Sunday, December 28, 2008

Year-end voyage










The shortest voyages can be the most gratifying.  Today in a December thaw I rowed my 8 ft. plastic dinghy out .48 nm, past Big Tom (a rock)  to  R2 - the nun buoy that marks the entrance to Eastchester Bay.  Outbound is a lot farther than inbound.  Rowing into the sea and the wind, aiming for the bridge, and pulled south on the ebb, you earn the leisurely slide back to the dock, feathering the oars, cutting across the sea, spinning and pulling to put the stern into the swells when a big one rolls in.  When you get to the dock that .48 nm looks far again and you're glad the pump can still put out enough to carry you there on the strength of your arms and your back.

Then check North River 2 at Barron's.  Boat yards are at their best in winter - full of boats.  Looking at the keels, hulls, and spars you can tell how they sail.   The functional shapes and  primary colors look their best against the gray sky.

And then Brian Dempsey's American Ale House.  Vikings 20, Giants 19.  Season not over.

Thursday, December 25, 2008

Vendee - 4,000 miles front to back - NZ - to Perth


18 of 26 still racing, Michel Desjoyeaux leads the fleet by 44 miles (after 14,000 nm) as they approach the "gate" east of New Zealand.  Gates are designed to bring the fleet north of the ice zones.  The leaders have 10,000 nm to go - aiming next for Cape Horn. 

Here's the Christmas Day Roundup, and a graphic with the fleet position

Southbound 650 - Valparaiso, Chile






Valparaiso - a neutral city and site of a key battle in our War of 1812, is the headquarters of the Chilean navy.   Taisy studied there at the Pontifical University - the only Catholic school I ever got her to.  Marilyn, Gary and I visited her there and heard Inti-Illimani in a pub, reminding me of the Allende years, as did the Esmeralda - the white tall ship in the naval base shot.  Prisoners were tortured aboard and Susan was arrested unfurling an anti-junta banner from its deck during an Op-Sail visit to NY when Reagan was blessing the Statue of Liberty or smtg.

We stayed in a Bohemian neighborhood at a hostel across the street from the Lutheran Church (called the German Church there) - and next door to the place where Jesse stayed, a coincidence.  So here are some of Jesse's typically well composed and selected shots of Valparaiso, plus one of a strange sculpture in the desert on the way south from Antofagasta.

Jesse and Andy parted ways in LaPaz.  Next post will (hopefully) be Tierra DelFuego.

For more pictures of desert, sea and highway go to Southbound 650.

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

The Long River 长江








That's what they call the YangTze 
扬子江 - The Chang Jiang 长江,the Long River - which is in fact the longest river in the world.  What you see here is the river  at Wuhan 武汉, a city of 6 million about 400 miles west of Shanghai.  A coal carrier heads west, a tug pushes a barge loaded with fiber of some kind (while crew on top of the pile directs the pilot), a fisherman and mate - tossing a net by hand.

You'll also see here a couple of dredges, a fish monger selling to people on line for the ferry, two friends Liao Meizhen 廖 美珍, Teng Rui 腾锐 and fellow passengers on the ferry ride. Cruise ships leave from here down river to Shanghai - or west up through the 3 Gorges Dam locks to the Three Gorges 三峡 at the border of Sichuan and Hubei provinces. 

Viking ship Sea Stallion - Dublin to Roskilde, DK




Experimental archeology is what they call a crew of 60 sailing Sea Stallion - a 30 meter replica Viking ship - 1,150 nm from Dublin to Roskilde, Denmark - a 6 week effort from June 29 - August 9, 2008.  The idea is to learn how the Vikings did it - by using identical equipment (like binding the rudder with a fresh sapling, not line; and pumping out tons of Irish Sea water as they plowed windward in 5 meter swells ).  When they couldn't sail they rowed - 30 at a time in 30 minute shifts.

The pictures here show the good weather. For the best pix and a good retelling you'll have to go to Wooden Boat magazine # 206 (Jan/Feb 2009).  But the Viking Musem in Denmark does a pretty good job here.

Iditarod on Foot, Bike, Skis - no dogs allowed


Riders Through the Snow
December 24, 2008
During the Iditarod Trail Invitational, racers brave hundreds of miles of frozen Alaskan wilderness on foot, ski or bicycle.  Maybe it really is a spiritual experience - 350 miles of Alsakan wilderness in the winter.  Here's the video   Wanna sign up for next year? Here's the link to Alaska Ultra Sport.

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Guangzhou, Guangdong (Canton) by Sea?





I haven't yet approached China by sea.  When I went to Shanghai for a couple weeks in 2005 I went with British piloting charts, hoping to charter something that would get me out into the East China Sea.  No luck.  There were a couple of power boats across the river from the campus but no way to get my hands on them.

This time, going to Guangdong (Canton) I imagined coming up the Pearl River to Guangzhou, under sail, passing by the Portuguese outpost of Macao and the Brits in Hong Kong, landing in Guangzhou. But all I have is this photo of the Spirit of Baltimore 2  tied up by White Swan Hotel, not far from the stadium , of which I got a misty shot from the bridge over the Pearl River.  Here's a link to Spirit 2's log of their 1998 voyage to East Asia.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

On The Street: Santa Con 2008 - 5,000 Santas in New York. Is China next?


Taisy was there - on the steps of the General Post office and all around mid-town.  With 5,000 other Santas, red, green, and all celebrating what the Chinese call 圣诞节Shengdan Jie.  In fact, since every waitress and grocery clerk in China sports a Santa cap like at this IGA in Wuhan, I think this silly celebration will soon flourish in China - where they can REALLY put together a crowd

Bill Cunningham was there too in Manhattan - with his usual wonderful photography.  So here it is- Bill Cunningham's audio slide show: SantaCon(vention) in New York.



Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Southbound 650 - Macchu Picchu - Cusco







  
It's irresistible to be light-heartedly cynical "why ride that far on a motorcycle for chrissakes to see a goat and some old ruins".  But mountains do inspire.  I remember babbling in the shadow of Denali as it loomed like a diamond ring in the distance while fishing the Lake Creek River in Alaska.

Pablo Neruda too, a far better babbler, got carried away in Canto XII from The Heights of Macchu Picchu:
Look at me from the depths of the earth,
tiller of fields, weaver, reticent shepherd,
groom of totemic guanacos,
mason high on your treacherous scaffolding,
iceman of Andean tears,
jeweler with crushed fingers,
farmer anxious among his seedlings,
potter wasted among his clays--
bring to the cup of this new life
your ancient buried sorrows.


For more great shots go to Southbound 650
and p.s - Pascale reports the latest ultrasound shows the nascent rider is doing well. 
- gwc
p.p.s. - it has been pointed out to me that the quadriped is a llama.  Well, you know what they say about ducks. - gwc

The Furious Fifties - boat breaking seas and storms



The thrill of 400 nm plus days isn't an answer to why you would risk or endure 50 knot winds, confused 7 meter seas, icebergs too big to be called "growlers", and condensation dripping from every surface.

The cruel boat-breaking seas of the southern ocean have wreaked havoc 36 days out. 19/26 starteers are still racing.  Recent retirees: Dominique Wavre (keel swinging free under the boat taking shelter (3,300 miles south of Capetown)at  Kerguelen (Desolation) Island, Bernard Stamm (aground in 50 kts. in the same miserable cove where he stopped for rudder repairs), Mike Golding (race leader dismasted 950 miles SW of Perth).   And Michel Desjoyeaux surges into the lead with 20 kts boat speed.

The tales are amazing.  Check out:


Thursday, December 4, 2008

Ushuaia on the rocks




South - still dangerous.  I know enough to know that Antarctic tourists don't know what they don't know.  I know because I've capsized in a 60 mph summer squall off Kings Point.  I know that I can't imagine a 103 kt. hurricane in the waters of Wilhelmina Bay on the outer end of the Antarctica Peninsula.  And I know from hard grounding a chartered J-24 25 years ago that even in  the Penobscot Bay not every rock is on the chart.  

The 80 passengers on the cruise ship Ushuaia, on the rocks there, waiting for rescue by the Chilean Navy, know about the 103 kt. storm now as their ship lies impaled on the rocks with a hole in the hull, as this blog post explains.

I want to take photographs too with the steely grays of Frank Hurley, two of whose images -  from original negatives - are on my wall, relics of Ernest Shackleton's doomed Endurance.  I want to tie up to an ice floe like National Geographic Explorer's Endeavor does there regularly.

But I have come to the conclusion that we should not do Antarctic tourism - not unless you are really ready to take your chances in a lifeboat, or have what you need to spend a week on an ice floe, or camp out on an iceberg or an icy rocky shore without shelter beyond what you have on your back or your raft.  

Chris Matthews for U.S.Senate

Chris Matthews for U.S. Senate - challenging Arlen Specter?  I'm for it.  Here's my take on my HC classmate, posted on Politico.com in the Agenda feature:

George Conk (guest), law teacher/lawyer, NY:

I have known Chris since freshman year at Holy Cross when his voice, in the next room, rose loud over all others, after mandatory 11 PM lights out in our monastic dorms. And it was politics that he breathed. He knows how the Congress works. He was spokesman for Tip O'Neill when everyone else was prostrate before Gramm-Rudman and the Reagan Juggernaut. With a solid Democratic majority and a presidency beginning with an iconic sheen Chris's iconoclasm and humor is needed - in a place where every other member looks in the mirror and sees a president. Chris knows he's not going THAT far.