Author Peter Janssen

Cruising Life
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Hurricane Michael Wipes Out Panama City Yard Building New Coast Guard Cutters

Hurricane Michael destroyed more than homes, marinas and recreational boats in the Panama City, Florida, area. It also wiped out the family-owned shipyard that was just starting work on a $10 billion contract to build the Coast Guard’s new Offshore Patrol Cutters. The company had just started building the first hull. Here’s the full story from Breaking Defense: Amid the devastation wrought by Hurricane Michael last week is a family-owned shipyard the Coast Guard had just picked to work on the $10 billion Offshore Patrol Cutter program, the largest acquisition project in the service’s history. The Eastern Shipbuilding Group in…

Boat Reviews
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Fleming Introduces New F78 Classic, a Blue-Water Cruiser, at Lauderdale Show

Fleming is introducing its new F78 Classic at the Fort Lauderdale show, an upgrade of its flagship 78 but with a redesigned flybridge and boat deck. With good reason, considering its success in cruising around the world, the company calls the F78 “the ultimate cruising yacht.” The Fleming 78 is built to European CE Category “A” standards, meaning it is a strong, well-engineered, go-anywhere, blue-water cruiser. Flemings are known for the exceptional engineering and attention to detail, inside and out. The redesigned 78 is an outgrowth of the Fleming 75 that was launched in 2000. Ten years later Fleming redesigned that…

On Watch with Peter Janssen
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On Watch

Fort Lauderdale  ’18: A New Look, New Entrance, New Food & Drink and 1,500 New Boats. Plus: Our Reviews of 40 New Cruising Boats There By Peter A. Janssen The ever-growing Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show will run from Wednesday, Oct. 31, through Sunday, Nov. 4, with a lot of improvements from its new owners – and a lot more boats, displayed at seven locations linked by a network of water taxis and shuttle buses. The first thing you’ll find is a new, redesigned entrance on Seabreeze Blvd. a few hundred yards  north of the Bahia Mar Hotel and Marina,…

Cruising Life
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The Hamiltons’ Latest Cruise: The Stunning Lysefjord in Norway

Dirona is on the move again. The 2009 Nordhavn 52 owned by James and Jennifer Hamilton just cruised up the Lysefjord in southwest Norway, one of the cruising world’s major – and hard to get to – attractions. A remnant of the ice age, Lysefjord (light fjord) is 26 miles long and is bordered by steep granite cliffs that often rise 1,300 feet above the water. Underwater, the depths start at 43 feet and then plummet to more than 1,000 feet as the fjord moves inland. This summer the Hamiltons, a high-tech couple from Seattle who’ve been cruising since 2012, took…

Cruising Life
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Pusser’s To Open New Restaurant and Painkiller Bar on Cane Garden Bay in the BVI

Here’s some really good news if you’re heading for the British Virgin Islands any time soon. Pusser’s will open a restaurant, bar and company store at Myett’s Hotel on the beach at Cane Garden Bay. The new Pusser’s will replace Myett’s existing restaurant there, and will open around the end of November. Cane Garden Bay is on the northwest side of Tortola, basically across from Jost Van Dyke. It’s one of the prettiest spots in the BVI, which is so full of pretty spots that it’s become a worldwide cruising and chartering favorite. The area was hit particularly hard by…

Cruising Life
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Southport Marina, NC, Offers Daily Weather Briefings for Snowbirds on the ICW and Offshore

Here’s a great service for snowbirds heading south on the Intracoastal Waterway or offshore: Free daily weather briefings at Southport Marina in historic Southport, North Carolina. The briefings, on the docks at 6 p.m. daily, cover weather, sea conditions and any particular navigation problems from Southport south to Savannah, Georgia. Now in their fifth year, the popular briefings are known as “ICW Navigation and Offshore Weather Briefs on the Dock” and they’re sponsored by Carolina Yacht Care and Zimmerman Marine, Southport Marina. Aimed at transiting boats, the briefings are done by Hank Pomeranz, a retired U.S. Navy meteorologist, cruising sailor…

Cruising Life
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Want To Buy a Lighthouse? The Government Will Be Selling Six in the Florida Keys

Who doesn’t love a lighthouse? Well, the federal General Services Administration, for one. The Coast Guard has designated six lighthouses in the Florida Keys as “excess,” so the GSA is looking to unload them. A lot of people are not happy about that. Read the full story in the Miami Herald: From Carysfort Reef off Key Largo to Sand Key in the Lower Keys, the future of five of the six lighthouses that once kept ships from crashing into the Florida Keys’ coral reef is uncertain. The U.S. Coast Guard, which oversees the lighthouses, has declared Carysfort, Sand Key, as…

Cruising Life
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Meet the New Hyper-Sub: 35 mph On the Surface, 6 mph Under Water

A new Florida company is testing a combination of a fast cruising boat and submarine called the Hyper-Sub that it says goes 35 mph on the surface, 6 mph when submerged, and can dive down to 1,200 feet. Created by HSP Technologies of Lake City, Florida, the prototype was tested this summer and the company is now conducting further sea trials. The Hyper-Sub is 45 feet long with a 16-foot beam and uses two 480-hp Yanmar diesels for surface power. Underwater, it’s powered by two 60-hp 12-inch innerspace thrusters. The boat/sub carries 525 gallons of fuel, and burns 34 gph…

Cruising Life
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Boat Hits Whale Off Long Beach, California. Fire Department Issues Warnings

A boat hit a humpback whale off Barrier Island near Long Beach, California, and the Fire Department there warned boaters there to keep at least 300 feet away from whales in the future. The Fire Department also posted the picture above on Facebook, showing boats much closer than that to a whale near the harbor. “Boaters, this is unacceptable,” the Fire Department wrote. “These boats are way, way too close to our friendly neighbors (whales) who’ve come to our shores for a visit. Not only is it dangerous to get so up close and personal, it’s also illegal.” The Fire…

Ft Lauderdale Boat Show
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Fort Lauderdale ’18: A New Look, New Entrance, New Food & Drink and 1,500 New Boats. Plus: Our Reviews of 40 New Cruising Boats There

The ever-growing Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show will run from Wednesday, Oct. 31, through Sunday, Nov. 4, with a lot of improvements from its new owners – and a lot more boats, displayed at seven locations linked by a network of water taxis and shuttle buses. The first thing you’ll find is a new, redesigned entrance on Seabreeze Blvd. a few hundred yards  north of the Bahia Mar Hotel and Marina, where the entrance has been located by generations, and just south of the International Swimming Hall of Fame. “First impressions are crucial,” says Andrew Doole, the show’s general manager,…

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