Official Google Blog: Google Maps for mobile now with Street View and walking directions

Now this is pretty cool, Google Maps for mobile now has walking directions. The question is when will they buy a site like Canal Plan, who have a lot of photos of the canals and then produce a boating directions guide with boat eye photos :)

Official Google Blog: Google Maps for mobile now with Street View and walking directions

Working on water :)

Hi All,

I've no idea how many people actually read this blog, maybe it's just my mum.. infact, maybe she doesn't read it?! Anyway, for those of you who have read it, thank you, and do leave some comments so I know your out there :)

As you will have seen from my previous post Sirius was broken into, since then I have tried to spend more time on Sirius, the problem is, as I work in IT I have a constant requirement to be online, so I needed a solution!

I have previously used various GSM and GRPS data cards and to be honest, none of them were really very usable compared to sitting at home connected to a broadband connection. This time around, my house mate Nick offered to lend me his Vodafone 3G data card, wow! What a difference! It was almost as good as being connected to a broadband connection and perfectly acceptable for working on Sirius, finally technology has caught up and floating working could become a reality :)

I was so impressed that the following week I signed up and bought one of the Vodafone 3G data cards. For those of your interested, I bought a Express Card version as they are Quad Band ( i.e. work pretty much in every country including USA ) and they support the full 7.2mb current maximum speed, where as some of the USB modem versions do not support the full speed.

If you are interested in getting one, go onto the Vodafone business site as they are not available in the consumer area. The costs FREE card and £15 / month for 24 months gets you 3GB of data per month. So far I have used about 100MB in 1.5 weeks, so it doesn't look like the 3GB limit will ever be a problem!

Jerry Cans from Freecycle

A couple of days ago I ran out of Diesel, miles from a filling stop, so I thought I would try and get hold of a couple of Jerry cans ( the big 20 litre fuel containers ). I decided to put a note onto Freecycle to see if someone had one they would like to give away, and low and behold, 24 hours later, I now have three!!

I am going to use them to give Sirius a good drink and then I will probably give one or two of them to a couple of my boatie friends :)

Boat vandals...

Sirius was unfortunately broken into twice this week, I think by some local kids from the Theale / Reading area. They were apparently spotted a couple of times, the first time was after they smashed a window for the second time, and the second time they were spotted they were again hanging around Sirius, looking like they were about to cause trouble.

2 white boys and 1 black... all on bikes.. unfortunately that is all the description I have, but if you moor around the Theale area along the K&A keep an eye out!

Now who's going to help me translate my blog into 37 languages !?

I just noticed the following post on the Blogger Buzz Blog. You can now create your blog with the user interface in one of 37 languages! I thought I might post my next few articles in Manderin, Arabic and Jedi ;-)

Blogger Buzz: Three new languages and a whole new direction for Blogger

Starter motor in for repair.

Well, a quick update for you all. It seems the reason Sirius was not starting very well ( or eventually at all ) was due to water damage to the starter motor. I took the starter motor off last weekend and have now been told by the service company it will cost me about £100 to get it fixed. Fingers crossed they do a good job and i'll be able to get Sirius moving again at the weekend :)

I have been neglecting Sirius a little!

Yes, it's true. I have been so busy this summer that Sirius has been rather neglected. So much so that I have not cruised anywhere for over 2 months! I need to replace the starter motor, and have a diesel heater to fit.

If anyone has any spare time and would like to help with some boat DIY just let me know... 

Form an orderly queue please... one at a time... no pushing I know you all can't wait to get your hands dirty ;-)