The Royal Cruising Club Pilotage Foundation publishes pilotage information through books and a range of media acessible through its own website www.rccpf.org.uk.
Reviews of the most recent RCCPF Publications and other books written by RCC members are shown below.
Skip Novak on Sailing: Words of Wisdom from 50 Years Afloat is a fascinating collection of articles contributed to Yachting World between 2014 and 2023.
A Cruising Adventure and How-To Guide by Nicholas Coghlan
Royal Cruising Club Pilotage Foundation Balearic Islands 12th Edition, David and Susie Baggaley
Andrew Wilkes reviews Marek Jurczynski's publication
Skipper Lynam developed his love of the sea and sailing as a schoolboy at King William’s College on the Isle of Man becoming, in time, a successful canoe sailor.
Review of Royal Cruising Club Pilotage Foundation publication ‘Norway, Mainland coast, fjord and islands, including Svalbard and Jan Mayen’ 4th Edition
Bermuda, Azores, Madeira Group, Canary Islands and Cape Verdes:
Editor: Jane Russell, RCC, RCCPF Publisher: Royal Institution of Navigation, 2020. Available as a free download
Nigel Wollen reviews Mark Fishwick's West Country Cruising Companion
An excellent pilot by Madeleine and Stephan Strobel updated May 2020.
4th Edition. By Rod and Lucinda Heikell. A Review of this welcome update by Will Pedder
This practical guide deserves a place of honour on the chart table of any sailing yacht venturing to the Chilean channels or, as Bill Tillman referred to them, ‘the magical place of the unknown’.
"The book is a triumph, and represents a significant raising of the bar. Jo is to be congratulated, and I do hope readers will be enthused sufficiently to cruise the South China Sea."
This book is a very practical guide to long distance ocean sailing, compiled by a very accomplished and experienced practitioner and aimed at the would-be ocean sailor.
This meticulously updated 8th edition invites the cruising sailor to safely explore numerous exquisite locations, reassured by the author's wealth of experience.
Our review of September 2019 updated to include CCA review as a download. This book is not a “how to do it” manual, more a compendium of the most important issues.....
"I commend Christopher and the RCCPF team on producing an excellent book that will be an invaluable resource to anyone making this trip (Trinidad to Tobago) for the first time"
Reviewed by Peter Bruce who says: "This Second Edition is thoroughly comprehensive and gives those with it a huge advantage over those without."
Reviewer Jay Devonshire writes: "An up to date Pilot Book is an essential, and this latest publication is to to be recommended."
For many a sailor, crossing the Atlantic Ocean is their holy grail, the equivalent of scaling Mount Everest for a climber. Both are immense challenges and preparation is key.
The RCC Pilotage Foundation has recently brought out a fourth edition, published by Imray, of their extensive guide to The Baltic Sea and its Approaches.
‘Gibraltar and the five Mediterranean costas of Spain form the subject matter of this pilot.’
Paul Heiney's lavishly illustrated book warrants a well-deserved place in the chart table and has plenty of general interest for those seeking inspiration for their next cruise.
This is a beautifully produced and extremely well structured guide to this very long and diverse cruising ground. Reviewed by Katharine Ingram
The Canary Islands Guide is very much a guide for tourists rather than a pilot book, but as such it has the information for a touring yachtsman to enjoy these islands.
For such a small country The Netherlands has an amazing 6,000km of navigable waterways and there is something there for everyone.
The revised edition of the Arctic and Northern Waters Pilot is a compelling volume that takes the reader into waters that few will travel, for those who go there it is essential reading.
Reviewers Katharine & Peter Ingram write: "This RCC Pilotage Foundation book is a beautifully produced and extremely well structured guide to the vast cruising area that is the Pacific Ocean."
The 3rd Edition of this very useable cruising companion is brought right up to date (2016) by Derek Aslett. Published by Fernhurst Books and available through Imray and many local chandleries.
The newly published third edition of the RCC Pilotage Foundation Norway pilot book by Judy Lomax is reviewed below by Madeleine Strobel
A Sixth Edition of the RCCPF Atlantic Islands Pilot has just been published by Imray. It is reviewed by Alan Spriggs (RCC) below.
This is the 7th edition of this well-known and popular book. There is much that is new in this edition, all beautifully explored and explained.
Pilot books have evolved from rock dodging manuals into something more discursive and interesting. The Isles of Scilly pilot seventh edition is one of these As you would expect the book gives sound sailing directions for reaching Scilly, something of an epic in itself as the archipelago owes its charm not only to its astonishing natural beauty but to the fact that it is at least thirty five miles to windward of just about everywhere. Then it provides advice and instructions for moving from island to island Scilly may be one of the world's most gorgeous cruising areas but it is also one of the most alarming. In my youth we messed about there in engineless boats perpetually reminded that the seas had come all the way from New York to hammer those black deadly rocks; and that staying alive depended on many transits and clearing lines all to be learned by heart.
Forty years on, Scillonian sea marks are still largely non existent. In its purely pilotage section Hackett's Isles of Scilly, as well as pointing out anchorages, channels, dangers and the complete absence of marinas features several charts and chartlets showing at least twenty-six of the most important transits and clearing lines These form a foundation for the text.
Anyone tempted to bash on regardless across that nice blue bit of water between the bow and the Bishop Rock and hope for the best should read the excellent introductory sections of the pilot expanded and indeed completely rewritten in this edition. These deal not only with the multifarious natural wonders of the archipelago and its interesting culture but its maritime history. A navigator afflicted by the claustrophobic feeling of being trapped in a spider's web of transits and clearing bearings may find it salutary to turn to the author's account of Scilly wrecks. This begins with the wrecking of Sir Cloudesley Shovell with a large British fleet in the now as then appallingly difficult Western Rocks famous for rips, overfalls and fearsome weather and continues through centuries of disaster and island heroism to the present day.
A nitpicker might raise an eyebrow at a few infinitesimal solecisms; Hanjaque for Hanjague Hangman Rock for Hangman's Island. Ignore them. It is hard to imagine a boat cruising Scilly managing without this indispensable companion to the attainment enjoyment history navigation and pilotage of a place unique in the world.
Sam Llewellyn,
September 2024
Published by Imray at £34.50
ISBN: 978178679 488 8
