Author Peter Janssen

On Watch with Peter Janssen
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On Watch

The Manatees, and the Manatee Zones, Are Here to Stay There’s good news for the manatees, Florida’s official marine mammal. They are no longer an “endangered” species; instead, they’ve been downgraded to just “threatened.” The U.S. Interior Department, which is in charge of such things, announced the change just after Manatee Appreciation Day. (Who knew? It’s March 29, in case you want to celebrate next year.) Manatees, which can live 60 years or so, have been around for the past 45 million years. They move slowly, spending most of their time eating seagrass or sleeping, although they can swim four or…

Boat Reviews
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Sabre’s Latest: Dirigo 66 Flybridge, Now Heading for Florida

Sabre has just completed the first flybridge version of its 66 Dirigo, and the Maine-built boat is on its way to its new owners in Florida. The company launched the very first 66 (pictured above) more than a year ago and I was fortunate enough to be on the final leg of its delivery, also in Florida. My conclusion: That Downeast beauty is one of my favorite boats, both for its overall cruising performance and comfort, and for its classic good looks, inside and out. I wrote at the time that the first Dirigo was ready for superlatives, since…

Cruising Life
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AccuWeather: Fewer Atlantic Hurricanes This Season, But At Least One Killer

The good news is that AccuWeather is predicting fewer Atlantic hurricanes than usual for this season. The bad news is that there still will be three bad ones – and one really deadly one. AccuWeather reports that warming temperatures in the Pacific will send strong westerlies to tropical areas of the Atlantic that will slow the development of hurricanes. Still, the hurricane season, from June 1 through Nov. 30, will see ten named storms – five less than last year – threatening the East Coast. Three of those five will be major hurricanes. And at least one will be a…

Cruising Life
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Latest Update on First Kadey-Krogen 50 Open: The Owner’s Report

Here’s the latest update on the progress of hull number one of the Kadey-Krogen 50 Open, written by its owner: Larry Polster, who’s also a partner and vice president of Kadey-Krogen Yachts. Like any other owner, Polster and his wife Janet are very involved in planning almost every detail of their new boat, since they intend to spend a lot of cruising time on board after the boat is delivered next February (but Polster isn’t giving up his day job). In this latest report, Polster tells how he and Janet are planning the galley on the new 50 Open, since…

Boat Reviews
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New Manchester 29 Built on Iconic Blackfin Hull

Take a good look. Have you seen this boat before? Well, yes, at least a lot of it. Think of a Blackfin Combi, circa 1991, one of the best-riding sea boats ever. Back then Blackfin and its major competitor Bertram were building rock- solid boats with deep-V hulls that earned reputations for taming oceans. But that was then and this is now. Now, this great-looking inboard cruiser, introduced in February at the New England Boat Show in Boston, is a brand-new Manchester 29, built by Crocker’s Boat Yard in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts. And everything about the boat is new – except…

Cruising Life
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Looking for Something New? Try the Aqua Lily Pad

You probably won’t need this on your next trans-Atlantic, or in four-foot seas, but you’ve got to admit that the Aqua Lily Pad is a hoot. Roll it out the next time you’re anchored on a quiet cove and have some fun (and imagine the looks on the faces of the other people who’ve already anchored there). The Aqua Lily Pad floats as soon as you unroll it, so you don’t have to waste time inflating something. Then sit, walk, relax with a good book (or something to drink) and enjoy yourself. The 20-foot version costs $689, while the big-boy…

Cruising Life
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Good Samaritan Rescues 5 From Raft As Boat Burns, Sinks: See Video

Here’s a you-are-there video of a charter boat captain rescuing five people floating in a raft as their 74-foot fishing boat burns and sinks in the Gulf of Mexico. The captain, a true Good Samaritan, heard the distress call and even though he was 30 miles away, he sped to the rescue. The Coast Guard arrived about the same time as the charter captain, but he was already pulling people on board. No one was injured Take a look here: http://www.fox13news.com/news/245864650-video#/.WOOrXJ3pnoF.facebook

Cruising Life
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5 Best Floating Bars in the Caribbean: Dive in Now!

I don’t want to make too much of a thing about this, but to me and most of my friends, having a drink or a beer or a glass of wine at the end of a day cruising or chartering is one of the better things in life. A nice celebration, a little social hour, a time to relax and reflect as the sun goes down. That’s all well and good. But what’s better is if you can do this on vacation not on your own boat (charter or otherwise) but on a boat that’s a bar – a floating…

Cruising Life
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Spring Cleaning for Your Engine Room: What You Need To Do

A clean engine room is a dead giveaway about the owner’s care of his boat; it’s evidence that he does care, that he knows what he’s doing, that he plans ahead and takes care of things before they need taking care of. The converse: A dirty engine room is, well, simply not part of a boat you want any part of. Aside from all that (and my ungrammatical sentences), a clean engine room not only will help in keeping your boat running, but it also will preserve (and possibly enhance) the overall value of the boat. It certainly will boost…

Cruising Life
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New Fast, Bright, Prize-Winning Raymarine Axiom MFDs

Raymarine’s new Axiom MFDs, which won an Innovation Award at the Miami boat show, are now out in the marketplace, in an entirely new line of 7”, 9” and 12” touchscreens that run 50 percent faster than anything the company has built before. The new Axioms can run multiple programs and come with bright, all-glass optically bonded displays for easy viewing (even if you’re wearing polarized sunglasses), and they have high-speed, quad-core processors running the new Lighthouse 3 operating system. Sonar is built in, including Raymarine’s new RealVision 3D. They come ready for plug-and-play with radar, FLIR, engine gauges, autopilot…

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