How do you actually manage sleep on a 3-5 day passage with two crew?

geem said:
I think when you liveaboard for months or years at a time, the boat becomes your home. Having just me and the Mrs onboard, the boat is our personal space. Inviting friends to share you personal space for several weeks would get testing in a house. On a boat it is more so. You can't go for a walk around the garden!
We still get on with our friends that crewed with us. No fall out, but it doesn't mean I want to live with them
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I get that; I live on board probably 4 months a year; the boat is certainly my home.

But I have "guest rooms" and a guest heads, and decent privacy in my aft cabin -- the guest cabins are in the forepeak.

I don't invite people on board I don't want spend time with. Fortunately there are a fair number of such people in my life.
 
So a variety of watch keeping systems are used. I still wake up at 0400 to do the morning watch. 40 years since I was doing long passages!
Comfort and "soft" motion is important to allow those folk needing sleep, especially at night, so adjust sails to conditions, On a long journey does it really matter if it takes 20 or 21 days?
It is not a race.
 
Perhaps this thread should be about how to sleep, rather than watch keeping.

Having a berth you can wedge yourself into helps. If you're rolling around in an aft double cabin it doesn't help

A good sea berth with an adjustable leecloth is whats needed. If a double is all that is available wedge yourself in with kit bag, pillows, coats, (dry) sailbags, etc.

If you are comfatbley wedged in, and not moving too much it helps a lot. Then you can actually relax and sleep.much more easily.
 
PabloPicasso said:
Perhaps this thread should be about how to sleep, rather than watch keeping.

Having a berth you can wedge yourself into helps. If you're rolling around in an aft double cabin it doesn't help

A good sea berth with an adjustable leecloth is whats needed. If a double is all that is available wedge yourself in with kit bag, pillows, coats, (dry) sailbags, etc.

If you are comfatbley wedged in, and not moving too much it helps a lot. Then you can actually relax and sleep.much more easily.
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When we sail as a couple our go to sea berth is the saloon starboard side. It was designed as a sea berth. The table leaf folds down to create the leeboard with a cushion to make it comfy. The saloon cushions is level with the waterline and you are directly over the keel. The motion even in rough weather is surprisingly comfy. Our aft cabin buy comparison can only be used in very settled weather. Being in the ends of the boat is not conducive to a good sleep.
In gale force conditions, we wedge ourselves in with cushions. When you climb out of bed, it looks like you have stepped out of a jelly mold
 
It's important that the sea berth is very narrow so the leecloth will hold you across the shoulders. It's quite impossible to get any rest if you are being rolled back and forth like a bit of pastry. You must be as one with the boat.

The other thing is that the on-watch crew keeps thing as quiet as possible. To quote the father of offshore racing, John Illingworth, 'It is maddening to be woken an hour before you are due on deck by the avalanche of saucepans in the galley or the whistling of La Taraviata off-key'.
 
michael_w said:
It's important that the sea berth is very narrow so the leecloth will hold you across the shoulders. It's quite impossible to get any rest if you are being rolled back and forth like a bit of pastry. You must be as one with the boat.

The other thing is that the on-watch crew keeps thing as quiet as possible. To quote the father of offshore racing, John Illingworth, 'It is maddening to be woken an hour before you are due on deck by the avalanche of saucepans in the galley or the whistling of La Taraviata off-key'.
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This is one of the things I hate about our DSC radio. In some parts of the world the coastguard will blast out an alarm for some routine information broadcast. On our set at least, it doesn't seem possible to turn off the alarm tone, or even turn it down.
I'm tempted to buy a non DSC radio but I appreciate that not hearing DSC alarms would be a bit foolish.
 
michael_w said:
It's important that the sea berth is very narrow so the leecloth will hold you across the shoulders. It's quite impossible to get any rest if you are being rolled back and forth like a bit of pastry. You must be as one with the boat.

The other thing is that the on-watch crew keeps thing as quiet as possible. To quote the father of offshore racing, John Illingworth, 'It is maddening to be woken an hour before you are due on deck by the avalanche of saucepans in the galley or the whistling of La Taraviata off-key'.
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We routinely wear ear plugs whilst off watch. It doesn't completely kill sound but it dulls the noise enough that everything sounds like background noise.
I can still be woken by a shout from the Mrs when necessary. It helps me to get to sleep and stay asleep. Good off-watch sleep is super important
 
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