Hi, again,

When we'd last seen each other we'd just pulled into Long Island's
Thompson
Bay after landing a Barracuda. Following a lovely sundowner aboard a
friend's boat, populated by even more friends (who we knew from prior
anchorages) by the time we'd begged a ride there. Shortly after we got
back
to our boat, again via the courtesy of one of the guests aboard the
other
boat, Barry (the 'cuda) succumbed to the donation of his two large
filets.

Of course, we checked our mail and other internet interests before we
went
to bed, this being yet another place where we succeeded while others
were
frustrated. However, there are several places ashore where you can go
and
log on for the price of a beer or Coke, so it's not like other
cruisers are
locked out...

Long Island was named by some sailor who said he didn't want to leave,
but,
instead, stay a long time. However, it is, actually, a long island,
about
60 miles, in fact, very sparsely populated over its beautiful length.
Additionally, it was one of Columbus' stops - claimed to be the first
"New
World" landfall, whether truly so, or not, which gives it a bit of
even-more
special cachet in these beautiful waters.

Our first couple of days were spent relaxing and enjoying the peaceful
anchorage. Contrary to our fears generated by looking at the charts,
Thompson Bay, and, as you'll see later, the Salt Pond area of the
anchorage,
we found ample depth to accommodate our 7-1 draft. Well, technically,
we
don't really know our draft for sure, as the couple of times we've
done
measurements, the sea floor wasn't perfectly flat, so it was a best-
guess
extrapolation from the amount of room under the keel and the depth of
the
water at the waterline.

If we ever get to a really flat seabed, with low enough water to make
the
measurement more meaningful, we'll do a new measurement under the
keel, and
then drop the line at many places around the boat to get a more
accurate
reading. However, all the horror stories of how we couldn't possibly
"do"
the Bahamas in our deep draft boat are pure hooey. Generally speaking,
it
doesn't matter if you draw 3' or 8', if you push your envelope, so to
speak,
you'd touch from time to time. And, for sure, we've spoken to many
shoal
draft (under 4.5', generally speaking, is a "shoal draft" boat)
cruisers who
have touched, not only in the Bahamas, but elsewhere. The trick is, of
course, not to run headlong onto a really big flat space of rock which
normally would be dry at low tide! (Original readers, and those who
have
bothered to go to the yahoogroups link in my signature line and go to
the
beginning know that's what we did right out of the box...)

Anyway, despite the boat being built with a DWL (design water line) at
6'
over the bottom of the keel, we consider ourselves a 7' draft boat.
Indeed,
like many cruisers, including at least once before we purchased the
boat,
the waterline has been raised on Flying Pig. During our wreck refit/
rehab,
we covered our prior bootstripe with bottom paint, made a new "reveal
stripe" (a 1" section over the top of the bottom paint, and a new
bootstripe
(a contrasting color of wider size, in our case, 4" in Morgan Blue).
Despite that, the reveal stripe is stained from salt water critters,
and
when we next refit, we'll repaint and raise the bottom paint yet
again.

Which brings us to the title...

Cruising is boat repairs/maintenance in exotic locations... This stop
was
no exception, as we quickly developed a set of "1-2-3's" - our daily
maintenance and fix-em-up jobs which keep at least in time with, if
not
ahead of, the curve so we don't have to spend months in a yard to
remedy our
sloth.

My first chore was to fix whatever had befallen our wind indicator, as
it
suddenly showed dead - no direction, and no speed, along with no
number in
the speed LCD display. Out comes the multimeter, and I determined that
the
unit was getting power, so I went looking at that same connection
between
the mast base and the two display units we had. Long-time readers will
recall that it had received some soldering attention from our
electrician
friend on another boat when we were in Miami last winter. Sure enough,
there
were several broken solder joints, along with one pin on the 20-pin
connectors.

Ah, well, another day in paradise. Unsoldering the matching broken-pin
one,
and preparing to move it to a new location (there were several open
pins
available), another couple of joints failed. In the end, I wound up
doing
about half of the total connections again and, sure enough, the
displays
came to life. The display in the cockpit required alignment, as it had
wandered from its prior setting. As the direction indicator is servo
motor
driven, there's a pretty simple adjustment on the back of the unit
which
allowed us to mate up to the reading in the display at the navigation
station, and all was well, again, with that unit. We had another list
of
things we wanted to do, but first, we wanted to do some touring.

We'd spoken with some friends in Georgetown who had been to Long
Island just
before they headed north, and got some of the lay of the land and
recommendations. As we did in Marsh Harbour, we rented a car with
another
cruiser couple and went sightseeing. The lovely folks at Long Island
Breeze,
a resort with a dinghy dock, apartments, pool, laundry facilities and
showers, along with free internet, were kind enough to direct us to
some map
brochures and guide booklets, on the entryway table, and then sit down
with
us and point out the exact locations of some of the more notable
places to
see.

Not wanting this to turn into a travelogue, I'll try to just highlight
our
experience. With such a long island (we put just over 150 miles on the
car
in a full day), there's a lot of blank space in between attractions.
And,
since, particularly, due to Thompson Bay being near the top of the
island,
it would take a long time to reach the bottom, we started there.
That's
because, if we missed something we wanted to see, we'd not have to
drive all
the way down to the end to do it on the next leg.

We'd arranged with Fox Auto, one of many rental places on the island,
to
pick up our car at 1PM. That would allow us to stay out late if we
wanted
to, going again in the morning, and returning the car mid-day. That
worked
out well, in the end. All the way to the bottom, where we took our
lunches
to eat, was about 40 miles. We were rewarded with a beautiful beach,
nearly
isolated other than another couple who'd come for the same purpose
(lunch),
and nobody in sight for the couple of miles we hiked south on the
deserted
beach, picking up more shells than we could carry without using our
Crocks
(soft rubber/plastic shoes, if you've been out of touch, which seem
all the
rage these days) for buckets.

From there we constantly moved north. We'd been alerted to a fixture
on the
island, Goat Pond Bar, run by the same woman who opened it in 1946,
but it
was closed, so we worked our way up to Clarence Town, a shipping and
marina
center with a nice anchorage for those coming from the "ocean" side.
Every
few miles was punctuated by another sign announcing another village,
and we
were surprised to see that several had their own police departments.
I'm
not sure what they police, as from everything we've heard, crime is
virtually nonexistent on the island.

After a quick tour of the waterfront area, we visited two churches
constructed by Father Jerome, an architect in his earlier life, and
built
before he did his retirement home, the Hermitage, on Cat Island. These
churches, unlike his home, were built to more conventional scale (he
was a
very short man and his home reflected his stature). One of them had
two
spires, with ladder-type staircases to the top. The view from there is
stunning, and worth the very close quarters and nearly vertical climb.
In
the same town there was a very curious home, fenced, with "Private,
Keep
Out" signs posted. It looked more like a museum or perhaps another
multi-ethnic church, but it, too, was impressive.

Everywhere on the island is spotlessly clean, including the beaches,
which
were devoid of the typical debris from ships and shipwrecks. It's
obvious
that the islanders take great pride in their home, because all that
stuff
had to be hauled off by someone...

The highlight of the afternoon was Deans Blue Hole, the deepest blue
hole in
the world, at 660 feet deep. Unlike the blue hole in Marsh Harbour,
however, this one was all salt water, and right at the edge of the
land.
It's the home of free diving championships, where someone takes a
really
deep breath, and swims as deeply as he or she can before coming back
to the
surface. Just before we left, practices for the next championship were
being held there. However, our visit was before then, and we eagerly
went
in the water.

It's set in a very unusual way, with cliffs on the land side (the
better for
high-diving displays), circling around for about half its perimeter,
with
the rest sand. On the sea side, it's totally the flats - not more than
knee
deep, for hundreds of yards. However, walk toward the blue hole, and
eventually the sand starts to drop off relatively sharply, making it
nearly
impossible to stop sliding toward the deep.

We'd been warned, so to speak, to bring along our snorkeling gear,
but, much
to my chagrin after getting in, our bag we'd gotten as a promotion
from
Delta for signing up for Amex cards wouldn't hold our flippers, so we
left
them on the boat. I'd sorely wished for them and my weights which give
me
nearly neutral buoyancy, because the ledge of the coral and limestone
was
deep enough (about 20') that without them, I couldn't get down to
experience
the vertical walls of the hole. At that, it was an awe-inspiring
experience.

As the day was getting late, we missed the caves and the museum on the
way
back up, but we did find the famous Max' bar and grill, where we had
dinner
shortly before sunset. As it was over 20 miles back to where we'd left
our
dinghies, we set out for home, deciding to meet the next morning early
and
head north. If there was time, we'd come back for the caves and
museum,
both highly recommended by other cruisers who'd done them.

And, lest one believe that you have to rent a car to see the island,
the
Bahamas are still very hitch hiker friendly. We heard from some other
cruisers who had chosen that way of exploration that the locals will
often
clue you into spots not noted on any of the tourist materials, so,
should
you find yourself here (or anywhere other than, perhaps, Nassau),
don't
hesitate to just stick out your thumb. Here, as everywhere else we've
been,
cruisers are more than welcomed, and folks go out of their way to help
you.
Case in point was my time last year in Georgetown, where I hitch hiked
to
the airport, 20 miles out, twice, in the course of sending and
retrieving my
computer for an upgrade...

Anyway, our driver dropped us at our dinghies, 1.6 miles from where he
left
the car, which was right next to a beach where we'd had our first
bonfire/happy hour shortly after we arrived there. We met up there for
the
ride back to our boats anchored nearby, returned to our respective
boats,
and went to sleep, invigorated and impressed with what we'd seen so
far.

Morning broke, and we headed north. There were a couple of diving
spots
noted on our materials, one famous for all the Eagle Rays, but after
going
rather a long way to get to the first, we found that the surf was
crashing
onto the very sharp rocks where we'd have to get in. That, plus the
breaking
waves over the reefs dissuaded us from swimming that day! However, as
one
of them was very close to the Stella Maris resort, we peeked in there
to see
what it was like.

It's huge, spread out over hundreds of acres, and obviously host to
many
business meetings, as we saw lots of folks looking like they were
doing just
that. The very helpful gal at the reception desk provided us with a
large-scale map of the far north end of the island, and we set out,
again,
for more explorations.

The further north we went, the more sparse it got, but there was
another
resort we wanted to explore, along with another snorkeling spot,
which, due
to its being on the lee side of the island, had more promise. The road
down
to the end of Cape Santa Maria was long and bumpy, but we never did
find the
snorkeling spot we'd wanted to. However, the resort was impressive,
including several free-standing homes which had been built on the road
into
it.

As the day was proceeding rapidly, and we were already nearly there,
we
elected to go to the Columbus Monument at the northern tip of the
island.
The road is horrible, and according to a cruiser at a happy hour on
the
beach a couple of days ago, was even closed for a while, but we made
it down
there. On the way, we saw a truck who'd passed us on the other
long-and-horrible road down the cape. They'd had several fly fishing
rods
lashed over the hood, and, sure enough, we saw them out flats-fishing,
presumably for bonefish, the taking of which is renowned in these
parts.

Continuing until we got to the base of the monument, we also saw
another
familiar vehicle and faces, some folks who'd been at the Blue Hole
with us
the previous day. They were here for the lobstering possible at the
base of
the hill on which the monument sat. I learned why, after I made the
climb...

The climb up is described as "arduous" but it didn't compare to, say,
hiking
to the top of Chitzen Itza, in Mexico, but it did have a chain to hang
on to
if you felt you needed it. I sort of galloped up there on the smooth-
rock
side, but on the way down, concerned for some slippage of the loose
stones
on the steep hill, I did let the chain slide through my hand.

Once to the top, I admired the monument, and the view, but the real
treat
was to follow a little path and step over the warning ropes to go to
the
edge of a sheer cliff overlooking a cutout in the limestone. Waves
crashed
into the channel cut into the rock, ending at a cave, where it boomed
back
out again. However, on the far side of that channel, separated by a
narrow,
sharp, ridge, was where the lobstering was. To the ocean side, there
was a
large reef just under the breaking waves. Those waves didn't make it
into
the large area of reefs - covering the cove - where I could well
believe
that many lobster might have been hiding.

So far, we have yet to see more than one lobster, and that one was in
a
protected area last year. The lobster season ended yesterday in the
Bahamas, so we'll not be able to take any for a few months. However,
friends of ours returning from our next area of exploration reported a
freezer full after a couple of weeks. We'll have more to say about
those
areas in a bit and in future logs, but before we leave the Bahamas, we
hope
to be experienced lobster hunters :{))

After making our way back down the hill and out the tortuous road, it
was
late enough that we passed on getting lunch in the area, and instead
hurried
back to turn in the car on a timely basis. Our driver (we've given up
cars,
so have no insurance to fall back on, so our other couple were the
"responsible party" for our excursion) dropped us at another landmark,
Thompson Bay Resort, home of Trifena, the owner lauded for her special
cooking and atmosphere there.

While he was taking the car back, soon to be delivered back there by
the
rental company, we wandered in to see what it was like, neither of us
having
been here before. Trifena doesn't cook other than by schedule, and,
sometimes, based on what she has available. Recall that everywhere in
the
Bahamas requires everything to be brought in, sometimes by circuitous
route
of air, boat, small boat, car or golf cart, and then hand-carried to
the
establishment. She intially said she wasn't open, but came out nearly
immediately, asking if we'd be ok with wings, conch, grouper and the
Bahamian specialty of Mac'n'Cheese (which isn't at all like most of us
are
accustomed to, but instead a baked concoction which is cut into
rectangular
pieces a couple of inches tall, totally firm, rather than the
spoonfuls
typical of American restaurants), along with a lobster salad. Well,
Duh!
Of course!

So, she set to cooking while we explored the restaurant, including her
amazing shell displays. After we'd enjoyed the veritable feast (which
another three diners also got shortly after we'd started - good thing
she
decided to open!), I drooled over a large triton (or, maybe a whelk)
shell
which I'd seen, in Georgetown, made into a horn of the same ilk as a
conch
horn - but much more decorative and unusual. Because it had a chip out
of
the pointy end, as well as one unnoticed by me until later, on the
foot, I
was able to get it at a bargain.

As it was still afternoon, I wasted no time in hurrying back to the
boat,
getting out my grinder and metal cutting blade and, sitting on the
platform
at the back of the boat, quickly cut off the end to the size
appropriate to
make a mouthpiece. Inside to the workbench, I got out the Dremel tool
with
a carbide tip and removed the interior structure to allow it to be
smooth
inside as well as at the rim. The moment of truth came as I put it to
my
lips and sought out the resonant frequency for the shell. I was
rewarded
with a rich bariton sound, and the upper harmonic of a trumpet. Thus
armed,
I now can take part in the nightly ritual of Bahamian cruisers of
saluting
the sunset with a horn made from a shell :{))

Well, as the title suggests, there was still work to do, including
some
fairly urgent stuff. You'll recall that my KISS wind generator took
flight
in Marsh Harbour. While I was able to salvage the most important
parts, I'm
still missing a new housing and various other small parts needed to
start
over on a new installation. One of the tasks was to determine whether
the
bearings were suitable for re-use. To do that I basically had to
disassemble the bearings, and, once done, if satisfied with their
state,
regrease them. While it could be done on the shaft, doing it off and
in my
hand would be a great deal easier. So, I visited a fellow cruiser and
borrowed a special tool which allowed me to remove them. In fact, they
were
ok, and, once regreased, were back on the spindle from which they
came.

I sorely miss having had that for the last couple of months, as the
wind has
been pretty consistent. Our solar panels have done a great job of
keeping
our batteries topped up during the day, but we've had to run our Honda
eu2000i generator to replace the 100-300 amp hours per day that the
KISS
would have been producing in this time. However, all in due time. The
parts are on the way to George Town, where, when we return there, I'll
reinstall them and the unit.

Oh, ya... The Honda... Salt air and constant vibration aren't very
kind to
the rubber feet which help isolate the noise from whatever surface you
put
it on, and two of the 4 had failed. When I did my on-radio seminar on
replacing the pull cord on these machines (a design error which causes
nearly all of the regularly used machines to break the pull cord
eventually), I also covered some tweaks for the machine. One of them
suggested that when it was apart, you apply stuck-stuff relieving
juice
(PBBlaster, e.g.) to all the interior bolt ends for the feet to make
it
easier for the day when you have to change them. Having taken my own
suggestion, after about a week of soaking and vibrating, the bolts
did,
indeed, come out, and I put in my new feet I'd ordered during the
great rush
over the winter visit to the states. No more shielding wood under the
raw
bolts, I also was able to use the closed-cell foam someone gave me
after
that on-air seminar, and she's now a gentle purr when running. Once
the
KISS is installed, we may well not have to run it at all, a wonderful
thought.

The bearings and the Honda feet were the most critical after I'd
finished
the wind indicator repair, but much still awaited us. Our Sea Dog
pelican
hooks for our gates (the open parts in the guard rails around the
boat) were
not secure, not designed, it turns out, for that application,
frequently
opening due to a passing control line or other jarring. Finding the
sort of
pelican hooks (go through a hole, and back onto itself, thus looking
like a
pelican with his beak down) which could be used on a chain was
challenging,
but I finally worked with a company to provide turnbuckle ends which
had the
same threads as their pelican hooks. Those are on the way as I type,
and, a
bonus, very little more than the Sea Dog versions. That's made even
more
urgent by the departure, one by dropping, and one by force, of two of
the 6
we have (upper and lower gates for three entries), in both cases
caused by
missing security rings on a pin which held it in place, along with the
chain. So, we'll have to buy some more stainless steel chain, as
well...

However, one of the chief targets of our anchorage was the charted
depths
presumed to allow us to settle to the bottom at low tide, the better
to have
the boat stand still while I scrubbed the bottom. In the time we've
spent
in fecund waters, nearly a year counting our refit in Saint Simons
Island
last summer, the fall and early winter in Marsh Harbour, and to a
lesser
extent, in St. Augustine's harbor before coming to the Bahamas, we'd
developed a meadow under our boat.

Fortunately, unlike some boats, it wasn't a reef, as it was nearly all
very
light grassy stuff, but there sure was a lot of it. After determining
that
the place we first anchored, where the chart showed "only" 7 feet at
low
tide, we moved quite a bit more north, toward the hook which provides
the
shelter in Thompson Bay. After a couple of hours spent chasing, or
running
away from, the boat, as the winds pushed her around, exhausting me
without
much progress, we picked up the hook and moved a half-mile south.

The charts all show this as having, optimistically, 6 feet, more like
4 or
5, but we motored slowly at close to a low tide for as much as we
dared,
fearing we'd run into some ledge (all sand, but, none the less, it was
shown
as WAY too shallow for us here), finally dropping the hook opposite
what
looked like something ET might have crash-landed in. Despite our
persistence
in moving further and further into shallow water, we didn't touch, let
alone
go aground, until nearly the full moon, when the tidal range is its
largest.

As the low tide wasn't much use to me if I couldn't see, however, I
had to
go during the middle of the day during mid-tide, when the range was
smaller, meaning that the keel touched only briefly. However, our
location
was well protected, and the boat's movement wasn't so much as to wear
me
out. Plus, it did actually touch, therefore not move, for a brief
period of
time. So, over the course of 4 days, I managed to clean every
underwater
inch of our boat.

As I mentioned, it was more like a meadow than a reef, so most of it
yielded
fairly readily to a long-handled deck brush. Weighted down with extra
weights, which allowed me to stand or kneel on the bottom and not
float up,
and protected by my wetsuit from becoming chilled, I was able to stay
under
for several hours each time. What small barnacles there were, few and
far
between, yielded readily to the plastic back of the brush.

Our bottom paint is designed to slough off, allowing the copper
component,
the thing which discourages stuff from growing on it, to renew. So, in
my
scrubbing, I was also creating clouds of bottom paint which would have
otherwise very slowly worn off while we were under way. When we
painted our
bottom, we put several coats on in what we called our marker color,
with a
like number of coats of the visible color. With all our scrubbing, our
marker color is starting to show in many places.

That's a heads-up for an upcoming bottom job. The first layer has
lasted us
3 years, so we're confident that job won't have to be done
immediately, but
it does serve as a warning. While I was underneath polishing, Lydia
was on
top, also polishing. Stainless steel, in a marine environment, unless
it's
very unusual or perhaps has chrome instead of nickel mixed in, is
merely
stains-less. Rust spots will still show, and, as those who've been
with us
from the beginning know, in particular, I'm unhappy with our arch
builder,
on many levels. The stainless there requires much more work than our
railings, for example, which I fabricated myself.

Much worse, however, was that during the polishing process, Lydia
uncovered
a broken weld on the top section of the arch. It's just one of the
stiffening members, on which we usually hang ropes, but if that one
failed,
others might be close behind. As unhappy as I have been with the
builder,
I've considered, but only briefly, for reasons to be seen shortly,
removing
it and having modifications done to stiffen it up. This weld failure,
however, brought it to a head.

My reluctance to remove and remodel the arch is chiefly because I'd
have to
unwire all the stuff which is up there, a huge task involving tearing
apart
much of the interior of the boat, or, perhaps, not at all my normal
anal way
of approaching such stuff, cutting them all and then splicing or doing
junction blocks for reconnection after the work was done. The weld
break
was on one of the legs with most of the wires running down it. No way
to
weld it without running the risk of damaging them, so I'd have to
unwire it,
anyway.

That led to thoughts of a total remodel, or, perhaps, even starting
over, on
the arch. Doing it in the boonies, where we are, would be chancy at
best,
and doing it in the States, never mind the thought of having to go
back
there, anyway, would be VERY expensive. However, one of our
sisterships has
had multiple refits in Cartagena, some of which included stainless
steel
work. He'd been very satisfied with the end result, and it was very
economical, to boot.

So, let's have a look at his pictures, which I have not only in my
hard
drive, but in some cases, can be seen in the Morgan 46 info gallery in
my
overall gallery (see the link in the signature). Hm. His hard top
looks
pretty good, too, and review of his pictures showed that it must have
been
done there as well, because when he started, it was a bimini over the
cockpit.

Many emails later, I had the full skinny on his rehabs there. Prices
were
astoundingly low, albeit with materials being substantially more
expensive,
to wit: his hard top, with full enclosure and VERY stout support
(designed
to be able to walk on it), cost 40% of the bimini and enclosure which
came
with our boat, new at the time, 6 years ago. A day's skilled labor was
at
the same rate as an hour of a helper during our refit, so expensive
materials' costs were quickly assuaged by the relatively tiny.cost of
fabrication.

Well... That put a very different perspective on our plans. As it
stands
now, we expect to do our Bahamas thing as planned, but make our way to
Columbia very soon, perhaps in just over a year. There we'll redo the
bottom paint, have a hard top bimini and enclosure done (one of our
long-term goals, anyway), and see about either rebuilding or starting
over
with our arch. We're very excited about the thought, particularly
since
I've been angry about my arch from the first time I set foot on it
after it
was installed, and with the exciting thought of a hard top bimini and
enclosure which will allow us to add much more solar power to our
setup
adding impetus, we can't wait.

Our electrical installer, svhotwire.com, who did the KISS and Solar
installations, in his forethought, has provided us with a controller
capable
of handling 60 amps of solar power to the battery. As we see as much
as 25
amps with the setup we have now, our new hardtop will make that an
easy
goal. A typical day in the tropics with our added capacity may well
produce
several hundred amp-hours a day of battery replenishment. Once in the
trades, our KISS wind generator will typically add another 100-500 amp-
hours
per day, and we should easily be free of running the Honda for
anything
other than heavy duty power tools, or during an extended no-wind, all-
rain,
period. In fact, we may be forced to use the microwave instead of the
propane, watch movies, run both computers, and otherwise behave like
decadent powerboaters in order to avoid overcharging our batteries :
{))

So, with slick bottom, and shiny stainless, set off by Lydia's further
working on all the topsides teak, we look great, and should go a great
deal
faster through the water. So, of course, we're about to head to where
there's nobody to look at it :{)) We're leaving tomorrow for the
Jumentos
and Ragged Island (http://www.tageo.com/index-e-bf-v-18-d-
m2198055.htm),
where, except for one very small settlement on the bottom island,
there
isn't a soul to be seen other than someone else on a boat.

We've been looking forward to visiting this area ever since we
encountered a
cruiser last year in Georgetown who reported, due to the totally
available
fishing, that he'd spent only $500 for the entire winter. Other of our
friends report that trolling behind your dinghy is about as hard as it
gets
to catch fish, and, since I'm entirely comfortable with diving,
picking up
conch will be easy. The only thing we'll miss is the lobster. Ah,
well,
early down here on the way south next fall, and we'll have that, too.
And,
we're looking forward to the isolation and the great shelling and
Lydia's
obsession with finding both hamburger and heart beans, the better to
make
more jewelry, both of which are said to be easily found, unlike her so-
far
experience of MAYBE finding one or two. One of our friends brought
back
more than 300 heart beans and more than 100 hamburger beans from a
couple of
weeks there, so, it's hopeful. But, we'll be in the boondocks, for
sure.

Accordingly, we'll also be out of range for any internet connectivity.
We
have to confess to having been spoiled in the last many months, never
very
far from our email and even voice communications with our family and
friends
ashore and afloat. However, for the next couple to three or more
weeks,
we'll be totally unavailable other than on Single Side Band or Ham
radio
links.

Thus, while there may be comments or responses to this post, we'll not
see
them for quite some time. Therefore, you're not being ignored if I
don't
respond :{)) While we're gone, you'll be able to track our progress
when
we're not at anchor by clicking on tinyurl.com/FlyingPigSpot, our SPOT
personal gps transmitter page which allows you to see up to a week's
worth
of our travels. Those of you on my log list directly will get updates
forwarded through that list from our Ham email link to my son; if
you're not
on the list and would like to be, you can join by clicking the
yahoogroup
link below.

Until next time, Stay Tuned

L8R

Skip and Crew

Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
and/or http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog

"You are never given a wish without also being given the power to
make it come true. You may have to work for it however."
(and)
"There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in
its hand
(Richard Bach)