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I provision my boat for 6 months at a time with canned and dry goods. Perishable
goods are picked up when I come into port. If I have another person on board we
can be self sufficient for 60 days or more.
When single handing sea trips (port to port) are usually 3-5 days.
The Gulf of Mexico is well traveled by tankers and oil boats; a vessel is normally 30-45 minutes away when you see it on the far Horizon. For safety reasons, I try not to sleep more that an hour at a time while at sea. Most of the time I use an egg timer to wake me up and sleep more at daytime than night.�
Coming out of Galveston the rigs stretch out south into the gulf for 90 miles as well as east and west from Mobil, Alabama to Brownsville Texas. Along the Texas coast at night you see what appear to be cities, but it is just rig after rig lighting up the dark sea.
Sun Bum is rigged as a stay sail cutter and 3 reef main.
Equipped with auto-helm she will self steer in a 50 knot blow.
The worst I've had her in was a trip from Tampa to New Orleans. Caught in a Cat.2 hurricane, we let out droge lines to keep her stern to and steered her under reefed stay sail. Even then we were surfing on the wave fronts at 10 + knots.
Running downwind we but her in the slot between the Mississippi delta and the Ship Islands. This abated the wave action, giving us more boat control. From their up the Industrial Cut to shelter in Lake Ponchutrain Marina. The eye of the storm blew through six hours later. Though the water rose above the docks our spring line held fine and we ran the intercostal back to Clear Lake, Tx.