Settling into Boston, with a few gizmos
The boat in the screenshot (bigger here) shows the location of my rented fifth floor apartment in Boston’s North End. It’s wonderfully close to the Harbor (and a lot of great Italian food), but does face in the opposite direction, which is probably why I’m not getting a lot of range from my test Si-Tex AIS receiver. The signals, also shown, have to bounce off the eight story building across the street to reach the antenna in my window. Also seen in this screen is the little-mentioned ability of Coastal Explorer 1.1 to download photo maps (and topos) from Terraserver USA and overlay them with variable transparency over charts (in this case an ENC). It’s a nicely executed “bonus feature”, but you do have to be online for it to work, though it does cache the images for later use. Of course, if you buy the Chart Navigator Pro version of CE you get all these photo maps on DVD anyway; but you can’t blend those with charts (maybe a feature in the works?). Showing just north of my apartment is the U.S.C.G.’s big Boston Station. I’m hoping to visit there and maybe get out on a CG vessel, and I’m looking for other similarly ‘productive’ ways to occupy these two months I have to be in Boston. Ideas anyone?
Do you know if Coastal Explorer or Chart Navigator will adopt automatic frequency switching for the Si-Tex/Nasa receiver? And do you have an email address to which you reply?
Eat Lobsters at Quincy Market?
Go to the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology and the Harvard Museum of Scientific Instruments
These are two of my favorite places in Boston.
Purchase a fishing rod and get in on the Haba striper blitz that will be in full swing in a few weeks.
Walk down Commercial St past the USCG base, right across the street from the park, see my old apt on the third floor (top). Those were the days!
Head over to the Mariner’s House for breakfast & a navigation class; say hi to Madeline and Vinnie.
Walk down to Rowes Wharf to grab a Cal 39 at BHSC, then Nantucket bound!