Category Archives: Vehicles

Mystery of the Universe

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

File this one under: Mystery of the Universe When we opened up the camper on the docks here in Valparaiso only one thing was out of place. Our wine opener, a heavy, boxed SrewPull, was on the floor. The door …

Fuso vs. Valparaiso Dock Crew – Part 2

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

We returned to the docks on Wednesday, 16 January, 2008. We were scheduled for an inspection meeting involving three of the parties that operate on the docks: MARVAL, the overall operating company; TPS, the German company that operates the portion …

Fuso vs. Valparaiso Dock Crew

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

  The ship carrying our Fuso, Seaboard’s Thor Nectar, arrived late morning on Saturday, 12 January. Thor Nectar  

Emergency Beacon / GPS Tracker

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

I just came across this company and their product launched 1 November, 2007. Small, lightweight and portable, it combines EPIRB type emergency beacon functions with a general purpose GPS locator tracker and simple “I’m OK” message functions. It looks like …

Ready to Ship – Final BEV Buildup Photos

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

We are pulling out to put the rig on the ship to Chile in a couple of days. I am still working down the last items on the endless “to do” list. Today I discovered that the spare main circuit …

Money Creek, MN rally site destroyed by flash flood

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

Message below from our Milwaukee friend Bob Grambling.   I met Bob at a sushi bar down the street from my apartment when I was living in downtown Milwaukee. We later attended many BMW rallies together, along with his partner …

Hitt Wash Crossing

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

30 July, 2007 Hitt Wash Santa Maria Mountains Northwest Arizona, USA The white Toyota Tacoma pickup slowly moved into the water, dipping its front wheels in gradually and proceeding until the rears were also half submerged. It paused on the …

Cetacea Incognita

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

We were approaching the area where the North Atlantic ocean floor rises up to meet the continental shelf, just South of the Grand Banks, which are even shallower. The geography of the sea floor and the meeting of the Labrador …

The Points of the Compass

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

The sailboat’s compass glowed red in the 3 AM darkness. Quetzal, a late ‘80s Kaufman & Ladd 47 foot monohull, purpose built for the Bermuda race she had won, sliced through the North Atlantic almost silently. The cloudy skies blotted …

One Out, One In

Posted ago by Douglas Hackney

5 October, 2004  I was watching the GPS count down the kilometers.  We were riding down a dirt road on the outskirts of Beijing. It was a rough track, full of potholes, but lined with twin columns of trees, like …