🔒 Captain's Locker — Free Sailing Resources
⚠ Important — All files on this page belong to James Evanson / BetheCaptain.com.
Every PDF, document, checklist, and case study listed below was created by James Evanson and is hosted on his website at bethecaptain.com. We are linking directly to his files on his servers. We do not host, copy, modify, or redistribute any of his work. SailboatsUSA.com takes no credit for any of these resources. If you find these files valuable — and you will — please visit James's site directly, support his work, and tell other sailors about him.
Every PDF, document, checklist, and case study listed below was created by James Evanson and is hosted on his website at bethecaptain.com. We are linking directly to his files on his servers. We do not host, copy, modify, or redistribute any of his work. SailboatsUSA.com takes no credit for any of these resources. If you find these files valuable — and you will — please visit James's site directly, support his work, and tell other sailors about him.
Our editorial opinion: The Captain's Locker is one of the finest free collections
of practical sailing documents available anywhere on the internet. James Evanson has clearly
spent enormous time — and drawn on real experience at sea — to produce materials that are
professional in quality, immediately usable, and designed for sailors who are serious about
their responsibilities as captain. Whether you are a coastal daysailor or planning an offshore
passage, these documents belong in your nav station folder and your crew briefing kit.
Download them all. Print the ones that matter. They could save a life.
Jump to: Core Tools | Checklists & Guides | Watch Schedules | Case Studies | Visit BetheCaptain.com
📋 Core Tools — Documents Every Captain Needs
These are the working documents of a real captain — the forms, letters, and templates James Evanson actually uses before and during passages. Professional, legally-aware, and ready to print. All files by James Evanson / BetheCaptain.com.
🚨 Safety Document — PDF
Safety Briefing Template
Emergency roles, gear use, and abandon-ship flow in one printable document.
James designed this to be briefed, signed by crew, and kept accessible at the nav station.
This is the kind of document that professional delivery captains and charter skippers use —
and that every serious recreational sailor should use too. Print it. Brief it. Sign it.
Every time, with every crew.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download PDF
📧 Crew Document — PDF
Crew Welcome Letter
Expectations, packing list, costs, and duties — send this to incoming crew before they
step aboard. Sets the right tone from the start, avoids misunderstandings, and ensures
everyone arrives prepared. A must-have for any captain taking on new crew, whether friends,
family, or experienced sailors joining for a passage.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download PDF
🧾 Immigration Document — JPG
Captain's Entry Letter
Official crew letter for immigration authorities when crew is joining your vessel in a
foreign port. Anyone who has cleared customs in the Caribbean, Mexico, or Central America
knows how important a proper captain's letter is. James provides a solid template that
covers the essential information port officials expect to see.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download Image
⚖️ Legal Document — PDF
Vessel Delivery Waiver
Owner acknowledgment covering seaworthiness, insurance, and liability for vessel
deliveries. If you do deliveries — or hire someone to deliver your boat — this document
protects both parties by establishing clear expectations and acknowledging known conditions
before the trip begins. James clearly drew on real experience with delivery work to produce this.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download PDF
📜 Legal Document — PDF
Affidavit to Use Vessel
Owner authorization for temporary use of the vessel — essential for deliveries and port
clearance when the registered owner is not aboard. Many harbormasters and port officials
in foreign countries require written owner authorization. This document provides a
professional, legally structured template for exactly that situation.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download PDF
⌚ Watch Schedules — Tested Offshore Rotations
Watch schedules are one of the most underestimated elements of a successful offshore passage. A poorly planned rotation leads to chronic sleep deprivation, frayed crew relationships, and poor decision-making when it matters most. James Evanson has done the work of testing and refining these rotations so you don't have to learn the hard way. All files by James Evanson / BetheCaptain.com.
Why watch schedules matter: Every experienced offshore sailor has an opinion on watch
scheduling — 3-on/3-off, Swedish watches, the "Mother Watch" system. What James provides are
tested, practical rotations scaled to actual crew sizes that real people sail with. These aren't
theoretical — they reflect the reality of managing tired humans on a moving vessel over multiple days.
Choose your crew size and download the schedule before you leave the dock.
Select your crew size — download the matching schedule:
👥 2-Person Watch Schedule
👥 3-Person Watch Schedule
👥 4-Person Watch Schedule
👥 6-Person Watch Schedule
ℹ️ Watch schedules link to James's Captain's Locker page at BetheCaptain.com where crew-size-specific PDFs are available for direct download.
✅ Checklists & Guides
These are the documents that should live at the nav station, in the ditch bag, and on the refrigerator aboard every serious cruising boat. James Evanson created these for sailors who understand that checklists aren't an insult to experience — they are what experienced sailors use. All files by James Evanson / BetheCaptain.com.
🚨 Safety Checklist — JPG (Print-Ready)
Abandonment Checklist
One-page checklist for abandoning ship. James recommends keeping a copy at the nav station
and one in the ditch bag — and we agree completely. In a real emergency, memory fails.
A laminated card does not. This checklist covers what to grab and what to do in the critical
minutes before you leave your vessel. Print it. Laminate it. Know where it is.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download & Print
📋 Departure Document — PDF
Departure Checklist
30-day countdown, dockside procedures, and pre-departure systems tests — all in one
comprehensive document. The preparation phase before a passage is when most problems
can still be caught and fixed. James's departure checklist reflects the kind of
disciplined pre-departure routine that experienced offshore skippers use as standard
practice. Invaluable for anyone planning a coastal cruise or offshore passage.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download PDF
📖 Mini eBook — PDF
Sailing with Kids
Practical wisdom for cruising families — safety, schooling, and daily routines afloat.
Taking children sailing, especially offshore, raises questions that most sailing books
don't address honestly. James does. This mini eBook is the kind of frank, experienced
advice that a cruising family with kids genuinely needs: not just "it's wonderful!"
but the real logistics, safety considerations, and hard-won lessons.
Created by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com
⬇ Download PDF
📓 Case Studies — Real Incidents, Real Lessons
This is where James Evanson's work truly shines above almost anything else freely available to sailors. These are not hypothetical scenarios from a textbook. These are real boats, real crews, and real emergencies — documented and analyzed with the honesty and candor that only someone who has actually been out there can provide. All files by James Evanson / BetheCaptain.com.
Why case studies matter more than most people realize: The sailing community
historically learned from accidents through formal Coast Guard reports and Lloyd's of London
analysis — documents written by lawyers and investigators for other lawyers and investigators.
What James Evanson has done with these case studies is something different and far more
valuable: he has written them the way a trusted, experienced captain would explain an incident
to a fellow sailor over the chart table. Honest. Direct. Actionable. The lessons in these
documents are the kind you can only get from someone who has seen things go wrong at sea and
taken the time to think carefully about why — and what to do differently. Read both.
Read them before your next passage.
🚧 Case Study — PDF
S/V Escape — Lessons Learned
What failed, what worked, and what James Evanson carries into every passage after the
experience aboard S/V Escape. This is a first-person account of a real offshore incident —
the kind of document that makes you think hard about your own systems, your own crew
briefings, and your own go/no-go decision-making. The lessons drawn here are practical,
specific, and immediately applicable to any offshore sailor.
Written by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com — Real incident, real lessons
⬇ Download Case Study
🔥 Case Study — PDF
S/V Theros — Battery Fire at Sea
A lithium battery retrofit gone wrong: a fire at sea and the chain of decisions that
followed. This case study is essential reading for the entire sailing community right now —
at a moment when lithium battery retrofits are becoming common on cruising boats, and when
most sailors are making those decisions without fully understanding the fire risk profile
of LiFePO4 and other lithium chemistries. James documents exactly what happened on S/V Theros,
what warning signs were missed, and what you need to know before you put lithium batteries
in your boat. This document may be the most important thing in the Captain's Locker.
Written by James Evanson — BetheCaptain.com — Real incident, real consequences
⬇ Download Case Study
Note on the S/V Theros case study: If you have lithium batteries aboard,
or are considering a lithium retrofit, this is required reading before you make any decisions.
Boat fires are the single most feared event at sea — they are fast, they are deadly, and
lithium chemistry changes the risk profile in ways many sailors do not understand.
James Evanson has done the community an enormous service by documenting this incident in detail.
See also our Batteries page for lithium safety resources.
🌐 Visit BetheCaptain.com — Support James Evanson's Work
James Evanson built Be the Captain to help sailors become genuinely better captains —
not just more confident, but more competent, more prepared, and more responsible for
the safety of everyone aboard. The Captain's Locker represents only a portion of what
James has created. His full website contains courses, articles, and resources
that go well beyond what is listed here. If the documents on this page have
been useful to you, the best thing you can do is visit his site, explore his work,
and support what he is building for the sailing community.
Sailboats USA editorial note: We feature James Evanson's Captain's Locker
because we believe it is genuinely one of the best free sailing resources on the internet —
full stop. We have no financial relationship with James Evanson or BetheCaptain.com.
We feature his work because it deserves to be seen by every American sailboat owner.
All files belong entirely to James Evanson. All credit belongs to him. All questions
about the content should be directed to him at bethecaptain.com.