Yesterday, I purchased four 110 watt solar panels. This debate on been going on in my mind for weeks, as I had watched the price of solar panels get lower and lower on Amazon.com.
Yesterday, John the Rigger had come by, had worked about an hour, when he announced he had to meet Red at the Chinese warehouse, where they were contemplating buying solar panels.
I figured I better go along, if for no other reason than John will have to return.
At $110 each, the solar panels were impossible to pass up. They also solved my logistical problem of being able to get them in time for Dave to install then next week in Stuart or Ft. pierce.
The decision was made even easier my Lee Xu’s accommodating me in that I had brought no wallet, credit card or anything. A 3% surcharge for using AmEx, but no sales tax, made this a no brainer.
And when I got back to the boat, lo and behold, my Katadyn water maker had also arrived.
So, with the Katadyn and solar panels in the pilot house and John actually installing the paravanes poles, We’re making progress.
In two months, I’ll deal with the next and last phase before Europe, the new charting software and computer.
In the meantime, as I wait for the crew to start, I’m sitting here, reading Science News, and learning that it’s been confirmed that all native Americans are descended from a mix of Siberian and East Asians people and that dogs have a portion of their brains dedicated to deciphering human emotions (the key here was to train the dogs to lie perfectly still for six minutes in the MRI machine).
At this time, they have no plans to try this with cats.
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Author: Richard on Dauntless
I’m an eclectic person, who grew up in New York, lived overseas for many years and have a boat, Dauntless, a 42 foot Kadey Krogen trawler yacht. Dauntless enables me to not only live in many different parts of the world, but to do it in a way that is interesting, affordable, with the added spice of a challenge.
Dauntless also allows me to be in touch with nature. As the boat glides through the ocean, you have a sense of being part of a living organism. When dolphins come to frolic, they stay longer if you are out there talking to them, watching them. Birds come by, sometimes looking for a handout; sometimes grateful to find a respite from their long journey.
I grew up on the New York waterfront, in the West Village, when everything west of Hudson St. was related to shipping and cargo from around the world. For a kid, it was an exciting place of warehouses, trucks, and working boats of all kinds: tugs and the barges and ships, cargo and passenger, they were pushing around.
My father was an electrical engineer, my mother an intellectual, I fell in between.
I have always been attracted to Earth’s natural processes, the physical sciences. I was in 8th grade when I decided to be a Meteorologist.
After my career in meteorology, my natural interest in earth sciences: geology, astronomy, geography, earth history, made it a natural for me to become a science teacher in New York City, when I moved back to the Big Apple. Teaching led to becoming a high school principal to have the power to truly help kids learn and to be successful not only in school but in life.
Dauntless is in western Europe now. In May and June, I will be wrapping up the last two years in northern Europe, heading south to spend the rest of the year in Spain & Portugal.
Long term, I’m planning on returning to North American in the fall of 2017 and from there continuing to head west until we’re in Northeast Asia, Japan and South Korea, where we will settle for a bit.
But now, my future lies not in NY or even Europe, but back to the water, where at night, when the winds die down, there is no noise, only the silence of the universe. I feel like I am at home, finally.
View all posts by Richard on Dauntless
Dauntless at Sea 