Hi Brian,

I've been reading the many different sources' news on your routing of the Nissin Maru from the grounds. I used to work as a liaison in American-Soviet joint fishing ventures in the Bering Sea so am familiar with catcher boats and factory ships and all they do. Yes the factory ships are enormous - hard for most civilian Americans to imagine.

Like you I was/am a hippie, have lived in several places, had had several careers and one of them was legal assistant. Now I am pleased to have just finished an 18-month certification in diagnostic medical ultrasound. It's just sonar at different frequencies, used to see inside live bodies. It was a big deal for me to start studying sonography, as it is yet another career for me and everyone in my classes was at least 15 years younger than me. It's done and now i really start the career

Anyway - it has been really exciting reading about your current voyage, listening to the interviews of your "officers" / fellow Greenpeacers/ team/ crew by the Australian media. The Aussies seemed to get the best, earliest news I could find in the hours when the N.M. had first been sighted.

Your accomplishments seem to me to be huge and I couldn't understand why it wasn't on more people's lips around here. Well, I realized that there are SO many hot news stories out there that they are all just quick blips on the endless screen of the internet news. It is what it is - everyone sees the blips differently. Still, you are a Big Blip to me!

I just watched Jiri's slide show on the Greenpeace site and was disappointed that I could not find a link to his name so I was wondering whether you would be kind enough to tell him that his photos are really lovely and convey the wonder one feels in seeing remote sights at sea.

So often I wished, when I was in the Bering Sea (no icebergs when I was there; also pre-internet) that I could tell someone, show someone, shake someone with the vistas that we saw and that so few people are privileged to see. Jiri did a great job of getting the message out and I will continue to point people to your site to read about the important work you are all doing.

Each of you has your areas of expertise on this voyage, and you are probably called upon to play a variety of roles. So I hope to read more about your various activities and thoughts aboard the Esperanza.

Keep up the great work. People out here ARE listening and watching and vicariously sharing your days. I watch the 3 Esperanza webcams a lot, remembering exactly how it is to gaze at the horizon for hours on hours on days, watch birds forever, long for friends who are back on the beach, and still to feel fortunate to be out there on the wild blue yonder.

One more thought - if I am ever at a gathering where people raise their glasses to toast others, I always think to myself (since so few understand that there is a whole nother world of people out there afloat), "Here's to those at sea!"

Regards from the beach (literally) in Southern California -

Larkin

Hi, nice site! Your hard work paid off