hi everybody....and happy new year, again!! here are some random pics..on the left is a shot of the soldering workshop we had aboard Ute before leaving Barra....for those of you that don´t know, Ariel is (are you sitting down) a level II solderer as certified by NASA. yes, NASA. out of control. and she´s not just brainy, she´s a benevolent teacher to boot. we resoldered our VHF antenna connections as part of the workshop and consequently tripled our VHF range. sweet!

the first pic is me swimming to Hebe...that´s right, I jumped ship....it was an easy daysail from Barra to Tenacatita, and Allen wanted to have a sailing race. I on the other hand wanted to just get there already and get in the water, because the only thign better than being on it, is being in it. Luckily, Bill was willing to race Allen (read: willing to kick Ute´s ass as usual) and Hebe wanted to lead Team Snorkel. so we swapped crew mid-sail! I was a little hesitant to jump in as we had just sailed through a swarm of weird, chainlike jellies the size of Wacky Noodles, but they either weren´t around or I dodged a gelatinous bullet on that one.