Just had the best couple of days in and around San Francisco on our trip to the States to see Doug’s family and friends before he heads off to New Zealand. He thought it was just a chance to show me where he used to live, not realizing my ulterior motive for the visit – checking a) whether he really does have a sailboat, b) whether he knows how to sail it and c) what he’s like as a captain. And the results of my research? Affirmative for the first two questions, mixed responses to the third….
We had a great time at the Vancouver Boat Show over the Family Day weekend. We wandered round talking to various people about insurance, local marinas (for when Doug and Illusion return to Vancouver) and options for heating and lighting on the boat. I was excited to meet the lovely people staffing the Bluewater Cruising Association stand – they were very reassuring about the fact I don’t have a clue about sailing and I look forward to heading to some of their events while Doug is away. Continue reading “At the Vancouver Boat Show”
It’s a few years now since I’ve spent any time at sea. Over that time, knowing that one day I’d be back out there, I’ve been following a great advance in collision avoidance systems for ships. Having spent many nights out on the ocean, any advance in technology that can assist the sleep-deprived in keeping the boat and its passengers safe gets my attention. One particularly challenging aspect of night watch is identifying ships from their lights and trying to work out whether they are likely to crash into you. In some situations, minutes of uncertainty can result in hair-raising, adrenaline-rushed moments of panic. This is where AIS comes to the rescue! Continue reading “AIS, DSC, VHF, oh my!”
Various members of the crew will be updating the blog with their experiences along the way! If it’s not obvious, you can tell who wrote the post from the information at the bottom of each entry, where it states the author. In the right column of each page you’ll find the ‘Categories’ section where posts are divided by author, so you can easily choose to just read the entries posted by one particular person. This one, for example, will show up in the category ‘John’s posts’ and also says underneath that the author is John Noble. EDIT AUGUST 2015: We’ve now changed this to a general ‘Guest Crew post Category’ and have added the name of the post writer to the posts’ titles
Janice is already on her journey, currently somewhere in Indonesia; Deb is working away to finish her contract so she can be ready to leave soon; Doug has bought his one-way ticket to New Zealand and has a few weeks left in Vancouver; and John’s departure date is imminent. He has this eloquent first blog post for you today:
Continue reading “Introducing John – man of few words. Or is he just in a rush?!”
Those two dreaded words. There is possibly nothing more frustrating than a bad customer service experience. Right? Minutes, even hours, on hold. Wrong information. No trace of previous conversations. Time being wasted on all sides. Aaagh. (In fact, we recently changed mobile phone companies for exactly that reason.) In the middle of all the planning and computer-based work I’ve been doing to prepare for the trip, a recent incident stood out…. wait for it….. because of how good it was! Really! Continue reading “Customer service?”