The conference held here in Solomons last week was not only a who’s who of oceanographic vessel operations; it was most of the national community along with some foreign operators and representatives of the federal agencies that interface with marine research.
There were two demonstration trips on the Rachel Carson and I went along to answer questions and listen to comments. Nearly every attendee made one of the trips so this unusual and, recently, rather obscure vessel is now very well known in the fleet. The comments indicated that the most knowledgeable group of critics that could possibly be assembled was very impressed. The whole experience was as close as someone in my position could come to the title of this post.
I also got to spend time with people I’ve known and worked with over three decades, including the one who selected the company I was V.P. of to design the boat that started my oceanographic design career. It was a great week.
Those of you follow these posts closely know that I planned to leave on Friday. However, I learned at the conference that the decision as to whether I will be involved with the design of the next coastal research vessel to be added to the fleet is probably going to be delayed as much as a couple weeks. I’m enjoying Solomons, meeting people in the larger lab community, and enjoying the lack of my normal restlessness.
I plan to report and post pictures of a short cruise up the Patuxent River but the weather looks a bit dreary next week for exploring a new place so I’ll probably just stay put and catch up on a few more boat projects. I had a great day sail on Friday with someone from the lab. It’s rather novel for me to be just enjoying sailing around without constantly looking at the GPS display of hours remaining to destination.
BTW I'm also a very proud father this morning. My son is the tall one in this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIxQKnJRjwA&list=PLsRNoUx8w3rOC12ttG_i-XSHCTIBuLWyy
There were two demonstration trips on the Rachel Carson and I went along to answer questions and listen to comments. Nearly every attendee made one of the trips so this unusual and, recently, rather obscure vessel is now very well known in the fleet. The comments indicated that the most knowledgeable group of critics that could possibly be assembled was very impressed. The whole experience was as close as someone in my position could come to the title of this post.
I also got to spend time with people I’ve known and worked with over three decades, including the one who selected the company I was V.P. of to design the boat that started my oceanographic design career. It was a great week.
Those of you follow these posts closely know that I planned to leave on Friday. However, I learned at the conference that the decision as to whether I will be involved with the design of the next coastal research vessel to be added to the fleet is probably going to be delayed as much as a couple weeks. I’m enjoying Solomons, meeting people in the larger lab community, and enjoying the lack of my normal restlessness.
I plan to report and post pictures of a short cruise up the Patuxent River but the weather looks a bit dreary next week for exploring a new place so I’ll probably just stay put and catch up on a few more boat projects. I had a great day sail on Friday with someone from the lab. It’s rather novel for me to be just enjoying sailing around without constantly looking at the GPS display of hours remaining to destination.
BTW I'm also a very proud father this morning. My son is the tall one in this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIxQKnJRjwA&list=PLsRNoUx8w3rOC12ttG_i-XSHCTIBuLWyy
