Missing Cruiser's Impounded Sailboat Rescued off Panama
03.06.11
North had been solo cruising in the San Blas Islands in January, when friends last saw him.
About a week later, the body of another singlehanded sailor — Jean Pierre Bouhard, of France — floated to the surface. Bouhard had been shot, bound and weighed down by an anchor, and his 50-foot catamaran Levante was found abandoned, 100 miles away. Bouhard’s partner, Spanish sailor Javier Martin, had owned a charter sailboat named Twyla that had sunk in December.
After a weeklong manhunt through the Darien jungle, Martin was captured and charged with the murders of both Bouhard and North. He is currently awaiting trial in Panama.
North’s body has not been found,
Source: The Log Newspaper
America's Cup changes considered
23.02.08
Changes to the format of the America’s Cup preliminary events are being
considered in San Francisco by the holder, Larry Ellison’s Oracle Racing
Team, the sponsoring Golden Gate Yacht Club and the organisation they have
set up to arrange regattas over the next 48 months, the America’s Cup Event
Authority (ACEA).
Already having had to hold up the announcement about which of the 14
challenges received for America’s Cup 34 can meet the qualification and
financial requirements, ACEA, in conjunction with its sister organisation,
America’s Cup Event Management ACEM), has seen timetables slip as a search
continues for the venues to host the 2011-12 America’s Cup World Series
(ACWS).
Source: The Independent
Take a voyage to where dollar and euro are equal
01.06.11
ST. MAARTEN, LEEWARD ISLANDS — Getting to the Dinghy Dock bar and restaurant at Captain Oliver's Marina is an international experience. Walk down the dock from one side and you'll cross from the Dutch part of the island to the French part of the island. No passport required.
Officially, the island uses euros for money, but before long you realize that the island is a good example of the global currency situation, writ small. (It would be a good idea, however, to have your deepest thoughts about this before drinking your first Painkiller.)
Look around and you'll see lots of dollars supporting activity that would otherwise not exist. While the official exchange rate between the dollar and the euro is $1.41 to one euro, the posted exchange rate at the Dinghy Dock is $1=1 euro, if you pay in cash. Pay by credit card, which no one in their right mind would do, and you'll get the official exchange rate and lose a lot of purchasing power.
Source: Houston Chronicle
A builder of high-end sailboats has announced plans to invest $1.8 million during the next three years to open a shipyard in Dare County, North Carolina, that will create 71 jobs in Wanchese. Gunboat Co., of Newport, RI, produces catamaran yachts,
