Sailors report in Latitude 38's "Tsunami Devastates American Samoa"

The September 30 2009 'Lectronic Latitude has a very interesting post Tsunami Devastates American Samoa concerning the 8.0-magnitude earthquake.

Latitude 38 has reports from various sailors in the area:

• Australian singlehander Nick Jaffe of the Contessa 26 Constellation, 
• John Neal and Amanda Swan-Neal of the Port Townsend-based Hallberg Rassey 46 Mahina Tiare, 
• Eric and Emmy Willbur of the Pt. Richmond-based Flying Dutchman 37 Nataraja, 
• David Tyler and Fran Flutter of the UK-based Tystie, 
• Kirk, Catherine, and Stuart McGeorge aboard the USVI-based Hylas 47 Gallivanter.

One "good" thing is that it happened in daylight. The earthquake was at 6:48am local time.

I just started following @WWWayne on Twitter as he is Tweeting from his boat LTY in Pago Pago. Says he'll write up details with pictures soon on his blog http://learnativity.typepad.com but I expect he's pretty busy with other things right now.

Yak Throw Bag Safety Notice - At the end of your rope?

Wow, this could cause a BIG disappointment... Man overboard catches the rope and is happy until the rope parts... bummer!

Safety equipment manufacturer, Crewsaver, has identified a potential safety issue with a small number of its Yak Throw Lines sold between May 2009 and September 2009.

It seems that some of the lines are not one piece of rope but have a join in them which can fail.

Visit the Crewsaver website and read the Yak Throw Bag Safety Notice for more information.

If you have one of these, please take a few minutes and check it out.

DeWalt Cordless Jig Saw on sale at Amazon

We LOVE DeWalt cordless power tools.

This morning Amazon.com sent us an email announcing 50% off on certain power tools.  The DeWALT DC330K Heavy-Duty 18-Volt Ni-Cad Cordless Top Handle Jig Saw Kit was one of them.

Wow, the Jig Saw!

This is a tool I've been wanting for quite some time and today's price is only $231.25 with free shipping. Unfortunately, it would be too heavy to have it shipped to St. Maarten via our Florida mail service as we are charged $3/pound plus whatever else they deem fit to tack on onto the price of shipping :) and Amazon will not ship this to the US Virgin Islands (only baby items, books, DVDs, music, software, toys, VHS videos, & video games).

Another item they listed is the Skil 2352-01 3.6-Volt Lithium-Ion Multi-Cutter. This tool looks like it could really come in handy for certain lightweight applications, although we already have a DeWalt cordless circular saw (albeit larger & more powerful) that works great.  But, if nothing else, it would be a great pizza slicer!

Oh well... So It Goes...

JIMMY BUFFETT CONCERT IN ST BARTHS NOV 2009

It appears not to be just a rumour anymore, as Jimmy Buffett is now on the schedule for a quayside concert in Gustavia, Saturday 7th November 2009 at 8:00 pm.

What a great excuse (as if you need one) to have Cheeseburgers & Beers in Paradise! It's only a few weeks until Le Select’s 60th Anniversary is upon us. Join the celebration and attend the BIG anniversary bash November 6-8 2009... Where???? St. Barths, of course :)

What better way to partake of this event than on a boat? Contact Paradise Connections Yacht Charters and we'll hook you up!

We enjoyed Jimmy's concert in Anguilla a few years ago (we're on the DVD!) and we helped several good folks charter yachts for that Parrothead gathering. They thoroughly enjoyed the festivities in the authentic tropical venue.

Get in the mood & check out Amazon's Jimmy Buffett MP3 downloads for a quick getaway to Margaritaville!

LE SELECT’s 60th ANNIVERSARY - SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

• Friday, November 6, 2009
  

11:00 am – Noon: Complimentary appetizers and happy hour
11:00 am – 1:00 pm: Gunslingers Steel Band
5:00 pm: Choir performance by the Chorale du bon Coeur
6:00 pm: Speech by Marius Stakelborough, owner of Le Select, followed by a cocktail reception
8:00 pm: Music by Math’s Connection and The Tremendous Johnsons

• Saturday, November 7, 2009

11:00 am – Noon: Complimentary appetizers and happy hour
11:00 am – 1:00 pm: Gunslingers Steel Band
6:00 pm: Gunslingers Steel Band on the quay in Gustavia
8:00pm: Jimmy Buffett on the quay in Gustavia
10:00pm: Music by New Generation at Le Select

• Sunday, November 8, 2009

11:00 am – Noon: Complimentary appetizers and happy hour
11:00 am – 1:00 pm: Gunslingers Steel Band
4:00pm: Screening of the film “The Friends of Marius” at the Capitainerie (upstairs at the Harbour Office)
6:00 pm – 7:00 pm: Gunslingers Steel Band
8:00 pm: Fireworks, followed by a closing party with music by Les Romantiques at Le Select

• Monday, November 9, 2009

Marius invites you to discover the Back Street Gallery, Rue Père Dugon, Gustavia from 11:00am to 1:00pm and 4:00pm to 6:00pm

Maybe Bob can get a new hat as his "Tunes On The Dunes, Anguilla 2007" baseball hat is quite a bit past its sell-by date :)

So, come on down & have a good time!  Hope to see you there.

Way to Go, Palau - Shark Sanctuary

I heard this mentioned last night on the BBC World Service and found their article about it this morning.  Palau is to create the world's first shark sanctuary,  banning all commercial shark fishing in its waters.

Palau is hereby awarded a gold star. We appreciate your effort! Best of luck in the UN General Assembly today!!!

PALAU PIONEERS "SHARK SANCTUARY"
By Richard Black, Environment correspondent, BBC News website

The President of the tiny Pacific republic, Johnson Toribiong, will announce the ban during Friday's session of the UN General Assembly.

With half of the world's oceanic sharks at risk of extinction, conservationists regard the move as "game-changing".

It will protect about 600,000 sq km (230,000 sq miles) of ocean, an area about the size of France.

President Toribiong will also call for a global ban on shark-finning, the practice of removing the fins at sea...

WHALING MENTIONED TOO!
... Palau has in recent years regularly sided with pro-hunting countries such as Japan. Mr Toribiong told BBC News that before going to New York for the UN General Assembly, he had planned to "state to the world that Palau will revisit its current position" on whaling.

GOOD ARTICLE... READ MORE...

For those of you interested in the subject of sharks, their plight, and their importance to world ecology, you might wish to view Sharkwater (2006) by Rob Stewart.

First day of autumn 2009

Today's the first day of autumn, 22 September 2009.  That's it... Summer is officially over!


  <--- Sint Maarten & NOT Sint Maarten --->
Of course, it's just about like every other day here in St. Martin :) Blue sky, puffy white clouds... and today, the occasional sprinkle.

So It Goes...

Funny How to Wash a Cat video

This morning, my brother sent me a link to this video on YouTube: How to Wash A Cat



I'm sure that anyone who has a cat will identify with this :)

Enjoy!

One of my favorite things... in hurricane season

This is one of my favorite things to see during hurricane season...

We had light rain off & on (mostly on) all day Sunday.  Got soaked Saturday when we went to the store, but that's part of boat life :)

Today (Monday now) it looks like we're back to normal with blue sky and puffy white clouds.

First day of Autumn is Tuesday!

Talk Like a Pirate Day - September 19 2009

Happy International Talk Like a Pirate Day !

Bob's Boat Bits blog has an interesting post today about pirates. 
Check it out!

Here is a good post from Mashable.com with many interesting items, such as:

• History of the holiday
• Pirate talk
• Twitter like a pirate
• Facebook like a pirate
• Search like a pirate (Google)
• Pirate Talk for your iPhone
• Drink like a pirate
• Free e-Book : Guide to Pirate Parenting
• Pirates in the media
• etc...

 And this blog ( Miss Cellania ) has some pirate kitty images.

Cat Blogging Friday: Talk like a pirate day tomorrow

I hope that Buffy & Willow aren't disappointed that we don't have costumes for them to wear tomorrow, which, as you all know is International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

I wonder if this iPhone application works with the latest versions of iPhones. It is something I posted last year, but you might want to check it out to be prepared for the big day tomorrow!

AyePhone - Talks Like A Pirate So You Don't Have To

Tomorrow be Talk Like a Gentleman o' fortune Tide so ye better be prepared. Sharpen up yer cutlasses, polish yer earrin', an' put on yer best eyepatch. Enjoy, ya scallywag!

Watched film EASY VIRTUE tonight

We just finished watching the movie EASY VIRTUE on DVD (based on Noel Coward play). Their musical interpretation of Car Wash, & When the Going Gets Tough the Tough Get Going were especially interesting.

Soundtrack & DVD

We'll never find the CD in St Maarten, so we checked Amazon.com and they have the soundtrack for the film as MP3 downloads, either by individual tracks or the entire album... COOL!

Good flick, too.

New Regatta Les Voiles de Saint Barth 2010

We received this announcement in our email and thought some of you might be interested. They have a very nice looking website:

The 2010 Season will count a new sail event in the Caribbean. Indeed a new regatta " Les Voiles de Saint Barth " will be held between 6 and April 11th of this year. Organized with Saint Barth Yacht Club and Comité Territorial du Tourisme, with the support of Saint Barthélémy's Collectivité .

This event gets ready to welcome as many Maxi Yachts, Classics boats, Racings and Multihulls.

This Rendez-vous will be inescapable through a sports spirit and just as much friendly and festive.

In the idyllic setting of Saint Barth Island, residents, storekeepers and water sport professionals get ready to welcome these boats and their crews to make them discover or rediscover this unique island.

We suggest you to get all the information on our site : http://www.lesvoilesdesaintbarth.com

You will find also the 'notice of race' of the event there.

Organisation committee
Saint Barth Yacht Club

Sounds like fun!

Day after Friday (Boat) Cat Blogging

This morning we had lots of cabbage white butterflies traversing the lagoon. The cats were fascinated...

Buffy

.

Pleasant & Unexpected Surprise from BVIs

There was a post on the LatsAndAtts forum where someone said that you can clear in to the BVIs at Jost Van Dyke. Well, according to my information this was changed at the end of April 2009... See post here concerning BVI check-in procedures.

So, just to check, I sent an email to the person in the press release and I received a very pleasant response within an HOUR! I was so surprised to get an answer at all, let alone a quick reply :)

Hello Sheila,

Thanks for your inquiry.

I have been informed by Her Majesty's Customs that those arrangements remain in effect at this time.

You may contact Her Majesty's Customs on (284) 494 3701 ext. 6800 or 6802 for additional information.

Regards,
Joseph A. Daley
Ministry of Health and Social Development

Thank you so much, for taking the time to contact Customs and getting back to us! You deserve a gold star!

Renewal of USCG Certification of Documentation - Boat Registration

Well, it's that time of year for us again. Our renewal form has arrived in our friend's mailbox in St. Thomas, but as we are in St. Martin, we are going to renew it the same way as we did last year...



See previous post:
http://allaboutboats.blogspot.com/2008/09/uscg-renewal-of-certificate-of.html

Thought this was worth mentioning again.

Boat Cat Blogging Friday

I'm a bit late with this but I think it is still Friday somewhere so here's my Friday (Boat) Cat Blogging post...

The picture I was going for was different but as y'all know, cats don't always cooperate and tend to do their own thing.

Buffy was turned around and her little tail was dangling in front of the door to the cat condo. Willow was upside-down on her her back had both arms up and was grasping Buffy's tail... real cute picture. In the 5 seconds it took me to reach over and get my camera, they came up with this pose...

Good girls :)

AMAZON.COM Fall TV Sale

You should know by now that So It Goes loves TV series on DVD as they are a great bang for the buck. We do not have access to TV aboard so this is the only way we can watch programming that's available to the general public. We try not to read anything that will be spoilers for the season that we have not yet watched, such as House MD and Lost.

So, good news for us is that Amazon.com just notified us that they are having a FALL TV SALE.

Amazon DVD is celebrating the return of the TV season with our Fall TV Sale. With over 1000 TV DVDs and Blu-ray Discs up to 54% Off, and deals as low as $5.99 including favorites like The Office, 24, Mad Men, Entourage and many more. Sale dates are September 2, 2009- September 30, 2009 while supplies last.

Mad Men is a series we ordered last month but we haven't seen it yet. Our Amazon order is waiting for us at Reefco in St. Thomas. Thanks, Edy for holding our mail for us.

Readers: if you need anything to do with air conditioning, refrigeration or watermakers, check out Reefco in St. Thomas, USVI. http://www.reefco.net

So, I'm going to go look and see what Amazon has on sale... Maybe buy the second season of Mad Men? What's one more box, hey Edy??

Aftermath of Tropical Storm Erika

I'm really exhausted. All of this uncertainty about Tropical Storm Erika must have affected me more than I realized.

I got up at 2am and looked at the latest forecast and it hadn't changed much. Storm center directly south of St Martin at about 133 miles or so if I recall.

Last night we had a constant strong breeze with some gusts, some whitecaps and not much rain. Happy about that and now I can catch up on some quality snooze time today.

These photos were taken a few minutes ago at 1:40pm EDT.

It is gray and looks kind of like a winter's day.

We had tomato soup for lunch... Soup & Sandwich just like the old Campbell's commercial :)

Our friend Kerry, owner-operator of one of our favorite charter yachts Promenade (contact ParadiseConnections.com for info) just wrote to us from their hurricane hole. She said that she's "Bored and hot. Hardly any rain so far. Hardly any wind. We have had more on a normal day. Going to go out and look at the seas by dinghy later on this afternoon, as I can hear them."

So, hopefully that's it for Erika. I haven't read anything about the storm but according to the NOAA track it appears to have gone over Guadeloupe with 40MPH winds. Can't complain too much about that.

Tropical Storm ERIKA in St Martin Sept 2, 2009

11:00 PM UPDATE

• After watching a DVD I went to bed for about an hour. Buffy came in for cuddles which was nice. When the alarm went off at 11pm I got up to look at the weather. Tropical Storm Erika is almost directly south of us with the center being 143 miles away with maximum wind of 40MPH. That workboat that was on the wreck's mooring for Ana & Bill came back this afternoon. There has been much in the way of loud voices and cussing for the past couple of hours... Don't know what the problem is but at least there's no gunshots... Buffy & Willow have decided to stay inside tonight as it's a bit breezy. Here's the 11pm map from StormPulse.com

Click image to enlarge

6:15 PM UPDATE

• We've been getting ready for the storm. Charged up 48 volt battery bank for electric motor, cleaned prop, put out 2nd anchor, returned DVDs, taken care of sails, etc. The 5pm forecast has moved Erika more to the south of us. Looks like it has gone over Guadeloupe. The current storm track predicts that at 2:00am that the center of the storm with be 90 miles directly to the south of us with maximum winds of 40MPH and we are outside of that cone. Hurray. We'll keep a lookout.

11:30 AM UPDATE

• We went and got water & gasoline and then went to the French supermarket and bought some wine, pate, brie, and a nice baguette. When we got back to the boat it was time for the 11am forecast. Tropical Storm Erika is really keeping them guessing. They now show that it will pass to the south of us going over Antigua and then St. Thomas, but with a lower wind strength of 40-45MPH. Looking forward to the 2pm forecast. It's a busy day... Oh, the 11:30 bridge open and boats are coming in. Hope they anchor properly.

Click on image to enlarge
From http://www.stormpulse.com/tropical-storm-erika-2009

The 8am forecast (September 2, 2009) for Tropical Storm Erika shows that the center of the storm will be 26 miles away from St. Martin on Thursday at 2pm.

Click image to enlarge

But according to the 5am NOAA Tropical Discussion, they seem to be quite uncertain about a few things so hopefully things might look better later on... We are getting prepared.

TS Erika didn't have a depression

Just checked 5pm NOAA forecast concerning Invest 94L that everyone has been watching. Skipped the Depression phase and went to straight to a named storm... Tropical Storm Erika.

StormPulse.com gives an interesting view of tropical storms

Looks like Thursday at 2am (at least there's a full moon now) it might start to become a bit breezy here in St. Martin.

Tomorrow we'll go and gasoline and water. Top up the charge in the 48V bank and do "The Drill"... hopefully all for nothing... Let's hope :)

I bet we have lots of boats coming in to the Lagoon tomorrow. The Dutch bridge is open but the French bridge was scheduled to close today...

Remember that mooring that I was worried about that the Omar wreck dragged and then we had a workboat tied up to it for BILL? Well, our neighbor has tied up to it... better them than someone else. According to the wind websites, they have us down for zip wind.. We'll be keeping a look out on all of the weather sites.

So It Goes...