There are a couple must-have books for sailors…errr, actually, there are loads of great books out there for sailors. I’d be happy to tell you all the great books we have but the best ‘must-have’ books are the one’s that I’ve written. Check the following two books as I’m positive they’ll be helpful, practical and easy-to-read and digest. I wrote them for myself so everything is totally based on experience.
Skip my explanations below and just head over to Amazon now
- VHF Radio Checklists and Templates for Sailors – Reducing mistakes & making it easier when speaking over the VHF radio: Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk
- Checklists for Sailors: Passage Planning, Sailboat Maintenance, Cleaning, Medical and More – Making it easier to enjoy sailing your sailboat: Amazon USA and Amazon UK
VHF Radio Checklists and Templates for Sailors – Reducing mistakes & making it easier when speaking over the VHF radio
Have you purchased my book about making necessary VHF calls yet? Get it on Amazon – click the photo!
No one wants to contemplate living through a sailing disaster
When I hear about boats sinking, fires, limbs or fingers being removed, masts falling over or keels dropping off I quickly say to myself, ‘that won’t happen to us,’ and then close my ears to the rest of the story.
That being said, I did take a VHF Radio course in addition to a two First Aid for Boater’s classes. If it wasn’t for my young daughter I probably might have done less but the thought of having a medical issue on board and not knowing what to do scared me most.
No matter where you are, if you’re on a boat, an emergency response team will most likely take hours rather than minutes to get to you.
And that’s if you follow the correct procedure to get an emergency response!
Before setting sail full time I looked for a reference book containing all the standard VHF broadcasts to keep in our navigation table. I wanted something that made it easy for anyone on our boat (me included) to read out a MAYDAY, PAN-PAN, SECURITE or radio for Medical Advice.
I was also interested in finding some practical advice as to calling other boats, radioing marina’s and simple information regarding the VHF. After scouring the Internet I couldn’t find anything. Yes, you can get a book about the VHF if you do a course on the VHF but the book is full of non-essential (and somewhat boring) information. In the case of an emergency I don’t want to file through a course book telling me about history of maritime radio communications!
Amazon Reviews
I needed this to help me get the basics. James Steel
5 out of 5 stars Five Stars. Good. By Ahmed
Having the safety, distress, and urgency wording all in one place with easy to understand instructions makes this a must-have resource for all boaters. I highly recommend it! O. Fetisova
VHF Radio Checklists and Templates for Sailors is a simple reference guide that can be used by anyone to effectively make a VHF broadcast. Read more about this book, and view the table of contents VHF for Sailors or go straight to Amazon (USA or UK) and purchase it for yourself. If you’re not from America or the UK, just go to your local Amazon website and type the name of the book into Amazon’s search box.
Have you purchased my ‘Checklists for Sailors’ book on Amazon yet?! Click the photo to go to Amazon.com!
Checklists for Sailors: Passage Planning, Sailboat Maintenance, Cleaning, Medical and More – Making it easier to enjoy sailing your sailboat
After my husband and I decided to sell everything we own, buy a sailboat and sail around the world we were overwhelmed by the enormous learning curve. Sailing our new sailboat was one part of the equation but what really baffled us, at the start, were the hundreds of maintenance tasks and cleaning routines.
Actually sailing the boat was the easy part – keeping the boat afloat was a totally different matter!
Almost two years after we started, we’ve learned an incredible amount about sailing, passage planning, anchoring, taking guests aboard, servicing and maintaining our systems (engine, generator, pumps, batteries, and on), cleaning schedules, provisioning, medical concerns and even how to entertain young children on board.
This book has therefore been created as a guide, or a blueprint, to help you mitigate your learning curve regarding a variety of standard tasks associated with sailing a sailboat.
Reviews on Amazon
Don’t leave shore without it! Excellent, comprehensive checklists for every aspect of sailboat ownership. Should be bought and maintained by all serious sailors. Also if you are like me and already have existing lists, this book will help you to rethink and update those lists. Thank you for a fine addition to the ship’s library! Daniel Culpepper
This is an amazing book and a must have for every owner of …
This is an amazing book and a must have for every owner of a boat, sail or power. The author has written the book from her experiences sailing on her own boat with her family and therefore the lists are comprehensive and easy to understand. Every aspect of the yacht is taken care of from weekly, monthly, yearly service schedules as well as check lists for a variety of activities such as leaving the boat, passage prep and welcoming guests. From this book i have managed to draw on the lists and make my own comprehensive schedules and check list for my own boat. It really does take the guess work out of preparing to set to sea seeing you have checked and prepared everything on the boat before you leave. Throughly recommend the book to every sailor and motor boater alike. Thank you for writing it. Regards Paul
Here’s the link to the book at Amazon USA and Amazon UK. If you’re not from America or the UK, just go to your local Amazon website and type the name of the book into Amazon’s search box.
Any questions about either of the books? Email me at Kim@SailingBritican.com
Aside from selling books on Amazon, there is also a Sailing Britican Store
In 2013, Kim Brown and her husband Simon sold the company, house, car and all their possessions and said ‘screw-it’ to the rat race. They decided to instead go in search for an alternative life upon the seas. Their mission was to find more fulfillment in life, get back to nature, eat good food and truly enjoy family life. The Brown’s put their money into a sailboat, learned how to become homeschoolers and took their, at the time 3 ½ year old daughter, on what has already become a trip of a lifetime. The Brown’s have not retired. They, like most people need to make an income so the family is providing free educational information about selling up and sailing away in addition to sourcing and selling nautical items in their online shop. If you’re happy with the abundance of free information provided on SailingBritican.com and know someone that would value one of the items for sale in their shop, please support their cause! If one family can say no to the rat race, find more fulfillment and earn an income, perhaps many more can do the same. Visit the Sailing Britican Shop.
Furthermore, you can find Sailing Britican on Patreon, a website created to help content creators reward fans in return for financial support. Follow the link below.