Category: What’s on board…

To heck with all the 2007 “best of…” lists, let’s reminisce. It’s 1984, the 47’ sloop Civais has just joined the list of new builds at the Paul Luke yard in Boothbay, Maine, and she’s sporting about as spiffy an electronics package as I recall from the era…

Yup, check out the bigger image, it’s been snowing here again and this poor crew is just now getting ready to take the lovely Aeolian south for the charter season. Yipe! Apparently this was not exactly the plan…

Good day. My fourth METS show in six years (starts tomorrow), but the first with my (fairly) patient wife along, and the first day that I’ve gotten out on the Amsterdam canals or even seen much blue sky here (in November). We got a ticket for a Blue Boat tour with our B&B, and that turned out lucky too…

That’s an Argonaut Tflex-G615 under that extra layer of protection, just like the one I tested, and it’s connected to a down-below Mac Mini that’s running MacENC. This is on an “unsinkable” ETAP 37 belonging to Bob Etter, who…

Above is a laptop screen from the Wheelhouse II program which is part of the Raven pilot package I discussed back in June when I got a ride on Penobscot Pilot. Skip Strong grabbed the screen from a recording of the Nor’easter outbound trip he piloted that day, and it’s well worth seeing…

PMY’s Patrick Sciacca had quite a time testing this 3,600 hp Hatteras 60GT, at one point doing 48 mph in a serious seaway. He was also impressed with the 15” touch screen Northstar 8000i on center in the helm’s pop-up electronics console…

Darn, I was hoping to get a shot of Bruce Kessler in his wheelhouse departing the Camden Public Landing this morning, but got distracted by a contest idea (that you’ll find here this weekend)…

Despite indications that I only think about AIS, I do have some other subjects! A big one recently has been Lyman-Morse Boatbuilding. This morning I just finished up a PMY Sept. feature about the company’s woodworking department—now 50 crafts-people strong, and doing phenomenal work—and I’m researching an eventual electronics column about Electra, which began with an early June trail run. What a boat!…

6/28 I’m now ashore and able to upload this shot of Malcom Willard showing off a three-meal dolphin on a lake-like Atlantic ocean. It was taken on Tuesday, a few hundred miles south of the Gulf Stream. I didn’t manage to get the text below online until Wed. afternoon. Note that no electronics played a part in the fish’s demise:
Note to self: If I ever get to try this again—posting a Panbo entry from offshore with a sat phone—

That’s Skip Strong making his way down Nor’easter’s twisty pilot ladder, as seen from the bow of the Penobscot Pilot. Man, that move must get the adrenaline pumping, say, on a dark night with a big sea running. (Capt. Ryan told me that they can manage a ladder like this in up to about eight footers, sometimes getting the ship to turn toward the ladder and using the flatter turbulence created inside the turn). At any rate, Strong, who is a bit of a geek (and I mean that in a good way) has quite the electronics in that bag he’s toting…