RYA Night Hours

[Uricanejack]

I never felt the need to pursue or obtain a YM qualification nor did I feel the need to maintain a personal log, a ships passage log was a very different thing which I kept for the duration of the passage and then more often than not discarded either at the end or when I found the paper log in the chart table some time afterwards, the pencil marks on the accompanying chart would be expunged when the chart was next required. So after many thousands of miles and several hundred night hours many of which were on my own and most as skipper I suppose I wouldn't be eligible to apply to take a YM examination until I either constructed a log ( do they need to be signed off by someone? and if so what about all those people that either sail single handed or just two up? I appreciate that part of the YM examination is to demonstrate the safe handling of a vessel and crew management)

Yea pretty much where I’m at. But I did keep the old ships logs when it’s full. got them in a box somewhere. Other vessels which weren’t mine the ships log stayed with the ship. Found an old sight book from back in the day in a box. Should give to an examiner to see if they can decipher it. Probably get it handed back as useless its 40 odd year old.

 

[Uricanejack]

It was the Ballachulish and Corran ferrys where I first saw it used.

The Ballachulish ferry has long gone. No more dashing up from Glasgow on a Sunday to get the last ferry or that long haul via Kinlochleven back to Fort William as the bridge is always open.

Got quite a bit of seatime on them.
No night hours though damn thing ties up at sunset.

 

[zoidberg]

You youngsters. Haven't lived.....

 

[Sandy]

Got quite a bit of seatime on them.
No night hours though damn thing ties up at sunset.

I was sad to see the Ballachulish ferry be replaced, I was usually car sick before Onich on the way south!

The new ferry at Corran is just not the same without the turntable. The £10 crossing fee must be one of the most expensive tolls in the country.

 

[WindyWindyWindy]

There isn't a night hours requirement is there? Just to have been on two overnight passages.

RYA Yachtmaster Offshore exam

I imagine it'd be pretty hard to rack up 2500 miles and the requisite skills without having done any night sailing.

 

[WindyWindyWindy]

... it’s designed such that you could take the courses in order and theoretically pass (zero to hero does this).

That's not quite true, even comp. crew doesn't quite give enough for the day skipper pre-requisites in its most minimal form.

Comp crew, DS, and CS would only give you about 500 miles at their most minimal.

The zero to hero courses have a lot of sailing beyond the rya courses in order to meet the requirements.

 

[jamie N]

"Ferry Gliding" is a term that I've never encountered before this thread! I was extremely happy to find out that I'd been using it for over 50 years, from racing Cadets at Hayling Island, through to getting into Inverness marina on a +4kts tide!
The New Year starts well.....

 

[dunedin]

There isn't a night hours requirement is there? Just to have been on two overnight passages.

RYA Yachtmaster Offshore exam

I imagine it'd be pretty hard to rack up 2500 miles and the requisite skills without having done any night sailing.

Very easy in northern waters. I have done 2,000+ miles most years and never sailed after dark in Scotland or the Baltic.

Have also clocked up quite a lot of night hours in southern waters, shocking to a northerner how soon it gets dark in the trade wind belt and Caribbean (plus on occasional North Sea crossings)

 

[srm]

I imagine it'd be pretty hard to rack up 2500 miles and the requisite skills without having done any night sailing.

Fairly easy, just head north and get away from crowded waters. For instance I did my Ocean YM qualifying passage and return trip without going beyond mid civil twilight conditions: Shetland to Lofoten Islands, then back by coastal inshore passages to Alesund. Admittedly the passage back from Alesund to Lerwick may have qualified for a couple of hours of "night sailing" as it was in the later half of August. On the west coast of Norway all but the major landfall lighthouses are turned off for two or three months of the year.

 

[zoidberg]

Fairly easy, just head north and get away from crowded waters. For instance I did my Ocean YM qualifying passage and return trip without going beyond mid civil twilight conditions: Shetland to Lofoten Islands, then back by coastal inshore passages to Alesund. Admittedly the passage back from Alesund to Lerwick may have qualified for a couple of hours of "night sailing" as it was in the later half of August. On the west coast of Norway all but the major landfall lighthouses are turned off for two or three months of the year.

What are the pubs like....?

 

[srm]

What are the pubs like....?

Few and far between. However there is the grand Scottish tradition of taking a "carry oot" with you. The brexit dividend means that you can have it delivered to the boat free of UK tax and duty in Lerwick.

 

[jamie N]

What are the pubs like....?

Expensive³

 

[Sandy]

And the tined reindeer meat is vile.

 

[zoidberg]

The time-honoured 'cairry oot'.....

That reminds me.... when dinghy-camping around the inner Lofotens and later the High Baltic , we had with us some 'presentation packs' of whisky miniatures bought duty-free on the ferry over.

Just a couple of those produced in old Tures Ude's famous fishing shack - both he and it something of a legend in Sweden - hidden deep in the archipelago was the faint excuse for an impromptu wild Viking party, with Swedes coming in their boats from miles around...... and bringing their homebrewed illicit vodka and 'surströmming' into the jam-packed sauna/bastu.

Men, women, boys, girls.... at first with towels, then not.

That long night rid me of any last vestiges of Scots presbyterian guilt.....

 

[Uricanejack]

"Ferry Gliding" is a term that I've never encountered before this thread! I was extremely happy to find out that I'd been using it for over 50 years, from racing Cadets at Hayling Island, through to getting into Inverness marina on a +4kts tide!
The New Year starts well.....

I’d never heard the term prior to joining this forum ither and had to guess what it was. Which was quite funny. There are many others I was equally unaware of.

 

[WindyWindyWindy]

Fairly easy, just head north and get away from crowded waters.

Give me dark over cold any day.

 

[srm]

Give me dark over cold any day.

There is a saying in Norway:
"There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing"

Now that I live in a warmer climate the only thing I miss is the northern summer nights, in Shetland they are the "Simmer Dim", when it never gets fully dark. But I do appreciate the winter warmth here.

 

[WindyWindyWindy]

There is a saying in Norway:
"There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing"

Now that I live in a warmer climate the only thing I miss is the northern summer nights, in Shetland they are the "Simmer Dim", when it never gets fully dark. But I do appreciate the winter warmth here.

Do people not sail in winter up there?
That's half the year gone...

 

[Praxinoscope]

Some of the confusion over the ‘night hours requirement’ seems to be that the RYA website does not detail the requirements, or define them as well as in the personal log book, so those relying solely upon the web information do not have the additional information that is published in G/158.
I don’t have a copy of G/158, which I think is the current log book, but I would guess that it does have a similar set of definitions to my old G15/78, which does give guidance to the information required.
One change I have noticed since I did the YM Offshore 40 years ago this year, is that the LOA of the boat required to complete the personal log has been specified as 24’ LOA, (25’ LOA being minimum for the exam), which if this had been in force 40 years ago would have prevented my logged hours being acceptable as most were logged in a 22’ LOA.

 

[ylop]

Slight drift from the thread and the qualification aspect perhaps, but what are the penalties from 'society' for a pleasure yacht skipper, soloing and not keeping a watch? Let's assume that no incident has taken place, but that a Coastguard vessel has boarded and woken the solo skipper, West of Shetland.
Would the skipper be subject to a fine, or a penalty, or anything that might stop him doing exactly the same action, when he wants?
All of us on these forums put effort and place pride in conforming to 'Colregs', but does it matter if we don't, in the eyes of the law?
If we're involved in an unsafe act, of course we're liable, but are we liable to a sanction?
Asking for a friend, of course.

If I'm found guilty of any Colregs offence, would that disallow me from leaving harbour in my own yacht? The point I mean to make is that what action can can be taken to prevent a person from leaving a harbour in an ostensibly seaworthy boat, having previously been 'guilty' of an unsafe act with regards to Colregs; let's say not keeping a watch in any manner? Is there a prohibition against a 'yottie' sailing once they've been found negligent?

Your questions are a little bit strange.
1. Failing to keep a proper visual lookout at all times on a private/pleasure vessel could be an offence.
2. It sounds extremely unlikely that in the middle of nowhere anyone would be able to gather evidence of your failings if there was no collision.
3. The penalties for failing to follow the regulations include fines or imprisonment.
4. The regulations do grant the power to detain a vessel (in harbour) that does not comply with the regulations. It is not clear how anyone would demonstrate that a vessel does not comply if the only part being broken was the need to keep a proper lookout. However a vessel which has been detained isn't usually physically stopped from moving - it has paperwork served that says it must not, but if the owner/master decides to ignore that then they simply commit another offence - subject to fines.
5. I don't believe its possible to ban the skipper in general from going to sea on a pleasure trip (especially on another vessel), even if he intends to make passages where he will likely not be keeping a proper lookout. The secretary of state's representative does have various powers to instruct a vessel to do things but I doubt its something he's realistically going to do.

However, there may be things in local harbour byelaws etc that could be used, and creative Procurators Fiscal might try and find other routes to stop you - but finding one who has the time or understanding of the relevant laws might be challenging unless your are consistently pissing people off with your behaviour.