Everglades Challenge 2012

It was my sixth Everglades Challenge (EC) this year, and for the first time Chief’s words rang true: the hardest part of the Challenge is getting to the beach. My family was going to make a holiday around the race this year, seeing me off at Fort De Soto, and then spending a relaxing week on the beach at the finish line at Key Largo. But days before we were to depart our son was diagnosed with a rare and potentially fatal kidney ‘disease’, and the night before we were to leave my partner developed a terrible case of strep throat. It was only that Wednesday night before we decided I would indeed make a go of this year’s EC, leaving the next morning at 0500 for the solo 12 hour drive from Durham, NC to Tampa Bay, FL.

The best part of any WaterTribe event is catching up with all the old salts who are now firm friends. After loading up all our boats on the beach at Fort De Soto on Friday, everyone met up for that afternoon’s Captains' Meeting. This year was a record number of entrants with 15 boats registered for the 70-mile Ultra Marathon to Checkpoint One, 60 boats entered for the 300-mile EC, with another 11 registered for the 1,200-mile Ultimate Florida Challenge (UFC), all spread across five classes.

My stomach developed a few grumbles that night, but I thought nothing of it. I’d had a bout of the norovirus sweeping Duke’s campus a few weeks previously, and a colonoscopy on the Monday before leaving, so attributed it to my stomach returning to normal.

Saturday morning, we were all on the beach before sunrise, waiting for the 0700 gun—or in this case, bagpipes—to go off. We were facing a pretty stiff southerly, so at least warm, of about 35 knots, so it would be a bit choppy heading across Tampa Bay. Chief even walked down the line, shouting that we didn’t have to leave the beach if we deemed it too rough. But we were off--not all of us--a few decided to stay on the beach, one of them being a UFC entrant.

For the eight miles across Tampa Bay, it was quite a slog. Average speed was only around 1.5 to 2.4mph, and it was very wet ride, with waves rolling in around 3-4 feet at times.And then there were the tides...

To keep me going, I need to eat every hour or so, and I sip regularly on my Gatorade. My stomach started feeling queasy after about 30 minutes of paddling. I know sea sickness, and this wasn’t that. After a couple of hours of hard paddling I was hungry, but could only manage a few mouthfuls of energy bar before feeling even more nauseous. For the rest of the day, every time I tried to eat or drink, I felt sick. One of my personal “challenges” is that I have a very sensitive vagal nerve: if I vomit, or inadvertently swallow something that hits the nerve, I pass out (and I’ve really beaten myself up in the past, with some uncontrolled landings). And I can’t do that in a kayak in the middle of a rough sea.

After eight hours of paddling and only 20 miles of distance covered in very strong headwinds, I decided to pull over at Longboat Key, around 1630 hours. Little did I realize that this was Longboat Key Club & Resort, a gated AAA “luxurious and private setting for boating enthusiasts, resort guests and members at our exclusive Florida resort”.

I dragged my boat up a sandbagged ramp between the rip rap (to the left of the photo behind the shelter of the mangroves), and bumped into Doug and Leslie, who were on winter break from Minnesota, staying with Leslie’s mum, just a mile or so up the road. I explained my situation and did they think it would be possible for me to stay the night somewhere here, to see how I felt in the morning? Come along to the restaurant they said, and perhaps there’s someone there who can help. Come on in, said Kiki, the restaurant manager. You’d better come out here, I responded as I dripped all over the walkway (I’m still fully garbed in kayak gear at this stage). Once again I explained my plight and why I was indeed here. No problem, Kiki responded. Pitch your tent anywhere you like over there, and I’ll let the night manager know you’re here.

Saying good evening to Doug and Leslie, I wandered back to my boat, to find Whale pulling up to fill up his water bottles at one of the marina’s hoses. I let him know that I’d be staying the night here, to see how I felt in the morning. And off he paddled, around Florida.

I pitched my tent behind the lee of an electrical box. Don waved at me from his 65 footer launch just across from me, and asked if I was okay. I told him my story. We have to go to the theatre this evening, but if you’re awake by 10:30, you can shelter in the cockpit here, and then have a shower and spend the night with us.

The kindness of strangers is extremely heartwarming.

I was in my tent by 1930 hours, so missed Don’s hospitality. All I could eat, or in this case drink, was an Ensure Plus (350 calories), which with half of a Nature Valley oats bar forced down around six hours previously was all I’d eaten all day.

It blew pretty consistently all night. Around 0500 the expected northerly front hit. First a few drops of rain, then some thunder and lightning, and then the wind. I had a bit of my tent inner zipped down for some fresh air. “The” gust tore up under my fly and not only unzipped the entire entrance but took down the inner of the tent and lifted the windward side of the fly. I lost three stakes. There was dust and sand flying everywhere, and for about ten minutes I lay against the fly to keep the entire tent—and me—blowing off the marina. During a lull I made a dash to my kayak—which had been turned 180 degrees in the wind—and dug out my deeper sand stakes to restake the tent. An hour or so later I emerged, to see some pretty impressive white caps running down Sarasota Bay. It would have been just fine to leave, with a following wind and sea, but I still couldn’t eat, and my stomach still felt terrible.

Don emerged from his boat and waved me over. Come and have a cup of tea and some scrambled eggs. And for the next four hours Chicagoans Don and Sue looked after me extremely well. I can’t thank them enough. Their heartfelt generosity and terrific life stories very much made up for the fact that I knew my EC had come to an end.

On SandyBottom's trailer, with Don and Sue's launch in the background.

And to cap it all off, SandyBottom and SOS—in Mosquito—still hadn’t left the beach, and she would be at the marina soon after noon to come and pick me up. (Thank you, Dawn!)

We also picked up TwinSpirit on the way back; with OneEyedJake helping.

I never thought I’d feel so… relaxed, about dropping out. I surprised myself. Perhaps because you have to be fairly rational in such a situation. If you can’t eat or drink when you need to be paddling at least 15 hours—mostly more—a day, if you’re feeling pretty damn crook, if you can at least drop out when there’s somewhere--and someone--nearby to help you and you don’t have to endanger other folks in the middle of nowhere, then it’s really a no-brainer.

It took me another ten days to come right.

The conditions for this year’s EC were the worst ever in the ten-year history of the event. Only 25 boats completed the event, with eight of those entered in the UFC. More than anything, I feel a bit sad not having had the experience of paddling in those conditions, and completing the hardest ever EC.

I can’t wait until next year!

Gear list

They say that half's the battle's getting to the beach to compete in the Everglades Challenge. I've usually found that half the fun is packing. But it's been a wee bit more stressful than usual in the last week or so--our son has been diagnosed with a rare kidney disease--Poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis (PSGN)--which has no treatment. But he now seems to be on the mend. So we still hope to be leaving for Florida on Thursday, ready for race start on Saturday, March 3....

But on the hope that we will be heading down to Florida, I've finished packing. And for the first time, I've completed a gear list, with weights. I can't believe how much can fit in a 5.32m (17.5') kayak!

I've heard through the WaterTribe forum that with this warm winter we're experiencing that the mosquitoes are going to be bad this year, particularly in the Everglades. Thus another first is spraying my tent and some clothes with Permethrin. I'll be interested to see how that works.

The new Flat Earth 1sqm sail is all up and ready, but I won't have a chance to test it out before the race starts. That would be too easy.

Next wee hurdle: I have a colonoscopy on Monday....

SPOT upgrade

After five years using the original SPOT (below), I've now upgraded to the new SPOT 2 (above).

It's definitely a worthwhile upgrade. I found a great deal online at Best Buy, even though it's the silver rather than the orange version (apparently, orange sells 10:1 over silver), but when you're saving around $70, silver's just dandy.

So, what's better? First, the weight. The new version weighs 147 gms (5.2 oz), while the old one is... quite a bit heavier. I'm carrying it on the deck of my kayak, so the weight doesn't really affect me overall, but if I was an ultralight backpacker, every gram makes a difference.

It's also much smaller, thus taking three (lithium) AAA batteries, rather than two AAs.

But what I really love about the new SPOT 2 is that you can have your Tracking on and still send an OK message at the same time, and this year's Everglades Challenge has a new rule that we need to send an OK every 4-6 hours (for insurance purposes).

With the old SPOT, it was a 20 minute process--try this at 0200 after you've been paddling for 18 or more hours...
You can't send an OK message if the tracking in enabled, and you can't go back to tracking mode immediately after pressing the "OK" button. To send an "OK" the user must first disable tracking mode. This is done by either restarting the device (off and then on) or by holding down the OK button for 3-5 seconds--in which case 3 blinking red LED and then a solid LED indicate tracking mode is turning off. Once tracking is deactivated (or the unit restarted), the device is in standby mode with only the power LED flashing. Now the user can press the button to send an "OK" message. It often takes 10 mins to transmit the okay message (in triplicate) and SPOT International recommends waiting 20 minutes. The SPOT device attempts to send the "OK" message 3 times: the first one usually is sent out during the first minute (you can tell because the OK LED goes solid for a few seconds). Once the three attempts have been transmitted, the second light stops blinking and the SPOT returns to standby mode. So, now with the unit back in standby with only the power light LED blinking, you know you can now activate tracking mode. Alternatively, to ensure that the "OK" was sent, the recommended method is to wait 20 minutes after pressing the "OK" button before activating tracking.

Get my drift?

Sail changes

I've been a Pacific Action Sail (PAS) kayaker for over five years, but this year I'm making a change from the PAS to the Flat Earth Sail (FES). Both sails are 1 sqm, which is the maximum for Class 1 of WaterTribe's Everglades Challenge (EC).

I had three sails to choose from, which I believe are up to the rigours of an EC: the New Zealand designed and made PAS (as above), the Australian designed and made FES, and the American Balogh Sail Design's (BSD) 1 sqm. I have all three sitting here at home with me, and all three have varying capabilities.

The BSD is probably the best "sail" unit there is, but for me--a solo kayaker--I came to the hard conclusion that BSD's rig is a bit too complicated, high and heavy for my needs. And to stow it, I would need to get out of my boat and dismantle and tuck everything away in an already small, pod-seated cockpit. If I had a Kruger canoe, this would be a different conversation. BSD's Dave was also keen for me to fit the rig behind me, but then I wouldn't be able to trim or watch my luff as easily.

I have really enjoyed the PAS--my first EC I hit a consistent 25 kph (15.5 mph) in high winds and following seas! With my sailing experience, I believe I've been able to get more out of it than most, particularly closer up to windward. And being able to easily deploy the sail from the cockpit has been very useful. The sail is nylon, and I've found it's distorted over time; and PAS is not going to transfer to more typical sail material anytime soon.

I haven't yet had a chance to test my new Code Zero-styled FES (that's Dawn (SandyBottom) using hers above), but all the video and reviews I've watched and read with the sail in use has me excited about the possibilities. The sail shape and rigging concept is very Tasmanian--the folks who have really pushed sea/sailing kayaking to its limits. Like the PAS, the unit can be deployed from the cockpit. And FES users attest to being able to point up to windward quite a bit higher. Technically, it's 122cm (48") high, the boom is 87.63cm (34.5”), and the top batten (of two) is 119cm (47")--the lower batten acts as the boom. Sail material for the Code Zero is a white trilaminate sail material, which means it only comes in white.

Just like the PAS, the FES depresses the thin fibreglass of my for'deck. For the PAS, I had a unit made that the PAS rested on (see top photo). For the FES, I am extremely grateful that Alan (SOS) and Paul (DancesWithSandyBottom) Stewart have spirited my boat away to Graeme Byrnes' (Roo) boatyard--where Alan works--and are strengthening the underdeck with epoxy. I don't envy them this weekend--temperatures were down to -6C (20F) last night, with only around 4C (40F) today, albeit sunny. In the photo above, you can see the SpongeBob Pants-looking heater atop the for'ad hatch, trying to dry the epoxy!

New kayaking gear

I've reached a point in my paddling, and particularly in my readiness for WaterTribe's annual Everglades Challenge, that I don't actually need any new gear. Which is a pretty sad state of affairs.

But every now and then, someone releases a new piece of equipment that can make camping life just that wee bit easier, especially when it's 0200 hours, you've been paddling non-stop for 19 hours--probably against tides and with a head wind--and all you want to do is scoff something down, put up your tent and jump straight into your pit--even if only for a couple of hours.

With my tender hips, I've long given up the thinnish Thermarests that can conveniently be blown up by mouth (in an EC there's no time to let your mats self inflate). For the past five year's kayak camping--and past five ECs--I've been a die-hard Exped down mat user, which because of its internal down, can't be inflated by mouth. I have one of the older Exped 7s, where the mat's bag is also its bellows. It can take about five or so minutes to inflate the mat, considering I'm cramped into a small one-person tent, and the bellow's adapter sometimes slips off the mat's nozzle.

Thus I recently discovered Camp-Tek's Microburst. My Microburst arrived in the mail yesterday afternoon, and I've been playing with it ever since. Upon opening, the Microburst is beautifully packaged (see photo below), and comes with real English instructions. It also has an adapter for the Stephenson Warmlite (which is the smaller piece of equipment in the photo below). The Microburst comes with its own wee ripstop nylon bag (with drawcord), which keeps the inflater flap from opening by mistake (though it's recommended you store the machine without its batteries, and with the flexible inflater protruding).

Microburst takes two AAA batteries and weighs 65.2gms (2.3ozs, including batteries). For longer camping trips, Camp-Tek recommends using lithium batteries, and with that you should get about 25 inflations. All the technology behind the wee engine's rotors and engine can be read on Camp-Tek's website.

Cutting to the chase, this beauty filled my Exped 7 in about 90 seconds.

You may have to be a bit careful if you're stealth camping, as it is an engine. But it's not overly noisy; and heck, it only runs for the few seconds it takes to get the inflater onto your nozzle, and then the two minutes or less to inflate your mat.

Highly recommended!

EC 2011 Gear Reflections

It was a challenging Everglades Challenge this year, with strong headwinds and numerous weather fronts wrecking havoc on times during the race and somewhat slowing things down. It was a race when you needed your boat and your gear to perform to its best. But most of all, it was a race where you needed yourself to perform both physically, but even more so, mentally. Of the 74 boats that started the race on March 5, only 30 finished.

So what gear performed well, or didn’t, for me this year, my fifth Everglades Challenge.

The boat: As always, and perhaps even more so, my Sisson Arctic Raider performed brilliantly. In the 80km (50mph) gusts we experienced when the front hit us Thursday; in the pitch black, high breaking shoals we got caught in outside Big Carlos Pass; to the 25mph winds on the for’ad quarter all the way home on the last day, I gained new respect for the boat.

Greenland paddle: Still using a GP for the race, and loving it. Once again I used a paddle made by previous EC challenger StripBuilder—a beautifully laminated stick. It was particularly useful when we got caught by the breaking shoals off Big Carlos Pass and Thursday's front.

Pacific Action Sail (PAS): Another brilliant Kiwi product. Contrary to all the “wind-on-the-nose" stories, I did get a bit of sailing in this year. But be prepared when you have a front bearing 80km (50mph) winds. I didn’t get the sail down in time—the winds hit so quickly and I thought I’d have time to reach shelter. When the wind and rain hit, I immediately let both sheets go. I deliberately have the sheets a length that if I do have to let them go, the sail won’t flop over the bow of the boat and catapult me with trapped water. The wind was so strong I couldn’t bring in either of the released sheets, so I grabbed the knife on my PFD and cut the windward sheet. Only after slowly bringing the bow of the boat up into the wind could I furl the sail and lash it to the deck. Another trick to remember with your PAS is that when you're sailing direct down wind, never to let it oscillate—pull one sheet in a bit. It sounds as though this contributed to Dolphin Gal's capsize.

Knife: As mentioned above, I had to cut the windward sheet on my PAS in able to furl it. It’s the first time I’ve ever used my knife—a NRS Pilot Knife—“in anger”. It’s an EC rule to carry a knife on one’s PFD; and I surely appreciated that at the time. (Unfortunately, I lost the knife after the PAS incident, when I didn’t correctly click it back into its holster—another lesson learned. Thanks to KneadingWater for lending me his for the last leg of the race.) It also made me appreciate that I didn't have a folding knife, as I've previously used—one hand was on my paddle for bracing, the other for the knife.

SPOT tracking system: I lost mine half-way through Day 1. This year, folks seemed to have a few problems with their SPOTs, losing "transmission" during particularly stormy weather, or just crashing. I was loaned a new one (thanks, Etch) when I reached CP1, and never had a problem with that one. I still believe them to be great products. I've bought a replacement secondhand (yet never used) old version.

Sleeping system: Tried and trusted 1C (30F) discontinued REI synthetic sleeping bag and Exped DownMat 7. I still have the old bellows Exped, and like the bellows bag stuffed with dry clothes for a pillow. I am getting quite tempted by the Exped air pillow…

Tent: As always, my Macpac Microlight, which is not free-standing, but I can string up quite happily on a chickee. At 1.8kg (I have the older version; new is 1.6kg), heaps of solo room, and the inner pitches with the fly, I'll use no other.

Clothing: Kept it to a minimum. I wore a pair of ExOfficio boy shorts cut for underwear, with an old pair of Macpac cotton shorts over those. On top was either a long-sleeved REI SPF 50+ polyester shirt or an Icebreaker 200 Bodyfit Crew top. My paddling jacket is a Steve Gurney light racing jacket—sadly he doesn’t make then anymore. When it chilled down in the evenings, I put on a Mysterioso top. Every night I’d strip off and leave my clothes hanging on a nearby tree. There was a dew most evenings, and the fresh water helped a bit with the salt in the clothes.

Wet weather gear: Once again, my Reed Chillcheater Coverall cag was invaluable. When the front hit us Thursday at noon with stinging rain and 80km (50mph) winds—and the temperature dropped from 27C to 10C degrees (80F to 50F) in just half-an-hour—I threw the cag on over my PFD and made for CP3 in Flamingo. The cag was also measured to fit my ocean cockpit rim, offering double protection from the waves over the sprayskirt. I wore it again all the last chilly day (10C), from CP3 to the finish at Key Largo. When the winds hit 40km (25mph) on the nose I had to take it off and put my PFD over the top of it, as it was ballooning like a parachute and even with fierce paddling I couldn’t make headway!

Lighting system: The head lamp I used the most is the Underwater Kinetics 3AAA eLED Vizio Headlamp, which is excellent—light and comfy, and also has a red diffuse. For spotting camp sites in the pitch black I used a new Fenix HP10, which was very good.

GPS: My new Garmin GPSMAP 76CSx arrived two days before I left for the race. Loved it. And the batteries seemed to last for ever.

Food: I ate a lot this year! And I don’t think I lost any weight, which I normally do (dang!). I probably consumed around 10-12 energy bars a day, eating an entire bar every 90-120 minutes. But I needed the calories with all the headwinds and hard paddling experienced this year. And thankfully, even after nearly 19 hours of paddling on the first day (and then only two hours of “sleep”), I felt remarkably energetic the entire week. I discovered a few new bars I could eat one or two of every day: Cliff 20g protein Builder’s Chocolate Mint (YUM!), Cliff Bar Cool Mint Chocolate, Honey Stinger Protein Bar (sure packed a punch when needed!), and Hammer Chocolate Gel. Funnily, one of my favourite bars is still the Nature Valley Oats ‘N Honey, bought in bulk from Costco. Sadly, I cannot eat Larabars anymore—the fruit content kills my gums after Day 1. And my dried mango always goes down a treat—a real energy boost. Every evening I’d down an Ensure Plus, now with 350 calories. For the first two evening dinners—at 0300 and 2200 hours respectively, I scoffed a tin of sardines in oil—fabulous. Every other evening we cooked up a freeze-dried (we ate at the new restaurant in Flamingo on the last night). I always try and buy a few Back Country Cuisines when I'm back in NZ, and they make a tasty change. Of the 6.87 kgs (15.5 lbs) of food I packed, I returned with 2.1kgs (4.6 lbs). So I can still get better… ;)

Personal health: I worked hard at this this year. In previous ECs, my derriere has suffered. This year, every morning, I lathered myself with Desitin. What a difference that made! I still had one abrasion—from the very wet of the first day—but it was limited pretty much to just that. After Day 2, my right heel cracked—I kept applying Desitin to that every morning, and the heel cleared up in a day. Every night, no matter what time I hit my pit, I cleaned myself down thoroughly with one extra large wet one and a couple of smaller wet ones. Then I’d coat myself with baby powder to dry up any excess moisture. I am convinced that going to bed with a dry body gave me time to dry out—even if for only a couple of hours. As usual, the tip of my right forefinger is numb—usually takes a month or so to repair itself. As always, I religiously used my SunPaws, from Hydraulics—anything to cut out the sun on the back of the hands. This year, I was not going to have my
lip crack on me again—I wore a full cover Kokatat Destination Baja sun hat. It was a pain in the butt whenever I wanted to sip from my drinking hose, or eat, or talk—having to clear away the Velcro and then use two hands to replace the Velcro when you’d done, but it sure did the trick in keeping my lips out of the sun. Next year I’m going to try a High Protection UV Buff—much easier to yank up and down.

Pre-race training: Bugger all, to put it mildly. I managed three longish paddles in January and February (which were my first since late September 2010), but was fairly consistent with 15-20 minutes of core exercises every other day. I should be shot. But, really, an EC is all mental. And that I am well prepared for.

Coming up: day-by-day blows of the race.

Thanks, and more to come...

A huge thank you to Floatsome (David) for managing my blog and race updates on the WaterTribe site during this year's Everglades Challenge--he did a magnificent job.

And a big thanks to all my fellow WaterTribers--truly kindred spirits.

I'll get my gear and race review up as soon as possible.

In the meantime, it looks as though the race results are now up on the WaterTribe website. With losing my SPOT (tracking device) around mid-day on Day 1, and a new one being brought on line for me (thanks for the loan, Stan!) at CP1, my times for CP1 and CP2 are a bit skewed--just read them the same as Seiche's.

Some of the photos and video are being kindly posted by folks:
energy2paddle
Bumpy & MachoMan
and more video here.

All packed, I think

Andrew and I went to REI last night, to spend my outstanding dividend and a gift card on a few kilos of energy bars for the 2011 WaterTribe Everglades Challenge. We love REI. And it's always better to go on a week night with a nearly-four-year-old, as there's fewer people around when he rides the bikes.

The new Garmin GPSMAP 76CSx arrived mid-morning yesterday, courtesy of an overnight UPS service, and thanks to fellow paddlers KneadingWater and Seiche I now have a set of routes, waypoints and tracks to steer me by. I've even read the user's manual...

For the first time I weighed a few things. I've 6.87 kgs (15.5 lbs) of food, which includes bottles of Ensure for an evening swig, a few freeze-dried dinners, dried mangoes, a few Hammer gels, and lots of bars. I find if I don't eat at least every hour, I tend to fall over.

The rest of the gear weighs in at just over 11 kgs (c 24 lbs), which includes Macpac tent (1.8kgs), Exped sleeping mat (1 kg), sleeping bag (1.4kg), toiletries (1.16kgs, including three WagBags!), gas stove and related (1.36kgs), wet weather jacket (846gms), first-aid bag (286gms), sacrosanct dry gear (1.1 kgs), repair kit (730gms), under deck bag with head lamps, mozzzie head net, bug spray, etc (902 gms), and a tow belt (532 gms). This doesn't count what I'll be wearing, such as the PFD.

I'm not bringing a kayak cart. Race rules have been tightened up this year. Usually, there's been a cart of some sort at Flamingo's CP3, and that's helped us get from one side of Whitewater Bay to Florida Bay--a distance of about 200m. But now we're on our own to make the portage. Instead, I'll unload all my gear into two big Ikea bags, carry those over, and then carry the boat over. The boat weighs 24kg and fits snugly over one shoulder. I'm usually staggering a bit by then, but this should be doable, particularly after one of Flamingo's micro-waved hamburgers and an ice-cream!

So, we leave tomorrow morning for Tampa Bay, Florida, and the race starts at 0700 on Saturday, March 5.

Floatsome will be updating this blog, the Forum's always a good place to keep an eye out for what's happening, and you can watch our SPOT progress on WaterTribe's Challenge Mapper. I'm Kiwibird ;)

Photo: KneadingWater, SandyBottom, KiwiBird and Seiche, at CP2, Chokoloskee, EC 2010.

The last minute, oh, oh's

I finally managed to start packing yesterday afternoon for this year's WaterTribe Everglades Challenge. Considering I need to deliver everything—including boat—to SandyBottom's on Wednesday night, and we leave pre-sparrow fart on Thursday to drive to Tampa, FL, and the race starts Saturday morning, this isn't bad timing.

Except when you start testing gear and it doesn't work: case of the oh, oh's, which inevitably leads to $$$...

First up was the GPS. My wonderful Garmin Map60CS—lasting four ECs—was the first not to turn back on. (Yes, I should have downloaded all my routes as soon as I returned from last year's EC...) After a few hurried conversations with Floatsome, SandyBottom and DancesWithSandyBottom—and a few discouraging frowns from FliesWithKiwiBird, I am now the (hopefully) proud owner of a Garmin GPSMAP 76CSx (could have sworn it didn't say "Discountinued product" yesterday), with pre-downloaded BlueCharts. I've also downloaded Garmin HomePort, and I should be good to go (when the GPS is (hopefully) delivered tomorrow). Just have to figure out how to get all my routes and waypoints transferred...

Then my costly Princeton Tec Apex Pro headlamp decided to quit. I've never been happy with this bit of gear, always breaking down on me (even with replacements), and it's supposed to be top-of-its-class. I've replaced it with a (slightly) cheaper Fenix HP10. Having a Cree product in it (local company) encouraged me to buy it. The HP10 looks very cool on the Web site, but a bit "Made in China" (which it is) when you finally manage to get it out of its protective thankgoodness-I'm-not-90-packaging, but I'll test it out and see how it goes.

So, let's hope that's all that I'm going to have to replace pre-start this year...