" - William Snaith
"He was now convinced that the most valuable sail on board was the diesel."- Ray Kauffman
"The only reason that Uldra's engine never failed was because she did not have one." - Dennis Puleston
"I can't wait for the oil wells to run dry, for the last gob of black, sticky muck to come oozing out of some remote well. Then the glory of sail will return." -Triston Jones
On Weather:
"Headwinds are sore vexations and the more passengers the sorer." -Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Confronting a storm is like fighting God. All the powers in the universe seem to be against you and, in an exraordinary way, your irrelevance is at the same time both humbling and exalting." - Franciose LeGrande
"I once knew a writer who, after saying beautiful things about the sea, passed through a Pacific hurricane, and he became a changed man." - Joshua Slocum
"The pleasures of being becalmed became threadbare; there is a limit to untutored star gazing." -Charles Landery
"Off Cape Horn there are but two kinds of weather, neither one of them a pleasant kind." - John Masefield
"There is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes." -Old Norwegian Adage
"I loved cruising the coast of Maine . For one thing, it helped me conquer my fear of fog. Not that I have learned to feel secure in the fog, but at least I have learned how to grope without panic." -Herb Payson
"Being hove to in a long gale is the most boring way of being terrified I know." - Donald Hamilton
"Below 50 degrees south there is no law. Below 60 degrees south there is no God." -Old Sailors Adage
"I hate storms, but calms undermine my spirits." - Bernard Moitessier
"It's scary to have a 30 foot wave chasing you. If you are steering, you don't look back. The crew looks back for you, and you watch their faces. When they look straight up, then get ready!" - Magnus Olsson
"I don't know who named them swells. There's nothing swell about them. They should have named them awfuls." -Hugo Vihlen
"It's remarkable how quickly a good and favorable wind can sweep away the maddening frustrations of shore living." -Ernest K. Gann
"A tradewind starts gently, without gusts — a huge ocean of air that slowly and resolutely begins to move with ever-increasing strength. Suddenly everything comes to life. Spirits rise as the sails fill. The boat heels slightly and moves ahead. The almost oppressive silence gives way to the sound of the bow cutting through the water. Gone is the sea's glassy surface, and with it the terrible glare. Close the hatches and ports! We're sailing again!" - Jim Moore from By Way of the Wind, 1991
"A ship is always referred to as "she" because it costs so much to keep her in paint and powder." -ADM. Chester Nimitz
"I want a boat that drinks 6, eats 4, and sleeps 2." -Earnest K. Gann
"It looks like frozen snot." -L. Francis Herreshoff, looking at a Herreshoff Bullseye built of fiberglass.
"If a man is to be obsessed by something, I suppose a boat is as good as anything, perhaps a bit better than most." -E. B. White
"Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made." -Robert N. Rose
"The cabin of a small yacht is truly a wonderful thing; not only will it shelter you from a tempest, but from the other troubles in life, it is a safe retreat." -L. Francist Herreshoff
"A sailing ship is no democracy; you don't caucus a crew as to where you'll go anymore than you inquire when they'd like to shorten sail." -Sterling Hayden
"We had twelve hours of daylight, and if we did not sight the coast, I should conclude that Brazil was merely a geographical expression." -Frank Wightman
On the Sea:
"The sea hates a coward." - Eugene O'Neill
"The ocean is an object of no small terror." -Edmund Burke
"The sea drives truth into a man like salt." - Hilaire Belloc
"I wanted freedom, open air and adventure. I found it on the sea." - Alaine Gerbault
"Waves are not measured in feet or inches, they are measured in increments of fear." -Buzzy Trent
"The ocean has always been a salve to my soul...the best thing for a cut or abrasion was to go swimming in salt water. Later down the road of life, I made the discovery that salt water was also good for the mental abrasions one inevitably acquires on land." -Jimmy Buffett
"The sea is the same as it has been since before men ever went on it in boats." - Ernest Hemingway
"One of the best temporary cures for pride and affection is seasickness." - Henry Wheeler Show
" Land was created to provide a place for boats to visit." - Brooks Atkinson
"Never a ship sails out of a bay, but carries my heart as a stowaway." -Roselle Mercier Montgomery
"Cruising has two pleasures. One is to go out in wider waters from a sheltered place. The other is to go into a sheltered place from wider waters." - Howard Bloomfield
"Our voyage hade commenced, and at last we were away, gliding through the clean water, past the reeds. Care was lifted from our shoulders, for we were free from advice, pessimism, officialism, heat and hot air." - K. Adlard Coles
"The single commandment of anchoring is "thou shall create scope." - Reese Palley
__________________