Back at it

 Fizzin, - just fizzin...

What a feeling...

Yeah! It's still a great boat.

Harbourmeister

Sometime before the summer vacations I received a cute little thingy for testing. It's LadyJanes Harbourmeister, and she's moored right alongside my Ushuaia.

A cute lil motorboat

Yeah, I know... it's not a sailboat, but that little boat is so full of gizmos, fun stuff and sweet details - it's unbelievable. Let's go have a closer look.

Take me for a ride

Splash! There she is; It's almost as if she's begging to be taken for a ride, right? So let's hop on board and have a look.

Working instruments

There are loads of instruments to check; I mean, there are the usual ones such as speed, rpms and fuel, and then there's the fishfinder. It has depth and speed but it also shows fish, and that's where the fun starts.

Off we go

 

Let's turn the key and see what she's got for us. Hmm, and where's the reverse gear - oh - it's supereasy... keys up and down plus right and left. Yeah!

Full speed ahead

Easy peasy... and full speed ahead gives me around 14 knots. Not a lot but quite enough to get around the Blake with a bunch of friends in no time.

Rrrrrrrrr

She has a nice feel to her - if you can say that about a speedboat. The controls react as expected - swiftly and with style, and the boat leans into the curves in a very natural way. It's almost fun to speed around, hehe.

Going back

So she sails well... but what's all that fishy talk about. Yeah well I really dunno yet. The fishfinder seems to work great, but I have yet to find the fishing rods. I will get back with another post, once I discover where they've been hidden.

... and stop!

All in all a nice sailing experience... What I could wish for is some race comitee functionality... starting procedures and all that, but that lies somewhere in the future. If you wanna go fishing with friends - this is a good one, and you can even sleep in the cabin, if you hate to come home empty handed.

Sunrise

Gotta love a sunrise like this one:

Goodmorning...

Just gotta!

Yeah, I know... it's unreal. Not because it's not real, but because it's unreal like the real ones.

Unwinding and more

Ahoy! I'll admit it's been a while. First life is keeping me busy with loads of delicious sailing, and that's all good and sweet. However, today I received an email from a dear old friend in Second Life, and I tumbled down the rabbit hole, - or rather memory lane...

Morning yoga

Obviously, first life comes first, but I still have friends, fond memories - and unfinished projects - in Second Life, so my heart started beating a bit faster.

I logged in to check if SL is still there, and sure enough. It's there. Tradewinds YC, the red boatshack, the round table, the lighthouse... everything. Give or take. So I launched my favorite cruise, the Ushuaia, and started the day with a bit of sunrise yoga. That's the kinda thing I'd do in RL too.

Scrubbing Unwind

Boats never like being abandoned. Green stuff grows everywhere. Perhaps not so much in Second Life but still, I felt like giving her a good scrub after all this time. After a few hours of scrubbing plus a coffee break - Unwind has an espresso machine onboard, she was her good old shiny self.

Unwinding

Time to take her for a spin. It was sweet. Not that I had forgotten, but still... I was a bit surprised just how much it felt like sailing. It's actually pretty good. You need to constantly steer and trim, or she'll come to a halt. There are still things to do, in order to make the SL sailing experience better, but that's a subject for another post.

The sun sets behind the Tradewinds Lighthouse

I sailed around Tradewinds waters till sunset, - feeling bad for neglecting my virtual boats and friends in here. Had great fun mooring using sails only. It's a bit more challenging, but I don't much like all that motoring about; It's much easier to predict how a sailboat will move with sails up. Besides, that stinch of diesel is... yuck. Yeah well, - in SL it's a bit better :-D

Sunset thoughts?

Anyway, here's me and Unwind moored at Tradewinds thinking about that email. The subject being? The Flying Fizz! Still my absolute favourite racing boat in Second Life. In case you wonder, what it is, it's moored right behind my lovely cruiser on the picture above. Thanx for writing, Liv. I'll get back to you about that.

PS: Turns out my little blog here needed a scrubbing as well. Several comments were - ahem - rather unboatly; I sprayed them with barnacle remover and gave them a good scrubbing, - et voila.