Archive for June, 2011
Sometimes having communication is priceless…
We just passed my brother’s birthday and couldn’t help but think back to some of the funny things that happened to us when we were younger. I recall when I was about 12 years old and my brother was 10, we were out at the “cabin” our family owned. Now, back then, the roads we took to get there were just 2 ruts for the tires to drive in and sometimes we had to steer way to one side of the road or the other to keep the bottom of the car from hitting bottom on a big rock in the middle of the road (which was usually about 2 feet high with grass). This also made it very difficult to see the obstacles in the middle section! To make a long story short, we were out in the woods playing when we saw a big black shape coming at us through the brush. Our hearts skipped a beat, we looked at each other and without speaking another word, turned and ran faster than we’ve ever run before! As we entered into the cabin clearing, we were hollering a bear was after us and Dad looked at the look of horror on our faces and gently smiled. What he saw from his angle, was a logger coming out of the woods with a black coat on and laughing like crazy, knowing he’d scared us out of some of our life! Well, I guess it turned out not be an emergency, but I can assure you that in our young minds I’d have given a million dollars for a radio (possible a hand held CB Radio) that could have put us in touch with someone to help us out of our “imaginary” dilemma. Enjoy the summer. Happy Boater.
Now you can listen to your MP3 on the boat!
Now you don’t even have to give up your music that is continually plugged into your ear when you head out on the water in the boat! If you have a marine radio receiver, you can enjoy countless hours of fine listening while dangling a fishing line in the water or simply enjoying the sun! These little players have an MP3 plug built right into them which allows direct transfer of tunes through the digital speaker system provided by the marine speakers on board the boat or pontoon. This all points to a very fun time. Besides being able to listen to your favorite tunes, you will be able to receive any critical weather updates via NOAA through your marine radio receiver. What more could a person want for an incredible day! Let’s see…I think if you invite me on board, I’d like to hear some 50′s/60′s tunes, or maybe a bit of country! The good news is that you’re in charge of the music as it will be all your favorite recorded tunes. When purchasing a marine radio, make sure you have the “plug in” option for your MP3 or I-Pods as some of the radios don’t have that feature. You may as well get the radio that fits your lifestyle right at the get go!! Happy Boater.
Time for a summertime party?
With the summer season upon us, out thoughts naturally sway toward the “fun” side of life. It’s hard to beat the magical combination of friends, food, and fun – after all, that’s what makes up a party (the “magical ingredients”!) A “summer fun party” is greatly enhanced by music – YOUR favorite music. …but what if that requires you to have speakers placed around the hot tub – or out on the patio? Is moisture a problem for you? It is going to ruin your evening when your speakers get soaked with water and just quit working? They won’t quit working if you’re using marine speakers. These little speakers deliver high quality sound with extreme durability! They’re water proof so weather won’t interfere with your party! If they get splashed on while sitting in the hot tub – no worries! Your music will keep playing throughout the evening with digital quality. Good speakers truly are the key to good listening! One caution, though – make sure that the friends you invite to your party share your taste in music! Play it safe and be considerate as to what everyone else may like to hear also. Happy Boater.
Summer’s on its way – are you ready?
I’m sure we’re all ready for the summer season, but are we really ready for summer activities?? I think a lot of us are not – oh, the activities will happen alright, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that we’re ready for them. Let me explain. I’m sure there will be a lot of boats on the water this 4th of July and I’m sure most of them will have the required life jackets on board, but for a lot of us, that’s as far as it will go. There will be no flares, no first aid kit, no emergency lift raft, and most importantly, there will be no VHF marine radio! Now, this may be pure speculation on my part, but I really don’t think it will be far off from what I’ve seen when I’m out there. I see some real “hot dogs” out there, and just plain crazy drivers – some of which have had too much to drink and shouldn’t even be in the boat, much less driving one!! Remember, the VHF marine radio in many cases is your best source communication for immediate assistance because it is monitored 24/7 by the USCG and your transmission can be heard for approximately 20 miles over water. Besides that, there is the added convenience of hearing any late breaking weather updates. These could give you a “heads up” on any bad weather conditions and give you time to pull anchor and get to a safe harbor. Enjoy your summer and I hope you can answer the question of ”are you ready for summer?” with a positive response!! Happy Boater.
When you loose communication contact, you loose a lot…
Have you ever found yourself in a position where you really didn’t know where someone that you were looking for was? Maybe the area you were in didn’t have any cell phone service and you knew that if they were out driving, they didn’t have a 2 way radio or anything in the vehicle they were driving. If you have ever experienced this, you know just how helpless or unnerving this can be. Just this weekend, while out at our lake home, we had a part fail on the well and I had to run to town to find a part. My wife and her sister were out on the golf cart driving down 4-wheeler paths in the woods and they had been gone for about an hour. No telling where they could have been because there are so many paths they could have gone down. To make a long story short, I had to resort to writing a note, taping it on the door, and maybe take a brief drive down some of the main arteries to see if they were anywhere in sight before taking off to town. Sure would have been nice if they would have had a portable radio with them because more than likely they would not have been outside “broadcast” distance of about a mile with even a hand held CB Radio. Sure makes life much simpler if the right communication equipment is in place! Note: We even had a set of 2-way radios all charged up, but they had failed to take one with them. Sure doesn’t do much good if they aren’t used!! Happy Boater.
One thing a VHF Radio can’t do…yet…
As I observe what’s available in the marketplace in the category of VHF radios, I find high quality digital radios which are both durable and some are even waterproof (the hand held models). Water resistant covers are available for fixed mount radios so that water or inclement weather really isn’t an issue. However one thing that I’ve not seen any VHF radio
do is have the ability to take a picture, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see that available sometime in the future. After all, they make underwater cameras already – why not imagine the 2 rolled into one package?? As you think about it, it really isn’t a large leap to imagine something like that, is it? Sometimes it may be handy – maybe to take a picture of that prize fish you caught! Just in the last couple of weeks, I’ve encountered a couple if “picture moments” which I’ve missed due to lack of an available camera. Even my cell phone was not handy enough at the time to capture the “moment”. I observed a house cat coming out the ditch on the left side of the road – tail straight up in the air and “strutting” across the road in front of me when 3 deer came out of the ditch and followed the cat across the road! When then got to the other side, the cat disappeared into the long grass and the deer appeared to be looking for the cat – bewildered that they had lost sight of him. It was really funny!! Then 2 days ago, a bear climbed the 4×4 which I had anchored in 2 feet of concrete to get to my bird feeder. He ripped the log cabin bird feeder off the top of the pole and proceeded to have his feast of bird seed which was all over the ground. He left deep claw grooves in my 4×4 post as a lasting memory of his visit. I guess we have to put up with those things living in the country. Happy Boater.
Not many boats out there today…
For the past 3 days we have had small craft warnings out on Lake Superior with winds gusting up to 50 mph (and it actually seems a lot stronger than that as I listen to the rain and wind pounding against the windows of my home). Instead of being out on the lake my self, we took some friends and went for a ride up the shore in my vehicle and played the “good husbands” and let our wives do the touristy things and hit a lot of gift shops along the way and “grazed” at the little eating places also. We did have a fun day and were just as glad that we weren’t out in the elements in 50 degree temps (for this time of the year that’s redicul0us!) I guess this is one of the only parts of the country where we really don’t put away our winter things until after the 4th of July and we keep them handy from the 3rd week in August and on. This is the very kind of weather that you don’t even want to think about going out in without either a fixed mount VHF marine radio or a hand held VHF marine radio! You just can’t afford to be without one of these in rough waters. The rain will not even harm a hand held VHF radio, as it is waterproof to about 3 feet under water and it floats if dropped into water! That’s definitely good news to us fumble fingered people! Always be safe when venturing out on the water – or maybe the right thing for you to do is to stay off the water for a day during inclement weather and take your wife or girlfriend out and do the touristy things!! Happy Boater.
CB Radios, in some ways, bring you back to basics…
There was a time – not all that long ago – that the CB Radio was used widely for communication lines for a lot of rescue personnel. These radios have seemingly gone full circle and are coming back into the limelight. From the early 60′s to now we’ve seen quite a swing in the use of CB Radios…from being a “fad” in the early 60′s to very little use during the 70′s and 80′s (except for truckers) and now, since the 90′s we are seeing quite a recovery in popularity of these radios. Many, many “snowbirds” (as we call them) use CB Radios to communicate with their traveling partners as they pull their rigs south every fall. If you are one of those and maybe you don’t have a CB in your rig, let me tell you that Father’s Day is coming and what a great gift for him – something that all can use!! (best kind of gift!) This year as you travel south, you may be able to talk to others on the road and be able to zero in on where the best places to stop and eat are, or maybe where the best deal on fuel may be. We all need that!! It’s good to see so many CB’s coming back into use. The nice thing about them is that they are both fun and functional!! Enjoy. Happy Boater.
Crazy weather patterns make VHF radios more critical to own…
It seems like every time I look at the weather I see some place being battered with another terrible storm! Earthquakes, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, or raging forest fires seem to be in just about every newscast. In most of these instances, power has been lost in great areas, and multitudes of people cannot communicate with anyone for help. I would think that a small investment in a VHF marine radio (a hand held VHF marine radio) would be a logical thing to own in today’s world. My heart goes out to those whose lives have been torn apart by high winds which battered them to their core. Many have lost everything materially, but by some miracle have walked away with their lives. For some, that wasn’t to be. Now, I know that these little radios are most effective when you can send signal out in an unobstructed straight line, so they are most effective on water, but I know they are used on land as well and have become an effective tool for many as they are used on construction sites, farming, and in many other situations. Let’s take advantage of those wonderful lifesaving tools we have at our fingertips in today’s world. Happy Boater.
There’s comfort in knowing you have communication available…
Nobody likes being left out of something! Well, what if that “something” is not being able to communicate with someone else when you felt you needed to reach them? Now, cell phones are great – sometimes. What if you are out of cell range and have no service? That happens a lot up here in the in northern wilderness of Minnesota! Communication equipment – hand held VHF Radios – are now available for under $160 and could be the best investment you ever made – especially if you’re out on a boat and need help. These little units are waterproof, will float if dropped into the water, and have a range of approximately 5 miles. The USCG monitors channel 16 constantly 24/7 and are at your beck and call in the event of an emergency. Many lives have been saved to date simply because those rescued saw fit to invest a few dollars into their own security. Smart move. Have fun this summer, but be safe. Happy Boater.