Author Peter Janssen

Cruising Life
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New Prize-Winning Garmin Sonar with 200-Foot Range

If you’re thinking about doing some fishing on your next cruise or trip around the Great Loop, take a look at the new, prize-winning Garmin Panoptix LiveScope sonar. Its images of fish as far away as 200 feet from your boat are so clear that you almost could give them names. The new Garmin sonar delivers crisp live images in all directions – in front of the boat, under the boat, behind the boat and to the sides of the boat – in real time. The company says it’s the only live scanning sonar on the recreational boat market. The…

Cruising Life
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Phuket, Thailand: An Easy and Exotic Chartering Destination

The beautiful and safe waters off Phuket, on the east coast of Thailand, offer some of the best cruising and chartering opportunities in the world. The scenery in this exotic part of the world can be stunning, with towering limestone cliffs, secluded coves, pristine white-sand beaches and a mix of uninhabited islands and resort nightlife. The scuba diving and snorkeling are simply spectacular. Cruising there, in the Andaman Sea, is easy; navigation is usually line of sight. You’ll need to keep an eye on your charts and GPS to avoid the coral reefs, and the tidal range can exceed eight…

Cruising Life
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New Sta-Plug Mini Could Keep Your Boat from Sinking

Here’s something you’ll probably never use, but if there does come a time when you need it, you’ll really need it. The new Forespar Sta-Plug Mini, designed to fill small holes in your boat’s hull in an emergency, is making its debut at the Newport International Boat Show in September; it’s part of the Newport for New Products promotion. The Sta-Plug Mini is cone-shaped and made from high-strength, rubber-like composites with riblets that help it conform to the shape of the hull. It’s  four inches high and two inches across the base and you can compress it by hand and…

Cruising Life
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Prestige Launching New, Two-Stateroom, 420 Fly at Newport Show

Prestige is launching its new 420 Fly, an upscale, contemporary, French-styled cruiser, at the Newport (Rhode Island) International Boat Show, starting Sept. 12. Powered by twin Cummins diesels, the two-stateroom Prestige is said to have a top speed of 30 knots, and a range of 210 nm at its cruising speed of 22 knots. The new Prestige is filled with light woods and colors, and lots of natural light in the salon from its large side windows and sliding glass doors aft. It has more than enough seating, lounging and sunning areas on the flybridge, the cockpit, the foredeck and…

Cruising Life
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Algae Bloom in Lake Erie: 8 Times Larger than Cleveland

A toxic algae bloom in Lake Erie has grown to be eight times the size of Cleveland in the past few weeks. It’s so big that NASA is taking pictures of it from outer space. The bloom has now spread over 620 square miles, more than twice the size it was when NASA first measured it on July 30; then it was just the size of New York City. In its pictures, NASA says that “green patches show where the bloom was most dense and toxicity levels were unsafe for recreational activities.” Water in the lake is changing color because…

Cruising Life
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Frauscher Launching New, Much More Powerful, All-Electric Boat

As evidence of the rapid advances in electric-powered recreational boats, Frauscher Bootswerft is introducing its new 740 Mirage Air all-electric upscale day cruiser at the European shows this fall, and it has much more power and twice the battery capacity than Frauscher had in previous models. With its light weight (4,188 pounds), and 100-kW Torqeedo Deep Blue inboard motor, the new Frauscher tops out at about 31 mph. Dialed back to 6 mph, it can run silently, with no fossil emissions, for ten hours. The electric power is provided by two 40-kWh Deep Blue batteries, the same batteries that MBW…

On Watch with Peter Janssen
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Coast Guard Ending Massive Search for Two Missing Firefighters

The Coast Guard is ending a massive search for two firefighters who have been missing since they left Cape Canaveral last Friday morning for a short fishing trip. The two men were last seen launching their 24-foot Robalo center console on a boat ramp near Jetty Park in Cape Canaveral on Friday morning (see the surveillance photo above). Their families alerted the Coast Guard about 8 p.m. Friday when the men had not returned or responded to cell phone calls. The search started in Northern Florida and during the week expanded all the way up to the Outer Banks of…

Cruising Life
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Retired British Submariner Completes Great Loop in a Kayak

After more than 5,700 miles and 14 months, Steve Chard, a retired Royal Navy submariner, is going to hang up his paddle. He’s tired. Chard, 61, just completed the Great Loop in his kayak, and he was all alone the entire way. Even more remarkable, Chard went the long way around. He started on June 1, 2018, in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and went counterclockwise, up around Nova Scotia, past Prince Edward Island, into the St. Lawrence and down to the Rideau Canal, where he joined the Great Loop as most people know it. He lost 46 pounds in the first…

Cruising Life
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Boston Ferry Runs Aground in Heavy Fog. Four Hurt

A commuter ferry ran aground in heavy fog in Boston Harbor, injuring four passengers. The captain told the Coast Guard he had been cut off by a passing sportfishing boat. The ferry, the Lightning, left Hull, a small town on the southern edge of Boston Harbor, at 7:30 on a Friday morning, with 81 passengers on board. Normally, the trip to Boston takes 23 minutes. But about half way through the trip, the ferry ran aground near Long Island in five feet of water. The captain said that when the sportfishing boat cut off the ferry, he had to swerve to…

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Yacht Crashes While Captain and Mate Have Sex on Bow

I’ve never seen a story like this before, as reported in Australia’s Daily Mail. According to court documents there, the captain of a charter yacht, Crystal Blue, and a deck hand were having sex on the bow while the boat crashed into a nav beacon and another yacht on the northern part of the Gold Coast. The accident, in March, 2018, caused $140,000 damage to the Crystal Blue. The deck hand, Cheya Handley, said she had been drinking beer and vodka with the captain, Jeremy Kane Piggott. They were bringing the boat back home from a charter up the Brisbane…

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