Summer Sailstice was started in 2001 with the goal of connecting sailors in a common celebration of sail. The 25th Anniversary of Summer Sailstice saw over 100 plans pinned on our global map and thousands of sailors participating with raft ups, open houses, races, cruise outs and just plain messing around on boats. We'd call that an amazing success and hope everyone will continue to get out and SAIL all year-round.
Congratulations to the winners of our Contests and thanks to everyone for their participation!
Best Photo
Dennis Berke and his wife have been sailing their Hunter 290, BlueBelle, out of Port Superior Marina in Bayfield, WI since 2002. On Summer Sailstice they sailed to Stockton Island, one of the 22 islands in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore in Lake Superior, located off the coast of Northern Wisconsin. They were quite shocked to pull up a rat's nest when they weighed anchor after holding fast during high winds and captured this great shot.
He is the winner of a WinchRite by Sailology! This electric cordless winch handle was designed specifically for sailboats and features soft start torque, variable speed, and dual rotation for your 2-speed winches.
Best Raft Up
Chatham Sailing Club, Wilmington Island, Georgia, is a three-peat winner, having won the honors in 2023, 2024 and now in 2025. They had 13 boats (12 at any given time) plus one sail-by from another club. This year's celebration included 2 dogs, 2 kids, and at least 40 adults!
They are the winners of a 1 x 100 watt solar bundle donated by Sun Powered Yachts. With no moving parts, these solar panels are clean and silent, and produce no atmospheric emissions or harmful greenhouse gases. They're also easy to install, maintain and can be removed and stored.This will surely help with their energy needs on future raft ups!
Chesapeake Bay Tartan Sailing Club is deserving of an Honorable Mention with 4 boats, 9 sailors, swimming, drinking, eating, stories and great camaraderie taking place in Dun Cove, off Harris Creek, off Choptank River, off Chesapeake Bay, MD.
They are the winners of a Weather Routing Forecast Package donated by Weather Routing Inc. The Club can use this prize for a future cruise-out and includes forecasts and maps, a SeaWeather.net account for event organizers and SeaWeather.net trials for participants.
Best Video
Carol Barger of Chatham Sailing Club* perfectly captured the essence of a great day on the water with footage showing boats arriving, partying and departing at their annual Summer Sailstice Raft Up.
She is the winner of a Weems & Plath OGM Series LED KIS Light, perfect for a variety of tasks and built to withstand the harshest ocean environments. Mix-n-match mounting brackets give flexibility to light challenging areas. Perfect for 12V or 24V boat systems while also offering portable options using simple battery packs (will run 10 hours on a single 9V battery). We're hoping this prize will help to light up their future outings.
Video Honorable Mention awards go to:
Nathan Arndt* for his great footage of the downwind leg of the Dillon Yacht Club Peak 1 Regatta during their Summer Sailstice celebration on Lake Dillon, CO (the highest elevation event on our World Map!).
Dave Bloch* for his creative video highlighting the many virtual events taking place over Summer Sailstice weekend in Second Life, including the world's largest virtual boat show, tall ships parade, pirate show, waterfront dances and more! Find out more about how you can sail virtually when you can't get out on actual water at Sailing.sl.
Tyton Zepp* for his video featuring the Second Life Coast Guard Day, complete with helo ops, rescue swimmer demonstrations, and the USCG tall ship.
*Click on the winner's names to be linked to their video!
Honorable mention winners will receive their choice of a one-year digital or print subscriptions to Latitudes & Attitudes magazine to keep sailing in their life all year long.
Restore-an-Old-Sailboat
We couldn't pick one winner for this category! So much hard work was evident in the pictures and descriptions that we wanted to acknowledge the dedication to returning these two vessels to sailing glory.
Hwin ... Jason Sigmunstad and his family of Fort Peck, MT spent almost a full year restoring an 80+ year old wooden sailing dinghy. Thery replaced the complete trunk and centerboard, did a whole lot of wood and epoxy work, sanding, priming, painting and ran new standing/running rigging, replaced most of the mismatched screws and hardware on the mast. They took her for her first sail below the Fort Peck Dam on the Missouri River.
Jason is the winner of a Tektite/TEKNA SOSeFLARE day/night audible USCG compliant flare kit with complimentary float plan app included to keep Hwin's crew safe on the water.
Keep Truckin' ... Dennis Schmalzel and his brother Doug found a 2000 Hunter 320 that had been deteriorating on a farm field in Carsonville, MI for at least five years. At Doug's house near Detroit they stripped, painted and cleaned about 200 lbs of bird nests and refurbished the entire boat and are currently sailing her on Lake St. Clair. Dennis also owns a Hunter 320 so they had a perfect model to figure out how to put Doug's boat together. They are planning a late July buddy boat trip!
Dennis wins a Weather Routing Inc. Individual Forecasting Package, including a written or verbal forecast, and a month of SeaWeather.net access. We hope they'll use this prize for future cruises on the brotherly Hunter 320's.
Thanks again to everyone who participated in SUMMER SAILSTICE 2025 and huge gratitude to our generous prize donors! Mark your calendars for Saturday, June 20, 2026 for the next Summer Sailstice and, in the meantime, keep sailing!
