Posts In April 30, 2017
Boat range in ocean conditions is remarkably hard to predict but it’s just about guaranteed that your real range is far shorter than estimates or even careful measurement if it wasn’t done in real ocean conditions. Ocean swell slows boats remarkably. We had no idea how much impact this would have when we first got…
With a big push from the Gulf Stream and an evolving good weather forecast, an overnight run from Thunderbolt, Georgia turned into a three-night run to Cape May, New Jersey and eventually a four-night run directly to Newport, RI. Trip highlights from March 25th through 29th, 2017 follow. Click any image for a larger view,…
In January of this year, while walking in St. Marys, Georgia, we heard a drone and went to check it out. What really caught our interest here was that the person with the controls wasn’t even looking at the drone. It was a DJI Mavic Pro that had some really impressive features, including the ability…
We’d never heard of Thunderbolt, Georgia, nor the superyacht yard there, until we were referred to Ian Anderson, an electronics installer at local Mackay Communications. Following an overnight run from Halifax Harbor, we spent three busy but enjoyable days at Thunderbolt Marine while we upgraded our KVH V7 mini-VSAT satellite data system to the latest…
Besides a fire at sea, few things are more frightening for an ocean-crossing vessel than uncontrolled, and potentially undetected, water ingress. Safety Digest, published by the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) of the British Department of Transport (www.maib.gov.uk), often contains reports of small boats sinking in minutes. Many might have been saved had their captains…
During our stay in Belfast, Maine, Ben Ellison dropped drove up from nearby Camden to visit. Ben is the editor and owner of the Panbo marine electronics blog. If you haven’t spent time on the Panbo blog and you care about marine electronics, you really should. Ben covers most gear available, takes the time to dig…
Halifax Harbor Marina is among the closest marinas to Daytona International Speedway, which is the main reason we picked it. But we were so happy with our berth there that we extended our four-week stay to six weeks almost immediately upon arrival. It was an excellent base to attend the racing at Volusia and Daytona,…
Barely have the Daytona 500 crowds dissipated when Daytona Beach hosts the 76th annual Bike Week. The 10-day motorcycle event originated in 1937 and draws an estimated 500,000 people. From the marina we’d been hearing motorcycles pass all week, and after a morning of running errands with a rental car, we spent the rest of…
While in Florida earlier this year, we considered a variety of routes for our upcoming Atlantic passage. Some of the possibilities are shown in the screenshot above (click image for larger view). The waypoint east of South Carolina is Bermuda, and the one labeled Terceira Sao Miguel is the Azores. The other waypoints are mostly…
We bought a four-day package for the Daytona 500 that included the Can-Am Duel on Thursday night, the NASCAR truck race on Friday night, the Xfinity Series race on Saturday and of course, the Daytona 500 on Sunday. We had great time watching the races, and being at the Daytona 500 was super-exciting. But a…
Most John Deere engines are scheduled to have the vibration damper replaced at 5 years or 4,500 hours. However, our Deere 6068AFM75 uses a viscous coupling with an 8,000-hour replacement interval so we went nearly 7 years before needing to make a change. We crossed 8,000 hours as we headed into Boston early last year,…
We’d come to Daytona primarily to attend the Daytona 500, but that’s not the only major racing event in the area in February. Nearby Volusia Motor Speedway was hosting the season opener for the World of Outlaws Sprint Car racing, “The Greatest Show on Dirt!”. The last dirt track racing we saw was in August…
From Daytona Beach we made a road trip south to Miami for a couple of days to check out the Miami boat shows. While there we spent some time at sea on FBP 781 Cochise, toured the new Ranger Tug R-29 CB, and also checked out Nordhavn 92 Rest Assured. Trip highlights from Feb 15th…
We initially were planning to run offshore from St. Augustine to Daytona Beach, but decided to take the ICW for a couple of reasons. The nearest inlet to Daytona Beach is about 14 miles south of the city at Ponce de Leon Inlet and it looked like it might be a challenging entry. The breakwater…
“The first this, the oldest that” begins Lonely Planet’s description of St. Augustine. The town the Spanish founded in 1565 retains dozens of historical buildings ranging as far back as the Spanish era and now is a popular tourist destination. We spent two night anchored off town, enjoying the sights from the water and ashore….
Cumberland Island is Georgia’s southernmost barrier island and is a popular destination full of hiking trails and dramatic scenery. In the 1880s, Thomas M. Carnegie, the brother of steel magnate Andrew Carnegie, and his wife Lucy built Dungeness, a 59-room Scottish castle on the island’s southern tip. Fire later destroyed the mansion, and the Dungeness…
Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay is the the east coast home to the US Navy’s Ohio-class nuclear submarines. Nearby St. Marys has a museum packed with submarine memorabilia and even a working periscope. The attractive town also is the gateway to the popular Cumberland Island National Seashore. Following a half-day run from Brunswick, Georgia we…
We got another chance to see a Metal Shark boat in action during a routine Coast Guard inspection on the way to Brunswick, Georgia. We were trying to reach Brunswick Landing Marina to fuel before they closed for the day, so would have preferred not to have been boarded, but the Coast Guard officers were…