The Schooner Pride will be departing from the Aquarium Wharf at 360 Concord Street – to the left of the S.C. Aquarium – on July 4th at 7:00 PM and returning at 9:00. If the Patriot’s Point fireworks haven’t started yet, guests will be able to stay on board and watch from the dock – about the best seat you can get for this amazing show!

Tickets are only $42 per person and reservations are strongly recommended. They only have 49 seats available, and like always, it will be sold out!

Tickets can be purchased at www.schoonerpride.com or by calling 843-722-1112 or 800-979-3370.

Happy sailing!

Related Post(s)

1. Cruise ship pulling into Shem Creek
2. The world’s first electric hybrid sports boat
3. Discover shipwrecks at home with GE’s new Ocean layer
4. Abandoned boat law means fine and/or jail time
5. ‘Thriller Charleston’: speed boat excitement for the masses
6. Mt. Pleasant ‘Blessing of the Fleet’ 2008

From the Shem Creek blog.

The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th

NO, it’s not an April Fool’s joke in the middle of May, but thanks to PlanetInAction (via gearthblog), this amazing FREE Ship Simulator game lets you take the helm of several kinds of ships, including:

1. an airship,
2. a fuel ship,
3. a container ship, and
4. the Queen Mary 2 cruise ship!

What’s really amazing is the realism and visual & sound effects, which are based on Google Earth’s new visualization platform. It looks like the Charleston cruise ship business we’re hearing may move to Mt. Pleasant is now one step closer – something that would fit in great for Shem Creek Park patrons (if the water were deep enough of course) – people could just hang out in the park against the ocean and jump on their cruise ship to wherever when it leaves!

Back to reality, here’s a short video about “Ships”:

Thanks to Google’s latest Earth API release, it all runs in your browser via a geplugin.exe – which is currently using 23852K of RAM on my system – if you have the goods, it sure is cool!

UPDATE: Celebrity Cruises to call on Charleston – Celebrity Cruises has announced new sailings to the Caribbean from the Port of Charleston, a needed boon as the S.C. State Ports Authority bids adieu to its largest cruise customer, Norwegian Majesty. This fall, Celebrity Cruises marks its return to Charleston, kicking off a series of port calls that will continue through early next year and resume next fall. Norwegian Majesty made its last stop in Charleston on Friday.

Related Post(s)

1. Shem Creek Photos
2. Bioluminescence in Shem Creek
3. The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th
4. COPA paints up Shem Creek this Saturday
5. The world’s first electric hybrid sports boat
6. What’s in Shem Creek’s water
7. 3.4 acres of Shem Creek preserved
8. Discover shipwrecks at home with GE’s new Ocean layer
9. Abandoned boat law means fine and/or jail time
10. ‘Thriller Charleston’: speed boat excitement for the masses

From the Shem Creek blog.

Cruise ship pulling into Shem Creek

Chris Anthony, co-founder of the company that produces the Aptera 2e electric car, says their Epic Wakeboats 23E burns 50% less fuel and emits 1/2 as much CO2 as a typical wakeboard boat during a four-hour trip on the water.

The 22′ is a series hybrid that uses a small gasoline engine to drive a generator which keeps the lithium-ion batteries going as they empty out – similar to what’s in a Chevrolet Volt. The batteries are mounted along the centerline of the boat, and can be recharged from a common 110/220 volt wall socket.

The boat is expected to cost around $150,000 come July, but they hope to produce a $70,000 model by 2012.

If you’re still interested, the closest dealer right now is Southern Ski Boats up north in Virginia.

Related Post(s)

1. The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th
2. Cruise ship pulling into Shem Creek
3. Discover shipwrecks at home with GE’s new Ocean layer
4. Abandoned boat law means fine and/or jail time
5. ‘Thriller Charleston’: speed boat excitement for the masses
6. Mt. Pleasant ‘Blessing of the Fleet’ 2008

From the Shem Creek blog.

The world’s first electric hybrid sports boat

Like a million other people today, I played around with the newest version of Google Earth, that voyeuristic fantasy ride of an application that any wanna-be adventurer could easily get lost in for hours.

The first thing I checked with their new ‘Ocean’ layer is whether or not the excavation site for the H.L. Hunley was marked or not – unfortunately NOT. Then I figured I’d pull the lat. & long. coords. up and at least get an idea of exactly where it was, so I went to National Geographic because they were out there flying their helicopter the day the sub was pulled up – yea, I was there, and it was awesome!

Anyway, from the map they had in the article (see below), I saw that the U.S.S. Hunley was pretty much right next to the U.S.S. Housatonic, a wreck that WAS marked in GE (in the bottom right corner above Google’s 1st ‘G’ in the image above). So now you can at least see how shallow the water is there (40′ if I remember correctly) and then it starts dropping off big time a little further out.

About that excavation – I left Goat Island before dawn that morning with my buddy Steve Prescott and his two kids. We slipped through the inlet out to the excavation site, imagining what the submariners were feeling while lurking under those same waters back in 1864. There were hardly any other boats there at first, but then they started coming in droves. There were even people kayaking all the way out there! When the sub was finally raised, it was incredible, a real parade of boats on the water – kayakers, jon-boats, small boats, large boats, party boats, you name it! On the way in, people lined up on Sullivans Island, Patriots Point, everywhere they could, to get a glimpse at the H.L. Hunley finally raised from the ocean floor. Most of us followed the sub’s barge from the excavation site all the way to the lab where it sat for months being examined. We hung out there with about 30-40 other boats partying for a couple of hours, and wound up being one of the last ones to leave. Definitely a day I’ll never forget!

I’m sure over time, the H.L. Hunley and many other shipwrecks, hazards to navigation, and the like will be marked up in GE, ’cause it’s just awesome! I’ve even heard of scuba divers marking their trails and I bet it’s a cool toy for treasure hunters and salvage guys too.

Nice job Google! I can’t wait ’til the day we have underwater video!

1864 U.S.S. Hunley shipwreck off Charleston, S.C.
(Credit: National Geographic)

* UPDATE: 2/4/9 – The world’s 1st deep water webcam, looks like that’s a done deal!

Related Post(s)

1. The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th
2. Sunset Champagne Paddle Escape
3. Cruise ship pulling into Shem Creek
4. Paddle to the Sea: a kayak journey through the Carolina’s
5. Charleston Race Week, Canoe and Kayak Festival
6. Black Mingo Creek kayak trip and bird walk
7. The world’s first electric hybrid sports boat
8. Explore South Carolina from A-Z with ETV
9. Google chooses South Carolina for travel marketing campaign
10. Abandoned boat law means fine and/or jail time

From the Shem Creek blog.

Discover shipwrecks at home with GE’s new Ocean layer

This doesn’t apply to emergency situations, but the boat or watercraft is expected to be recovered if such an event occurs. An abandoned watercraft is one that has been moored, stranded, wrecked, is sinking, or sunk, and has been left unattended for more than 45 days.

The State’s new abandoned boat law stipulates that all expenses for the removal of any abandoned watercraft will be provided by the owner. Fines upon conviction of this misdemeanor are between $1000 and $5000 and/or imprisonment up to 30 days.

* UPDATE 2/26/09: The City of Charleston has approved a new law prohibiting abandoned boats and outboard motors in public waters within city limits also. Here’s a short video about the abandoned boat problem.

* UPDATE 4/1/9: Boats Too Costly to Keep Are Littering Coastlines

“I am overinsured on this boat. If I make it go away so no one will find it, the insurance company will give me enough to cover the debt and I’ll make something on the deal as well.”

Related Post(s)

1. ‘Bench Mark’, winners of the 2010 MegaDock Tournament
2. Shrimp: if you can’t catch’em, grow’em
3. The 8th Annual HMY-Viking MegaDock Tournament starts tomorrow
4. Charleston gets NOAA mention for Earth Day 2010
5. Coastal fish populations assessed via underwater video
6. Charleston Community Leaders’ Forum on Shoreline Change
7. The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th
8. They may be muddy, but oysters will survive – if we let them!
9. Cobia state record claimed by Hilton Head Island angler
10. New striped bass regulations in effect

From the Shem Creek blog.

Abandoned boat law means fine and/or jail time

Related Post(s)

1. The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th
2. Cruise ship pulling into Shem Creek
3. The world’s first electric hybrid sports boat
4. Discover shipwrecks at home with GE’s new Ocean layer
5. Abandoned boat law means fine and/or jail time
6. Mt. Pleasant ‘Blessing of the Fleet’ 2008

From the Shem Creek blog.

‘Thriller Charleston’: speed boat excitement for the masses

It was also cool to see some turtles – or were they tortoises? – and some slithery snake bracelets brought in by local animal lovers.

Unfortunately, all the money being spent here isn’t gonna be much help for Shem Creek’s shrimping boats if these gas prices stay so high and the amount of shrimp out there keeps dwindling.

Of course I took a bunch of pictures while I was there, click the clown to see a gallery of 27 of them.

Related Post(s)

1. Commercial shrimp season starts, more turtles are being caught
2. Mt. Pleasant Blessing of the Fleet 2009
3. Super-Intensive Raceway Shrimp Farming Technology (SIRSFT) is coming our way
4. Save Our Seas, a SC Aquarium event benefiting wildlife rescue at home and in the Gulf Coast
5. Shrimp: if you can’t catch’em, grow’em
6. Shem Creek has something in common with Louisiana’s Grand Bayou
7. The Schooner Pride continues the Tall Ships legacy July 4th
8. NOAA’s newest multipurpose vessel to assess fish, turtle stocks
9. Cruise ship pulling into Shem Creek
10. Mt. Pleasant Skate Park draws crowds

From the Shem Creek blog.

Mt. Pleasant ‘Blessing of the Fleet’ 2008