Fixing Our Boat After Our WORST FEAR: An Offshore UFO Collision [Ep. 88]

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We complete the repairs in Itajai, Brazil, so we can continue sailing around the world just like Joshua Slocum did many years ago, and like the Ocean Race does in present times.

After a collision we had with our sailboat and an unknown floating object (UFO) while crossing the Atlantic Ocean, about 800 miles off the West Coast of Africa, the closest land – Sierra Leone. You can see this in Episode 71 https://youtu.be/jSrkCC6re78

Watch the many steps and solutions we use to re-core the hull and complete the fiberglass repairs using vacuum bagging to make our boat ocean ready again!

#sailing #sailingaroundtheworld #repair

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0:00 Grinding and Fiberglass Repairs to our Spade Rudder
1:04 Mixing and applying barrier coat to repaired areas of the rudder
2:09 This video is sponsored by Surfshark https://surfshark.deals/ssr
3:27 Pedestal steering inspection, removal, fiberglass, repainting, and moving B&G Zues3 MFD chartplotter into steering pedestal
8:04 Exterior hull damage repair. Cored hull outer fiberglass skin.
12:08 Visiting Gabriel @MagmaYachts, spade rudder mold and shaft placement
12:55 Installing new balsa core and vacuum bagging repair to the hull
17:45 Beautiful sailing drone shots of our J Boats J/46 sailboat and thank you to our Patrons

About Us

Kate and Curtis both learn how to sail when they were young. Kate was a junior sailor in Opti’s and 420’s while Curtis went cruising in the Great Lakes with his family. We met while sailing in a Melges 24 regatta and have been sailing together ever since. The first time we went cruising together as a couple was on a friends borrowed J Boats J 105 in the North Channel of Lake Huron and Canada (part of the Great Loop). Those few weeks, and watching other channels like Gone With the Wynns, Sailing Uma, Project Atticus, Delos, Nahoa, and Sailing La Vagabonde, convinced us that the sailing life was for us.

We bought our boat, a J Boats J/46, in 2019 after spending years searching for the perfect bluewater sailboat to sail around the world. We were interested in a catamaran and monohulls, but loved the performance cruising design of the J(it is faster than most cruising catamarans). We spent six months refitting her in Rhode Island, before selling our house and cars, quitting our jobs, and leaving land life for good to become digital nomads, with the goal of sailing around the world via Cape Horn.

We have since navigated over 12,000 miles together, through storms, big waves, pandemics, and lockdowns. We sailed to Maine, the Bahamas, the Caribbean, Grenada, Sint Maarten, the Azores, Canary Islands, and Brazil, on our way south to Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile to sail around Cape Horn and into the Patagonia fjords.

We never intended to become influencers or start a new YouTube sailing channel, but now it is what we do. We love sharing our experience and adventures with you. We have learned to fly the drone and edit videos, trying to produce relaxing and listenable videos for you to sail away and watch at home while having coffee on Sunday mornings.