This idea started with a discussion of possible cruising destinations. In a warm Sea of Cortez anchorage a couple of weeks ago, we were sitting in the saloon with our friends Evans Starzinger and Beth Leonard, talkingabout the the cold North Atlantic Islands (the Faroes, Iceland, Greenland, and Newfoundland). We were pouring over the charts of Iceland, when Evans mentioned that the commercial fishing boats in that part of the world had large areas painted with international orange. This was a legal requirement so they would show up better in the fog.

This led Evans and Beth to place a piece of reflective tape on their radar mast, and orange stripes near the top of their mainmast. You can see the radar mast in the photo above, and the main mast below.

That sounded like a pretty good idea to us. Then Evans mentioned they had some surplus 3M reflective tape, and asked if we would like some.

Their piece came from a bridge-building project in Auckland, New Zealand, and we took this as a sign that we should be more reflective. If you look closely at the photo above you will see pieces of this tape on our booms…

…and the leading edge of our forward "mast". What we’re after is better visibility at anchor, especially for our booms. This tape jumps out at you if there is any light on it – even from indirect sources.

We think the most dangerous activity in cruising is operating the dinghy at night, where there is other traffic – especially if any partying is going on. So we’ve added strips to the outboard sides and back…

…and to several places on the dink itself (such as the hand rails).

Evans and Beth have a large piece on the front of their inflatable.

The material we have is made by 3M, as mentioned before, and is available from sign companies, and from industrial suppliers like McMaster Carr. When we get back to the States we’re going to pick up some more for the dinghies.