Spent 90 minutes typing a description for each day but lost everything when i hit send.
Will try again later. Until then, everything is going very well and the boat is doing great! Lots of rain today. Hopefully it will clear up tomorrow.
UPDATE:
Day 1
We launched the boat at about 2pm. Isara volunteers, some Thai river police, restaurant staff, and a small tv crew were there for the send off. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to give a proper Goodbye to Ming and our volunteers because we were being rushed by the TV crew.
Once the boat was in the middle of the river I stopped the engine and started the “Think Before You Throw” audio message that plays on the loud speakers. For the next hour or two I just drifted. Only occasionally did I need to start the engine to move me away from shore.
The response from the message was good the entire time. People were waving and giving a thumbs up. Parents were lifting up their children in their arms so they could see the boat. I was happy to see parents encourage their children to wave at me instead of telling their children to divert their eyes from the strange man in the strange boat. It was reassuring that our campaign was a welcomed message.
At about 5pm it became clear that we were not moving as quickly as we had planned and that the boat was not going to reach Phon Pi Si before sunset. It was at this point I started to worry a little because there were not any places to safely park the boat. I kept floating down the river hoping that a perfect spot would be just around the next corner. No luck. The sun had set and now it was dark and lightning was in the distance. Now worry turned to panic as I turned on the spotlights and looked for anything to tie the boat to. With my binocuars I spotted a small shack in the distance. As I got closer I could see that it was a water pump station and there was a large metal pipe I could maybe get a rope around. I had never parked the boat alone before so I was really nervous. The fact that it was dark and about to storm only made things worse. Fortunately, after an hour of trying, I finally had the boat firmly secure to the shack. It was possibly the worst parking job in the history of boating but it worked.
Once the boat was safely docked I noticed a stowaway abandoned ship. A rat that had been living inside the hull made a run for it and made it back to land. I guess it has friends or family it needed to visit in the area.
The first night on the boat was ok. Took a while to get use to the noises. Distinguishig between noraml creeking and dangerous creeking. But, all-in-all, it was nice to have the first day behind me and it was nice to get some rest.
6 comments
Ginafish says:
July 16, 2011 at 2:09 am (UTC 0)
Try typing on your computer into wordpad, microsoft word, etc…saving repeatedly and then when you have edited to your hearts content, get your connection, copy and paste. Then sing Row, Row your boat.
Ming says:
July 16, 2011 at 12:00 pm (UTC 0)
Day 4 and still long way to go. Glad everything is going well.
Keep on going. Susu!!
Wes Jensen says:
July 16, 2011 at 12:44 pm (UTC 0)
Better yet, compose the post on your email browser and hit save draft after each section then send it to yourself before copy/pasting the text to the site, extra redundancy = less re-writes!
I remember writing a 5000ish word rant only to loose it when I was almost done..
Malin says:
July 16, 2011 at 12:55 pm (UTC 0)
What a shame you lost all the text. Hope you get time to write a new one. And save the text this time
Looking forward to hearing about the journey more in detail. And photos. Will there be photos at any point?
Kirk says:
July 16, 2011 at 2:39 pm (UTC 0)
guess i forgot to mention i am using a cell phone to type these posts, not a computer. i know to save often but this phone can’t.
Ginafish says:
July 16, 2011 at 2:54 pm (UTC 0)
I didn’t know you were using a cell phone. Oh well, Que Sera’, sera’! Send updates when you can, even twitter size.
Keep safe! Relax and get the recycle message out there. 