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15 August 2008
Montreal...at last...
07 August 2008 | 27 41'N:114 54'W,
Arrival at Turtle Bay, Mexico
02 August 2008
La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, Banderas Bay, Mexico.
30 July 2008 | 19 20'N:105 14'W,
More challenges...
27 July 2008 | 11 49'N:100 50'W, 490 mi. west of Guatemala City.
Things are "rotten in the State of Denmark"....
24 July 2008 | 04 10'N:094 19'W,
2 days out from the Galapagos
22 July 2008 | Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
Great news...bad news...
15 July 2008 | 3 35'S:88 16'W, SE Pacific...210 NM to go until Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos, Ecuador
Galloping to the Galapagos
11 July 2008 | 13 17.0'S:082 26.0'W, The SE Pacific...883 mi SSW from the Galapagos Islands.
"Mister Toad's Wild Ride"
09 July 2008 | 19 06'S:079 29'W, Somewhere in the SE Pacific, 1,270 mi from the Galapagos Islands.
"Too many collisions on the bus"
05 July 2008 | 28 23'S:073 08'W, Somewhere in the SE Pacific.
The "Chilean ChaCha"
03 July 2008 | 30 47'S:71 49'W, Travelling N on the Pacific - S30o47' W71o49'
First 4 days behind us...
01 July 2008 | 36 46'S:75 21'W, Travelling NW on the Pacific - S36o46' W75o21'
Finally on the "road" ! !
30 June 2008
Still in Valdivia, but leaving today!!!!(maybe)
27 June 2008 | Valdivia, Chile
We are just about ready to leave...
18 June 2008 | Valdivia.
Valdivia, and ES(Espiritu Santi, the name of the boat we will be sailing)
10 June 2008 | Valdivia and surroundings.
(No Title)
04 June 2008
In and around Valdivia, Chile.
03 June 2008 | 39 51.0'S:73 19.0'W, Valdivia, Chile
Finally in Valdivia, Chile
27 May 2008
Easter Island(Sailboat delayed..again!)
Montreal...at last...
15 August 2008
How nice it was to be awaken from a sun slumber by the sound of Don's 2 engine Beechcraft buzzing us at arount 300 ft.
It was quite the culture shock having so many people on board - Don (a short visit), Santi, of course and a cloce college friend, Pete.
After an incredible lunch of homemade vegi tacos (thank you Dale), Don left and the 5 of us set sail on our final leg to San Diego.
Santi quickly got busy reading every manual he could find, as well as checking out his new toy.
2 days later it was homecoming for Santi and ES. The slip wasn't ready so we anchored in a nearby bay...it was beautiful.
Joanne and I spent the Sunday in our rented car doing th tourist thing, had our final goodby dinner with Dale and were off on a 7:00AM flight to Montreal.
Now...what's next ...... will it be shipping my moto to Columbia in Janruary, and riding down to Patagonia, or will it be some serious trekking in southern China along the Hymalayan border in March ?
Stay tune.......
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Arrival at Turtle Bay, Mexico
07 August 2008 | 27 41'N:114 54'W,
We arrived at a perfect time Aug. 7/08 at 0700h in Turtle Bay to a beautiful sunrise. What a nice rest after four days of engine pounding against the wind and currents!
TB is a small tranquil local port around 350 miles south of San Diego. It's sole purpose in life is to provide a first fuel stop, not to mention a source of other equally important staples such as cerveza, rum, tequila. for all the sport fishermen heading down to Cabo San Lucas, a large sport fishing center at the very tip of Baja.
We are here to pick up Santi and his friend who are flying in on a private Beechcraft Baron owned by a friend of Dale's.....they should be here by noon. (We could all use friends like that!) Then it's a 2 day slog aginst the wind and current - as it was since leaving La Cruz - all the way to San Diego.
Joanne, who was a fabulous crew member, (and you can call her "sailor" now), AND established a personal record for the number of consecutive days at sea- 18 !!! and 2,300 miles !!!, will be arriving in Montreal on Monday.....I might hang out another few more days in San Diego.
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La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, Banderas Bay, Mexico.
02 August 2008
After arriving at Bahi Navidad to a fabulous hotel resort and marina, (Grand Bay Hotel, Isla Navidad Resort), we quickly realized that the cruising guide books were wrong and there were no services there. So early the next morning we powered our way to La Cruz.
Finally arrived in a spanking new marina, "Marina Riviera Nayarit" (www.marinarivieranayarit.com". We arrived here late Thursday nite.
Fortunately Dale had good dear friends John and Robin Bousha, on Avocet who have been at this marina for 2 months now. They were kind enough to arrange for a rigger (Mike Danielson...fantastic guy, who attended to our rigging problems) and a mechanic (John, who "popped" in today, 3 hours late, and seems to be spending more time on his cell than in the engine room....but woe to him because Dale is now on his case). We just hope he's done so we can leave tomorrow, Sunday morning.
So the rigging is now all ship shape...it's just the engine....and John...
La Cruz is just starting to be the next big spot on Banderas Bay....Puerto Vallarta, is the only other.....for now.
So our plan is now to sail up to Turtle Bay, Baja, Mexico, (approx 3 to 4 days) where we will pick up Santi, the owner, who will sail the rest of the way up to San Diego with us (approx. 2 more days). Santi graciously offered Joanne and I a berth on ES for a few days after we arrive so we can do the tourist thing around SD.
Last night Santi treated us to a fantastic dinner at a fantastic resto in La Cruz, "Frascati's" where we had a great dinner.
The days here are typically hot 35 - 37oC, and very humid, with the nights dropping only to the high 20's to low 30's.
Besides cleaning ES, Joanne and I are in the process of packing up our stuff and relocating to the starboard hull where we will spend the rest of the delivery. This will give Santi his privacy in the port hull.
Hopefully the next 6 days will go smoothly and we will all arrive safely and happy in SD.
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More challenges...
30 July 2008 | 19 20'N:105 14'W,
Well, we just lost our wind data for a second time...no solution in sight yet.
While beating to Banderas Bay last night in 25 kt winds - gusts to 30...and under bare poles, we decided to unfurl the staysail when the wind subsided to 20. Half way through the process part of the sail track broke off the self tacking boom. (BAD)
At first light we noticed the horizontal rigging that passes over the yoke and joins each of the 2 bows providing structural stability to the forward part of the 2 hulls, parted due to the "turnbuckle" unscrewing.....no cotter pin in sight!!! (BAD, BAD). On seeing this we decided it would be prudent to stop our course to Banderas Bay (70 miles) and head downwind (much gentler ride) to Bahia Navidad (40 miles).
Oh, and did I mention yesterday that our starboard engine alarm went off indicating there was no charging from the alternator. Upon inspection, I noticed the alternator ground wire was no longer attached to the engine block because the bolt holding it there CRACKED off....this is one of 3 bolts that holds the alternator bracket to the engine. Upon further inspection, I found a second bolt that broke off, which which is one of 2 that holds a fuel system part to the engine block.
Also our second reefing line somehow lost it's sheath....we will determine the cause of that in B. Navidad.
Oh, well, just another day breaking in a new boat....
So here we are, now sailing down wind through countless squalls to a safe harbour in B. Navidad for some much needed repairs.
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Things are "rotten in the State of Denmark"....
27 July 2008 | 11 49'N:100 50'W, 490 mi. west of Guatemala City.
Sunday July 27
The freezer has finally given up the ghost?.HOW DOES ONE HAVE HIS ?JOHNNY WALKER BLACK? ON THE ROCKS ?????
Trip so far 3824 miles. 643 nm to Banderas Bay (Puerta Vallarta) Mexico. 1050 nm to San Diego from there. We are Presently 490 NM off the coast of Guatemala
Everyone asks "what do you do all day out there on the boat?"
There is ?good? work, and ?bad? work when it comes to the mechanical side of our life at sea.
The ?GOOD? stuff consists of regularly scheduled and unscheduled maintenance due to normal wear and tear, such as engine oil and filter changes, watermaker filter changes, swapping out broken parts with new ones, inspecting lines and fittings on a daily basis, etc.
The ?BAD? stuff is the lots of extra work required, generally under poor conditions, because of poorly designed products and/or sloppy installation practices. Having to climb to the top of the 70 foot mast at sea 3 times ?twice to replace our wind instrument that just fell off ?BAD, and BAD?and once to re-route the spinnaker halyard to the exterior of the mast due to some mysterious chaffing inside the mast?BAD!
Replacing the defective ?Maxwell? hatch handles the other day, AFTER Maxwell assured us their handles were first class is an other example of ?BAD? work.
Well Friday, we inspected and adjusted the rigging(this would normally be a 20 min. job, but due to the cotter pins being inserted from the wrong direction as well as not being given the proper replacement pins, turned this into a 2 hour job?BAD), replaced the water pump ?GOOD?(will try to fix the old one tomorrow to have a spare available), daily cleaning inside and out, GOOD, watches, GOOD, and food prep, GOOD, emailing and blogging, GOOD, weather and route planning. GOOD
Dale made fresh banana bread, GOOD, towards the end of her watch so that Joanne and I woke up to the smell of it?.mmmmmmm. (It was make bread or turn the bananas into a science project in this heat). That was also the day we had vegetable and fresh ginger fired rice with toasted almonds and a fresh greens salad with Joanne's fabulous?vinaigrette, GOOD.
Sadly, Saturday was clean out the freezer and jettison approx. 15 kilo?s of beautiful Albacore and yellow fin tuna, as it is not operating at this time?..and the fridge is barely hanging in too. We figured that was a job done sooner rather than later as fish was definitely not a food that would improve with age.
Some lucky birds got lucky on that one!
Then there was the job of finding the problem with the fuel filler lines as the kitchen cabinets through which they ran were smelling suspiciously like a fuel dock. Turns out that I discovered that the overflow connection from the hose to the outside valve was not secure. Anyone who has ever owned a boat knows how hard it is to get THAT (diesel fuel) smell out. Most likely, the 4-5 scrubbings that have already been done will be succeeded by a few more. We will purchase some baking soda in Mexico which will help to complete that portion of the show. BAD, BAD, BAD !
Oh, and by the way, we had Ness's banana bread french toast with premium grade Canadian maple syrup(Extra Clair - the best!) for breakfast. (Joanne brought some goodies from home). Dinner was breaded eggplant with garlic pepper topped with fresh tomato and parsley sauce and grated reggiano?parmesana?(another addition to the provisioning courtesy of Joanne) accompanied by a repeat salad from yesterday-no complaints there.
As you can see from the menus, we are appreciating the remaining fresh ingredients that are surviving since Galapagos. The end of each leg of the trip presents its own challenges to remain creative and work with what you have. Fortunately Dale is an expert at this. During the 18 days from Valdivia to Galapagos, Alan came up with many fabulous crudites when the fresh greens were gone.?
Reading interspersed with quick rinses with the outside shower has topped the midday exercise routine as the temperature and humidity levels have reached an all-time high. .....low to mid 30's. Yesterday, Joanne's words of wisdom said it all " I am glad this is not someone else's book" as the sweat was running off her face while sitting and reading. It is a far cry from the winter weather in Valdivia and we are certainly not complaining. Poor time not to have ice, though.?Good time to make sun tea...another part of the daily routine. We have a spot on the deck between the pilot house and the secondary winches just inside of the spinlocks on deck that the container seems to ride nicely while brewing.?
Since leaving Galapagos, the wind gods have smiled upon us. We had favorable winds of sufficient velocity that we only ran the engines sporadically to charge the batteries. Friday and Saturday we headed more westerly than NNW to avoid some major thunderstorms that were lurking about. Commanders Weather service and Alex's daily buoy weather updates have kept us well informed and safe. Yesterday, we were back on the rhumbline and sailing along.....now we are motoring in what looks like "Lake Pacific."
Here is another example of a recent Commander?s Weather advisory;
?Dale and Ness, Thanks for your update. Was going to email to see how you were doing today.
Satellite shows strong thunderstorms in your region and wanted to give you a heads up.? Intense thunderstorms across the region bounded by 3-7N/87-96W with some smaller cells between 7-11N/96-100W.? All of these cells are generally sliding/expanding?to the SW.? Could see some sustained winds to 30kts and gusts to 40kts in some of these cells.
N of 10N and W of 100W there are no thunderstorms, currently.
Might be able to get away from most of the convection right now if you wanted to head W until about 98W then back on rhumbline.
These thunderstorms change constantly, however, and I can send you another short email like this in the afternoon with the latest positions and movements, if you can send me an updated position and conditions. ? Best regards Commander?s Weather?
No problem, plenty of fuel and good Volvo Penta 55 hp engines. We run one at a time and at cruising rpm we are able to maintain 8-9 knots with a gentle push from the sea.
It was a good time to shut off the engines and have a quick swim while checking the props and rudders. It was so hot, even I went in (but not before looking all around for the dreaded shark fins - did I mention that only my fear of sharks out ranks my fear of heights?). It was a very quick swim but one that felt good nonetheless. We drag a line behind the boat to hold on to when swimming as it there is always a deceivingly strong current even when the ocean looks so calm....good to stay attached to the boat at all times.
Since the night of five boobies(shitting all over our decks), we have been sailing with the only the tricolor navigation light way up at the top of the mast instead of the navigation lights that are mounted on either side of the pilot house. We suspected that it was these pilot house lights that were attracting the birds to our decks, and once extinguished, the bird visitor numbers have dropped off dramatically. Dale?s friend, Captain Michael DeLong confirmed this theory with an email:
The Red-footed Boobie, not to be confused with Booty, is of the?Gannet family and appears to suffer from the same 'moth/candle syndrome' as many birds do at night.? During heavy migrating periods in N.Y.C, many skyscrapers are?struck?by flocks of birds making their way along the Eastern Flyway of America after dark.?I believe it is the same concept?at work?there with?your boat.?
He also made references to me being a typical man who needs to grow female anatomical features and get a sense of nurturing (the Boobies(rather than tossing them into the sea)......just before he told Dale that he suggested that her sister grill the baby rabbits she is bottle feeding....oh well?.
The emails and humor are greatly appreciated. We can relate to the stories of people in the army who wait everyday for mail call.
We should be in Banderas Bay, Mexico Wednesday morning, where hopefully we can get our freezer and fridge (in that order) repaired for the last leg of our trip to San Diego.
OH, Happy Birthday to our good friend Hrair....61 years??, or is it 42?? , or perhaps 54 ??....oh, who cares...we love him just the same!
Love to all, Ness and Joanne
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2 days out from the Galapagos
24 July 2008 | 04 10'N:094 19'W,
Leaving Galapagos was almost as spectacular as arriving there. We sailed around the southern tip of Santa Cruz Island, up the eastern shore past Isla Seymour (where we had gone to see the wildlife) and on up through the chain. We were treated to a pod of dolphins escorting us around the tip of the island.
Our first night was a starry one and lying on the trampoline looking at the show of shows was breathtaking. Waiting to cross the equator could not have been in a better place. Most of the day and night we had winds of 10 knots and were sailing 9-10 knots with lots of sun.
Well, Joanne has been sailing with us for 2 full days now (since we left the Galapagos), and has quickly settled into the routine on ES.
Last night was quite strange in that we had 5 red footed Boobies either crash into or land on ES over the night. The first time it was sort of cute and Dale quickly became the "mother Boobie", but after seeing the mess these guys left on ES, we quickly ejected the rest of the freeloaders.
As I see it, based on our average speed of 9 kts, and 1,181 miles left to go to Banderas Bay (a few miles north of Puerto Vallarta), we should be there in slightly over 5 days.
Today is overcast, humid, and 85oF...it's really shaping up to be a lazy day....the only chores are to tighten up the standing rigging(the wires that hold up the mast), and change the secondary water filter for the water maker (an amazing machine that pumps the sea water at very high pressure through an extremely fine filter that removes all the salt and leaves behind only fresh water for our water tanks.
This is a lot more pleasureable than yesterdays crises when the rolling seas forced open the hatch under the companion way on the starboard side. This hatch is only foot or two above the water, and measures 2' by 2'. It's primary use is to provide an exit should ES flip over. This required the delicate task of removing the defective "Maxwell" hatch handles, all the while having gallons sea water from each passing wave being forced up my nose, and at the same time trying not to let go of any of the small pieces until the new spare handle was securely in place....a task that was repeated twice - once for each of the 2 handles - a total of almost 2 hours!
Anyways, as the old cliche goes, ..."a bad day at sea sure beats a great day at the office".
I miss you all.
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Great news...bad news...
22 July 2008 | Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
July 22, 2008
S 00o 44.8
W 090o 18.5
Hello everyone
Sorry for being so slack...
We actually arrived in the Galapagos on the 17th.
Well the Great news...bad news....
Alan had some urgent family matters to attend to and had to leave us here, but the GREAT news was that Joanne agreed to put her hectic schedule aside and fly out to Quito, Ecuador, and then on to the Galapagos to join us as the 3rd crew to San Diego, California.....about 15 days.
Many thanks to Santi for approving this change!
Today we are preparing to leave about 1200. The refrigeration repair tech is returning this morning and then we have the paperwork cha cha after that. Galapagos paperwork is a walk in the park compared to Coquimbo. The missing wind indicator has been installed on the top of the mast by yours truly, the electronics are back online and functioning properly, fuel is filled and the food will stay cold.
Our next planned port of call is Banderas Bay, Mexico. This has been a busy storm season so far and we have a decent weather window to "hop across" to the mainland just north of Puerta Vallarta. Banderas Bay is known for being a safe harbor against major storms and it is a good place to refuel and check for the next opportunity to press north to San Diego. Hurricaine Fausto is located near 20.4 N/116.8 W but will certainly have moved out of the way before we reach Puerta Vallarta area. Tropical Storm Genevieve is currently at 14.9 N/102.6 W and is moving west. This also is no threat to us. We will be heading on a rhumb line (direct route) to the harbor there unless the weather picture changes dramatically.
We have Alwoplast who are monitoring the buoy weather along our whole trip. Who said it is lonely out here? We feel so very supported and have up to date reliable weather information every day.
Galapagos has been a good place to regroup and prepare. Our agent here has helped us with all of our projects. There was some chafing on the anchor rode from the inside of the windlass so this morning he is delivering some more rode for us. We can splice it on as we get on our way. Alan is on his way home and Joanne has settled in as Swabby Junior. We had an official ceremony as Alan passed along his sailing gloves to her. A viewing of Capatin Ron is imminent to assure her understanding of how things work aboard ES.
The Darwin Center whose main function is research and breeding of endangered indigenous animals is just a 15-minute walk up the main street of town. (appropriately named Charles Darwin Ave) It is truly amazing to be able to be so close to these wonderful creatures.
The fish market in town is a small lagoon where the pangas come in with their fresh catch. The fisherman clean and sort their fish under a roof on tables with running water. The fish is amazing and their audience, pelicans, herons, and sea lions are most entertaining. We bought a yellow fin tuna that weighed 16 lbs without the head and tail for 26 dollars. Not too shabby for beautiful toro and maguro. They had wahoo, grouper and snapper as well.
On Sunday, not much gets done around here so Alan, Dale, and I took a tour to Isla Seymour just to the north of Santa Cruz Island. (This was the same tour that Joanne took while she was waiting for us to arrive here in the Galapagos.) It was a 45 minute bus ride and then 1 hour on a motor boat to the island. It is a national park that is very well protected. We hiked with our guide and a group of 15 people and enjoyed seeing nesting Blue Footed Boobies, several species of Frigates and their offspring of varying ages, land iguanas, Galapagos sharks, and many other types of birds. They are so protected that they are not afraid of humans and have no reaction to us coming by busily snapping pictures. Upon returning to the boat after several hours we were treated to a wonderful lunch of fresh fish and vegetables with rice as we motored our way across the channel to a pristine beach where we snorkeled and beach comber for 1 1/2 hours. After that, we returned to land and tried to stay awake on the bus ride back. It was a most amazing day and quite a treat from the work schedule.
So, friends we head off today for our next adventure on our way to San Diego. Santi and Carolina are very excited to have us closer and closer to their home. I am more excited about getting closer and closer to being home!
Love, Ness
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Galloping to the Galapagos
15 July 2008 | 3 35'S:88 16'W, SE Pacific...210 NM to go until Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos, Ecuador
Well we are happily sailing with the spinnaker on our downwind trek to Santa Cruz. Over the last five days, the wind has finally cooperated, come from SSE and is pushing us gently towards our stop over in Galapagos. On this entire trip, we have only used the main sail 4 times, only for brief periods. I expect that things will be quite different north of the equator on our way up to San Diego where historically the winds and the currents will conspire against us.
We finally decided to fish and not 10 minutes after putting out our hand line with a green squiggly lure on it, we had a smallish dorado (mahi-mahi) on the hook. They are such incredibly beautiful fish?an incredible bluish yellow iridescent green. His youth was apparent and we felt a sense of relief when he was off the hook. I have always had trouble wanting to kill such a beautiful creature despite the delicious taste they provide. Now, a tuna, well, I think I can get over it in my quest for some fresh toro. Dale had brought several cans of wasabi powder from home in anticipation of some fresh sushi along the way. It would be a shame not to use it.
We have been exchanging many emails with our friends at Alwoplast, the builders of ES, who have been our supporters, our tech support and our companions on this trip. One of their recent communications was to tell us that they are having a plate of Monica's sushi in our name. The things friends do for friends!
The cooking continues to be in the forefront of our afternoon conversation as a result of Dale?s legendary cooking. We?ve had homemade french bread and vegetable-lentil soup, pasta with tomato sauce, fresh cornbread, pan-grilled fish tacos in a quesadilla style, home made pizza, various risottos, and so on and so forth. As we get further from our last stop, the fresh salads have morphed into crudite as the harder veggies keep longer. Alan and I continue to be very nice to Dale as she?s the only one who knows how to make fresh bread.
We are all looking forward to our arrival in Galapagos. The new wind indicator is now in the hands of our agent, Johnny Romero who will help us arrange for any other parts or repairs we need.?There is an anchorage there with water taxis available to take us to shore for $.50 a ride. Customs and immigration is close to the harbor and should be a simple task there. Certain ports are well known for a relaxed governmental attitude making the paperwork cha-cha slow down to a waltz tempo.
Typically the talk has begun as to what everyone wants to have on the first trip ashore-cappucino, ice cream, fresh salad, rib steak, etc.?It seems that we will arrive either very late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning, depending on the wind gods. But at least we know that no mater what happens with the wind, according to our latest calculations, we have enough fuel to motor all the way there.
Early this morning, just after sunrise, Dale who was on watch, saw an open motor boat about 18-20 ft bobbing just off our port bow with the outboard engine lifted up out of the water. The three men in it began waving their arms when we approached. They were a long way from anywhere - at least 300 nm from any land. Dale called me to get up in case we needed to help them. Of course, when flying the spinnaker, it would have to be doused to turn in their direction. While I looked through the binoculars to check them out, I noticed a black flag off the starboard bow. It occurred to us that they could be waving us AWAY from them. We maneuvered to the right of the flag instead of between the vessel and the flag. Well, they stopped waving, put their engine down and motored off like it was a normal thing to be way out here in that itty bitty boat. They were clearly out there fishing by stringing a line between thier boat band the black flag. We checked the radar thinking that perhaps they belonged to a larger vessel, sort of a "mother ship" in the area. No boat showed up on the radar within 36 nm of us and neither did their little boat. Glad Dale spotted them.
Next edition from the Galapagos, 60 miles south of the equator.
Crew of Espiritu Santi?. Ness, Dale, and Alan
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"Mister Toad's Wild Ride"
11 July 2008 | 13 17.0'S:082 26.0'W, The SE Pacific...883 mi SSW from the Galapagos Islands.
Hi, Here is Dale's "newsletter" (with a few small edits)!
Please feel free to write to us at this email address. It is better if you start a new message rather than hit "reply" , and thanks for all of your communications......but please - no attachments or pics!
While a smooth, glassy surface over the ocean is beautiful to see, it is not a sailor's delight. The last two days have been almost void of wind and we are motoring at a lower RPM to conserve fuel. The Commanders Weather forecast is for fair SSE winds starting tonight. These are supposed to last through Monday. We will be delighted by that as it will be a great spinnaker sail because the winds will be behind us. Hopefully, it will happen soon.
The smooth seas do, however, have their up side. Yesterday we were treated to the incredible sight of a pod of 6 pilot whales. They followed us for about 20 minutes diving down and surfacing, blowing water out of their blow holes. I took some great pictures of them that I will send from Santa Cruz, Galapagos. ?Marine mammals bring with them a sense of awe that is not diminished by the number of times a sailor is fortunate enough to see them. This was Alan's first time seeing whales, but their effect was equally wonderous for us all.
The autopilot is working well now ? at least keeping ES on a compass direction rather than sailing towards a waypoint - and we are getting much reading done as sail changes are not relevant at this time. We have had some squid commit suicide on the decks, a few birds resting at night and many different types of birds swirling around behind the boat. There is always something to fix on a delivery like this, and this time, it was the spinnaker halyard.?
The first day we flew it, after three hours, there was visible chafing on the halyard (the line that hauls the sail up the mast for those of you wondering what a halyard is). My guesstimate is that the mast is around 70 ft high. ?When flying a sail that has such force behind it, we check often with the binoculars to see how things are looking at the top of the mast. We put a piece of fuel line around the part that was chafing, but it was too fat to fit through the shiv(pully). After closer inspection, it was definitely coming from inside the mast, not outside. The only solution to that is to rig another halyard outside the mast. This is a simple task, one that requires someone going up the mast in a bosun's chair (a small canvas seat that is pulled up to the top of the mast by an unused halyard), and one that is much easier accomplished in port. I offered to go up ?and got half way there when I had to admit that my legs were not strong enough to wrap my self around the mast. Soooo...once again, rather than swim with the sharks, Ness conquered his fear of heights and went up. Of course the boat was moving with the swells and the higher he got the more the mast swayed side to side. It was quite a ride- "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride?! This, for our Chilean friends is a hectic amusement ride at Disneyland that shakes you all around. Not a fun thing in the middle of the ocean while clinging to a mast and carrying tools.
All's well that ends well, and the mission was accomplished. We got to fly the spinnaker for the rest of the day and are waiting patiently for the opportunity to do it again.
Alan has perfected his tortilla making skills and is the exclusive creator of those on an almost daily basis to accommodate our fish stash. Now that we are addicted, they are excellent vehicles for butter, cinnamon and sugar, peanut butter, cream cheese and just about anything else you can think of. Tonight they will most likely be Italian style with grated parmesan and olive oil to accompany our pasta dinner. ?We have been enjoying some amazing different soups and hope that soon it will be too warm to want them. The fresh veggies are nearing the end but don't worry, we will survive.
Making sun tea has been entertaining and Alan has taken over most cleaning chores until it gets warm out and then he and Ness can fight over who gets to swab the decks. Ness loves that job when it is sunny. When the weather and winds are like this, the meals are fabulous and the boat sparkles---we are looking forward to multiple sail changes, the mainsail raising and lowering resemble a Chinese fire drill. (for our Chilean friends, that is a ridiculous teenage pastime that consists of a bunch of kids driving in a car and when they stop at a traffic light everyone gets out, runs around the car and gets back in before the light turns green) Sounds like fun, but it does resemble putting up and taking down the main sail.
We were noticing that the sunrise was getting ridiculously late, so we changed our clocks one hour back?. Which will be Galapagos time. What a power trip to be able to control time for our own benefit !
We are currently off the coast of Peru and glad not to be stopping for fuel. Who knows what that would be like!
That's about all for now...hope you are enjoying the ride along with us.
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"Too many collisions on the bus"
09 July 2008 | 19 06'S:079 29'W, Somewhere in the SE Pacific, 1,270 mi from the Galapagos Islands.
July 9/08
First of all, thanks so much for all of your emails. Always nice when ?it? says ?you have mail?.
Now, about the title- "too many collisions on the bus??"
We still are not sure what it means but it is a BAD message to see on your ?NKE? autopilot display. The next message, just as ominous was, "EPROMM corrupted"....and these were followed by a few others equally as confusing.
The ?auto pilot? is an electronic device in which you input either a compass direction or a waypoint(destination) consisting of a latitude and longitude, push the ?auto? button, and presto, ES sails (steers) all by itself. Hand steering is fun too, but only for the first 30 seconds.
We were sailing along in light winds, doing just fine, when the auto pilot alarm went off and I began our intimate relationship with the underneath of the helm station where all the electronics are. This happened July 6 around 1600-just when we were discussing our dinner menu - how rude. We spent quite a bit of time with the NKE manual and inspecting wiring by crawling in the compartment under the helm. We remembered the days on end seeing only the legs and feet of the electrician, Hector, at Alwoplast, thinking that it looked very uncomfortable. So, add 35 years (older) and the movement of a boat being hand steered to the mix??.not that much fun.Of course, it was Sunday so no technical support was available other than a few sat.phone calls to Chris (the designer, and user of NKE instruments), who had several suggestions, but, alas, no cigar. We wrote a detailed email documenting all the error messages, everything we had tried and what had happened. This was sent to Santi, (o wner), Chris (designer), and Roni(engineer) at Alwoplast. The next morning, we received an email from Roni with his suggestion - essentially re-booting the on board computer system. We tried it and it successfully brought back most of our auto pilot systems. Dale remembered once in the weeks of struggling with the NKE at Alwoplast that he had held down two buttons and restarted it, but none of my combinations of buttons had worked on Sunday. It is working now! We also received emails from Chris and tech support at NKE - much thanks to everyone who was very responsive to our plight.
We were a grateful crew to not be hand steering 24 hours a day - it was cutting into our reading time on watch and made group dining virtually impossible.
Anyway, winds are still light but have moved aft of the boat. So, spinnaker sailing it is! The wind/weather predictions from our friends at Commanders Weather have been very accurate. We are expecting SE winds (behind us) through the day today (Tuesday) changing tonight or tomorrow to E which will mean a beam reach with main and genoa. Despite the light winds, we are making avg 8 -9 knots with either spinnaker in the day or Genoa at night. On a beam reach, it will be great sailing too.
Talking about the spinnaker, there were issues here too. You see, sailing a new catamaran ?straight out of the box? like ES is great, but like any new, extremely complex ?device? there are many bugs to be worked out. For example, when we first tried to set the spin(spinnaker) a huge (approx. 1,000 sq.feet) complex, light weight, and colorful colorful sail that is used when the wind is coming from the stern(back of the boat), we discovered that none of it?s bits and pieces were assembled. Since in all our years at sea neither Dale or I ever assembled one, we put our collective heads together and after a couple of hours we got it right the first time, and 30 min. later it was flying as gracefully as any spin can. But as the winds often do, they slowly backed easterly and they were soon on the beam (side of the vessel) which required the dousing of the spin. It was then that we noticed that it?s halyard (the rope that pulls it up to the top of the mast) became badly frayed/chaf fed from rubbing against something at the top and INSIDE the mast. This required another excursion to the top of the 70?mast in order to install an external block (pulley ? I?ll make a sailor out of you(s) yet!).
To be pulled up to the top of a mast is scary at any time, especially for someone like me who?s only 2 fears are sharks and heights?.YIKES ! And add to this, doing it on moderate seas with fairly large swells, which tremendously exaggerates any motion 70? up. Just imagine trying to work 70? high, sitting in a little canvas chair at the end of a 15mm line while being thrown around like a fly at the end of a fly fishing line. It took every bit of strength just to hang on to the mast, notwithstanding the job of attaching a new block and threading the old halyard through it.This whole procedure lasted 1.5 hours and then I finally reached terra firma (ES), I was beaten up, and exhausted.The spin now flies freely!
Another problem occurred 4 days ago when we lost our wind sensor. It literally fell to the deck from the top of the mast and is now unrepairable?.probably not screwed down properly. While not a matter of life and death, this instrument is a huge time saver in that it tells us the wind speed, calculates the true and apparent wind direction, graphically displays the angle and where where the wind is coming from. This helps us immensely in the choosing of our sail plan.
We have a new-found appreciation of the small Chilean flag on the flag halyard. It is working very well as a directional indicator.
It has been some great fish eating onboard since leaving Valdivia with Monica's provisions and also with the lucky "catch" from Coquimbo. Tonight we will try some Robalo chilean style from Monica (our sushi lady from Valdivia). Alan made some homemade tortillas the other night and the fish tacos were been great. Last night we had our first homemade pizza onboard. As the days go by at sea, talk of menus and cooking become more and more prevalent.?
To Dale?s amazement, neither Alan or I had ever seen "Captain Ron", a classic movie and a viewing requirement on most boat trips. Dale brought the DVD. After seeing what a "swabbie's" duties are, Alan swabbed the decks this morning while Ness opened the window and said "get me another brewskie, swabbie," in classic Captain Ron mode. I think I may have created a monster...male bonding???
Today, we have cloudy skies but yesterday and today were in the mid 70s temp. We have graduated to a full time uniform of shorts and t-shirts! ?The graceful spinnaker is pulling us along at 7-8 knts in very light winds. All is well with the world. Dale calculated the fuel reserves and we have enough for 72 hours at 2200 rpm one engine at a time, which yields about 8 kts. We are sailing as much as possible to save those reserves for when they might be truly needed. During the last 3 days we have been averaging 180 miles a day. We have 1270 NM to get to Santa Cruz island in the Galapgos, Equador??.. Did I just see 9 kts, 9.6, 10???? All right!!
PS?once again, thanks to Dale for her help, and input, in crafting my blogs.
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OceanDrive Yacht Deliveries n o r m n e s s 3 2 2 0 r i d g e w o o d, a p t. 4 0 1 m o n t r e a l, q c., c a., h 3 v 1 b 9 c e l l: +1 . 5 1 4 . 4 9 7 . 1 6 1 1 e m a i l: firstname.lastname@example.com www.oceandrive.ca � Captain, International Yachtmaster Certified (# OF1251) [...]
� 200 tons unrestricted � sail endorsed. (This endorsement significantly exceeds the USCG �6 pack� Captain�s license.) � Experienced (sail) crew/1st mate/captain. � Offshore, transat, coastal, intracoastal, dingy racing � Heavy weather experience. � Good mechanical ability. � Canadian passport. � Languages spoken; english, french. � Canadian Sail Squadron courses- Seamanship, navagation, GPS. � Currently teach � Basic Boating �, � Navigation �, and � Piloting �, at � Power and Sail Squadron �. � University education. � Worked 30 yrs. with Xerox Corp. (now retired). � Excellent health, no medications. � Adaptable, fit, strong, mature, non smoker, social drinker. � Married � References on request. � Compensation required�to be discussed. Voyages completed in the last 10 years in the capacity of captain/first mate. All vessels were sailing vessels, between 32 and 61 ft. Total sea miles = 44,430 nm. Total sea time = 575 days Last 6 deliveries were done during the years 2005 to 2008. �100 nm. Virgin Islands (end to end). �50 nm. Lake Champlain, NY. (end to end) �280 nm. Rhode Island to Atlantic City �1,500 nm. Toronto to Abacos via. Oswego & Erie Canals, Intracoastal, Beaufort, Walker�s Key, Marsh Harbor. �800 nm. Stamford to Bermuda via offshore route. �1,100 nm. Long Island, N.Y. to Miami via offshore route. �4,200 nm. St. Thomas, USVI. to Ireland via Bermuda and Azores. �700 nm. Fort Meyers to Cuba (round trip) via Key West, Havana, Santa Lucia, Dry Tortugas. �200 nm. Miami to Key West. �200nm. Fort Meyers to Key West �500 nm. Fort Meyers to Isla Mujares, Mexico via Dry Tortugas. �3,800 nm. Stuart Fl. to Ireland via Bermuda and Azores, including sailing both the south and eastern coasts of Ireland. �1,600 nm. Annapolis Md. direct to Tortola, BVI. �4,500 nm. Panama City direct to French Polynesia. �1,300 nm. Puerto Rico to Florida via S.Cacos, Great Exuma, and Nassau. �7,000 nm. Cape Town, South Africa to Trinidad via St. Helena and Brazil. �4,500 nm. Barcelona, Spain to Oxford, MD. via Gibralter, Madeira and Bermuda. �1,600 nm. Annapolis Md. to Tortola, BV �5,000 nm. USVI to Tahiti, French Polynesia, via Panama Canal, Galapagos, Marquesas, and Tuamotus. �5,500 nm. Valdivia, Chile to San Diego, CA., via Galapagos, EC., and Banderas Bay, MX.
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Montreal...at last...
Arrival at Turtle Bay, Mexico
La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, Banderas Bay, Mexico.
More challenges...
Things are "rotten in the State of Denmark"....
2 days out from the Galapagos
Great news...bad news...
Galloping to the Galapagos
"Mister Toad's Wild Ride"
"Too many collisions on the bus"
The "Chilean ChaCha"
First 4 days behind us...
Finally on the "road" ! !
Still in Valdivia, but leaving today!!!!(maybe)
We are just about ready to leave...
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subset: commoncrawl


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Trouble sleeping? Here are 11 sleep strategies | Canadian Immigrant
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text:
Solr supports location data for use in spatial/geospatial searches.
Using spatial search, you can:
Index points or other shapes
Filter search results by a bounding box or circle or by other shapes
Sort or boost scoring by distance between points, or relative area between rectangles
Generate a 2D grid of facet count numbers for heatmap generation or point-plotting.
There are four main field types available for spatial search:
(now deprecated) and its non-geodetic twinPointType
(RPT for short), includingRptWithGeometrySpatialField
, a derivative -
is the ideal field type for the most common use-cases for lat-lon point data. It replaces LatLonType which still exists for backwards compatibility. RPT offers some more features for more advanced/custom use cases and options like polygons and heatmaps.
is for indexing and searching non-point data though it can do points too. It can't do sorting/boosting.
is for indexing bounding boxes, querying by a box, specifying a search predicate (Intersects,Within,Contains,Disjoint,Equals), and a relevancy sort/boost like overlapRatio or simply the area.
Some esoteric details that are not in this guide can be found at http://wiki.apache.org/solr/SpatialSearch.
Here's how LatLonPointSpatialField
(LLPSF) should usually be configured in the schema:
<fieldType name="location" class="solr.LatLonPointSpatialField" docValues="true"/>
LLPSF supports toggling indexed
, stored
, docValues
, and multiValued
. LLPSF internally uses a 2-dimensional Lucene "Points" (BDK tree) index when "indexed" is enabled (the default). When "docValues" is enabled, a latitude and longitudes pair are bit-interleaved into 64 bits and put into Lucene DocValues. The accuracy of the docValues data is about a centimeter.
Indexing Points
For indexing geodetic points (latitude and longitude), supply it in "lat,lon" order (comma separated).
For indexing non-geodetic points, it depends. Use x y
(a space) if RPT. For PointType however, use x,y
(a comma).
If you'd rather use a standard industry format, Solr supports WKT and GeoJSON. However it's much bulkier than the raw coordinates for such simple data. (Not supported by the deprecated LatLonType or PointType)
Searching with Query Parsers
There are two spatial Solr "query parsers" for geospatial search: geofilt
and bbox
. They take the following parameters:
The radial distance, usually in kilometers. RPT & BBoxField can set other units via the setting
. pt
The center point using the format "lat,lon" if latitude & longitude. Otherwise, "x,y" for PointType or "x y" for RPT field types.
A spatial indexed field.
(Advanced option; not supported by LatLonType (deprecated) or PointType) If the query is used in a scoring context (e.g., as the main query in
), this local parameter determines what scores will be produced. Valid values are:-
: A fixed score of 1.0. (the default) -
: distance in kilometers between the field value and the specified center point -
: distance in miles between the field value and the specified center point -
: distance in degrees between the field value and the specified center point -
: distance between the field value and the specified center point in thedistanceUnits
configured for this field -
: 1 / the distanceDon't use this for indexed non-point shapes (e.g., polygons). The results will be erroneous. And with RPT, it's only recommended for multi-valued point data, as the implementation doesn't scale very well and for single-valued fields, you should instead use a separate non-RPT field purely for distance sorting.
When used with
, additional options are supported: -
: The relative overlap between the indexed shape & query shape. -
: haversine based area of the overlapping shapes expressed in terms of thedistanceUnits
configured for this field -
: cartesian coordinates based area of the overlapping shapes expressed in terms of thedistanceUnits
configured for this field
(Advanced option; not supported by LatLonType (deprecated) or PointType). If you only want the query to score (with the above
local parameter), not filter, then set this local parameter to false.
The geofilt
filter allows you to retrieve results based on the geospatial distance (AKA the "great circle distance") from a given point. Another way of looking at it is that it creates a circular shape filter. For example, to find all documents within five kilometers of a given lat/lon point, you could enter &q=:&fq={!geofilt sfield=store}&pt=45.15,-93.85&d=5
. This filter returns all results within a circle of the given radius around the initial point:
The bbox
filter is very similar to geofilt
except it uses the bounding box of the calculated circle. See the blue box in the diagram below. It takes the same parameters as geofilt.
Here's a sample query:
&q=:&fq={!bbox sfield=store}&pt=45.15,-93.85&d=5
The rectangular shape is faster to compute and so it's sometimes used as an alternative to geofilt
when it's acceptable to return points outside of the radius. However, if the ideal goal is a circle but you want it to run faster, then instead consider using the RPT field and try a large distErrPct
value like 0.1
(10% radius). This will return results outside the radius but it will do so somewhat uniformly around the shape.
When a bounding box includes a pole, the bounding box ends up being a "bounding bowl" (a spherical cap) that includes all values north of the lowest latitude of the circle if it touches the north pole (or south of the highest latitude if it touches the south pole). |
Filtering by an Arbitrary Rectangle
Sometimes the spatial search requirement calls for finding everything in a rectangular area, such as the area covered by a map the user is looking at. For this case, geofilt and bbox won't cut it. This is somewhat of a trick, but you can use Solr's range query syntax for this by supplying the lower-left corner as the start of the range and the upper-right corner as the end of the range.
Here's an example:
&q=:&fq=store:[45,-94 TO 46,-93]
LatLonType (deprecated) does not support rectangles that cross the dateline. For RPT and BBoxField, if you are non-geospatial coordinates (geo="false"
) then you must quote the points due to the space, e.g., "x y"
Optimizing: Cache or Not
It's most common to put a spatial query into an "fq" parameter – a filter query. By default, Solr will cache the query in the filter cache.
If you know the filter query (be it spatial or not) is fairly unique and not likely to get a cache hit then specify cache="false"
as a local-param as seen in the following example. The only spatial types which stand to benefit from this technique are LatLonPointSpatialField and LatLonType (deprecated). Enable docValues on the field (if it isn't already). LatLonType (deprecated) additionally requires a cost="100"
(or more) local-param.
&q=…mykeywords…&fq=…someotherfilters…&fq={!geofilt cache=false}&sfield=store&pt=45.15,-93.85&d=5
LLPSF does not support Solr's "PostFilter".
Distance Sorting or Boosting (Function Queries)
There are four distance function queries:
For more information about these function queries, see the section on Function Queries.
is a distance function that takes three optional parameters: (sfield,latitude,longitude)
. You can use the geodist
function to sort results by distance or score return results.
For example, to sort your results by ascending distance, enter …&q=:&fq={!geofilt}&sfield=store&pt=45.15,-93.85&d=50&sort=geodist() asc
To return the distance as the document score, enter …&q={!func}geodist()&sfield=store&pt=45.15,-93.85&sort=score+asc
More Spatial Search Examples
Here are a few more useful examples of what you can do with spatial search in Solr.
Use as a Sub-Query to Expand Search Results
Here we will query for results in Jacksonville, Florida, or within 50 kilometers of 45.15,-93.85 (near Buffalo, Minnesota):
&q=:&fq=(state:"FL" AND city:"Jacksonville") OR {!geofilt}&sfield=store&pt=45.15,-93.85&d=50&sort=geodist()+asc
Facet by Distance
To facet by distance, you can use the Frange query parser:
&q=:&sfield=store&pt=45.15,-93.85&facet.query={!frange l=0 u=5}geodist()&facet.query={!frange l=5.001 u=3000}geodist()
There are other ways to do it too, like using a \{!geofilt} in each facet.query.
Boost Nearest Results
Using the DisMax or Extended DisMax, you can combine spatial search with the boost function to boost the nearest results:
&q.alt=:&fq={!geofilt}&sfield=store&pt=45.15,-93.85&d=50&bf=recip(geodist(),2,200,20)&sort=score desc
RPT refers to either SpatialRecursivePrefixTreeFieldType
(aka simply RPT) and an extended version:
(aka RPT with Geometry).
RPT offers several functional improvements over LatLonPointSpatialField:
Non-geodetic – geo=false general x & y (not latitude and longitude) — if desired
Query by polygons and other complex shapes, in addition to circles & rectangles
Ability to index non-point shapes (e.g., polygons) as well as points – see RptWithGeometrySpatialField
Heatmap grid faceting
RPT shares various features in common with LatLonPointSpatialField
. Some are listed here:
Latitude/Longitude indexed point data; possibly multi-valued
Fast filtering with
filters, and range query syntax (dateline crossing is supported) -
Well-Known-Text (WKT) shape syntax (required for specifying polygons & other complex shapes), and GeoJSON too. In addition to indexing and searching, this works with the
(GeoJSON Solr response-writer) and[geo f=myfield]
(geo Solr document-transformer). -
Sort/boost via
— although not recommended
Important: Although RPT supports distance sorting/boosting, it is so inefficient at doing this that it might be removed in the future. Fortunately, you can use LatLonPointSpatialField as well as RPT. Use LLPSF for the distance sorting/boosting; it only needs to have docValues for this; the index attribute can be disabled as it won't be used. |
Schema Configuration for RPT
To use RPT, the field type must be registered and configured in schema.xml
. There are many options for this field type.
The name of the field type.
This should be
. But be aware that the Lucene spatial module includes some other so-called "spatial strategies" other than RPT, notably TermQueryPT*, BBox, PointVector*, and SerializedDV. Solr requires a field type to parallel these in order to use them. The asterisked ones have them. spatialContextFactory
This is a Java class name to an internal extension point governing support for shape definitions & parsing. If you require polygon support, set this to
– an alias fororg.locationtech.spatial4j.context.jts.JtsSpatialContextFactory
; otherwise it can be omitted. See important info below about JTS. (note: prior to Solr 6, the "org.locationtech.spatial4j" part was "com.spatial4j.core" and there used to be no convenience JTS alias) geo
, the default, latitude and longitude coordinates will be used and the mathematical model will generally be a sphere. Iffalse
, the coordinates will be generic X & Y on a 2D plane using Euclidean/Cartesian geometry. format
Defines the shape syntax/format to be used. Defaults to
is another popular format. Spatial4j governs this feature and supports other formats. If a given shape is parseable as "lat,lon" or "x y" then that is always supported. distanceUnits
a| This is used to specify the units for distance measurements used throughout the use of this field. This can be
. It is applied to nearly all distance measurements involving the field:maxDistErr
and thescore
when score isdistance
, orarea2d
. However, it doesn't affect distances embedded in WKT strings, (e.g.,BUFFER(POINT(200 10),0.2)
), which are still in degrees.distanceUnits
defaults to eitherkilometers
is true`, ordegrees
replaces theunits
attribute; which is now deprecated and mutually exclusive with this attribute. distErrPct
Defines the default precision of non-point shapes (both index & query), as a fraction between
(fully precise) to0.5
. The closer this number is to zero, the more accurate the shape will be. However, more precise indexed shapes use more disk space and take longer to index.Bigger
values will make queries faster but less accurate. At query time this can be overridden in the query syntax, such as to0.0
so as to not approximate the search shape. The default for the RPT field is0.025
.For RPTWithGeometrySpatialField (see below), there's always complete accuracy with the serialized geometry and so this doesn't control accuracy so much as it controls the trade-off of how big the index should be. distErrPct defaults to 0.15 for that field. maxDistErr
Defines the highest level of detail required for indexed data. If left blank, the default is one meter – just a bit less than 0.000009 degrees. This setting is used internally to compute an appropriate maxLevels (see below).
Defines the valid numerical ranges for x and y, in the format of
ENVELOPE(minX, maxX, maxY, minY)
. Ifgeo="true"
, the standard lat-lon world boundaries are assumed. Ifgeo=false
, you should define your boundaries. distCalculator
Defines the distance calculation algorithm. If
, "haversine" is the default. Ifgeo=false
, "cartesian" will be the default. Other possible values are "lawOfCosines", "vincentySphere" and "cartesian^2". prefixTree
Defines the spatial grid implementation. Since a PrefixTree (such as RecursivePrefixTree) maps the world as a grid, each grid cell is decomposed to another set of grid cells at the next level.
then the default prefix tree isgeohash
, otherwise it'squad
. Geohash has 32 children at each level, quad has 4. Geohash can only be used forgeo=true
as it's strictly geospatial.A third choice is
, which is generally more efficient thanquad
, provided there are many levels — perhaps 20 or more. maxLevels
Sets the maximum grid depth for indexed data. Instead, it's usually more intuitive to compute an appropriate maxLevels by specifying
And there are others: normWrapLongitude
, datelineRule
, validationRule
, autoIndex
, allowMultiOverlap
, precisionModel
. For further info, see notes below about spatialContextFactory
implementations referenced above, especially the link to the JTS based one.
Standard Shapes
The RPT field types support a set of standard shapes:
points, circles (aka buffered points), envelopes (aka rectangles or bounding boxes), line strings,
polygons, and "multi" variants of these. The envelopes and line strings are Euclidean/cartesian (flat 2D) shapes.
Underlying Solr is the Spatial4j library which implements them. To support other shapes, you can configure the
attribute on the field type to reference other options. Two are available: JTS and Geo3D.
JTS and Polygons (flat)
The JTS Topology Suite is a popular computational geometry library with a Euclidean/cartesian (flat 2D) model.
It supports a variety of shapes including polygons, buffering shapes, and some invalid polygon repair fall-backs.
With the help of Spatial4j, included with Solr, the polygons support dateline (anti-meridian) crossing.
Unfortunately Solr cannot include JTS due to its LGPL license.
You must download it (a JAR file) and put that in a special location internal to Solr: SOLR_INSTALL/server/solr-webapp/webapp/WEB-INF/lib/
You can readily download it here: https://repo1.maven.org/maven2/com/vividsolutions/jts-core/.
It will not work if placed in other more typical Solr lib directories, unfortunately.
JTS's license is expected to be transitioned to BSD by the end of 2017.
Set the spatialContextFactory
attribute on the field type to JTS
When activated, there are additional configuration attributes available; see
for the Javadocs, and remember to look at the superclass's options as well.
One option in particular you should most likely enable is autoIndex
(i.e., use JTS's PreparedGeometry) as it's been shown to be a major performance boost for non-trivial polygons.
<fieldType name="location_rpt" class="solr.SpatialRecursivePrefixTreeFieldType"
distanceUnits="kilometers" />
Once the field type has been defined, define a field that uses it.
Here's an example polygon query for a field "geo" that can be either solr.SpatialRecursivePrefixTreeFieldType or RptWithGeometrySpatialField:
&q=*:*&fq={!field f=geo}Intersects(POLYGON((-10 30, -40 40, -10 -20, 40 20, 0 0, -10 30)))
Inside the parenthesis following the search predicate is the shape definition. The format of that shape is governed by the format
attribute on the field type, defaulting to WKT. If you prefer GeoJSON, you can specify that instead.
Beyond this Reference Guide and Spatila4j's docs, there are some details that remain at the Solr Wiki at http://wiki.apache.org/solr/SolrAdaptersForLuceneSpatial4.
Geo3D and Polygons (on the ellipsoid)
Geo3D is the colloquial name of the Lucene spatial-3d module, included with Solr. It's a computational geometry library implementing a variety of shapes (including polygons) on a sphere or WGS84 ellipsoid. Geo3D is particularly suited for spatial applications where the geometries cover large distances across the globe. Geo3D is named as-such due to its internal implementation that uses geocentric coordinates (X,Y,Z), not for 3-dimensional geometry, which it does not support. Despite these internal details, you still supply latitude and longitude as you would normally in Solr.
Set the spatialContextFactory
attribute on the field type to Geo3D
<fieldType name="geom" class="solr.SpatialRecursivePrefixTreeFieldType"
spatialContextFactory="Geo3D" planetModel="WGS84"/><!-- or "sphere" -->
Once the field type has been defined, define a field that uses it.
The RptWithGeometrySpatialField
field type is a derivative of SpatialRecursivePrefixTreeFieldType
that also stores the original geometry internally in Lucene DocValues, which it uses to achieve accurate search. It can also be used for indexed point fields. The Intersects predicate (the default) is particularly fast, since many search results can be returned as an accurate hit without requiring a geometry check. This field type is configured just like RPT except that the default distErrPct
is 0.15 (higher than 0.025) because the grid squares are purely for performance and not to fundamentally represent the shape.
An optional in-memory cache can be defined in solrconfig.xml
, which should be done when the data tends to have shapes with many vertices. Assuming you name your field "geom", you can configure an optional cache in solrconfig.xml
by adding the following – notice the suffix of the cache name:
<cache name="perSegSpatialFieldCache_geom"
When using this field type, you will likely not want to mark the field as stored because it's redundant with the DocValues data and surely larger because of the formatting (be it WKT or GeoJSON). To retrieve the spatial data in search results from DocValues, use the [geo]
transformer — Transforming Result Documents.
Heatmap Faceting
The RPT field supports generating a 2D grid of facet counts for documents having spatial data in each grid cell. For high-detail grids, this can be used to plot points, and for lesser detail it can be used for heatmap generation. The grid cells are determined at index-time based on RPT's configuration. At facet counting time, the indexed cells in the region of interest are traversed and a grid of counters corresponding to each cell are incremented. Solr can return the data in a straight-forward 2D array of integers or in a PNG which compresses better for larger data sets but must be decoded.
The heatmap feature is accessed from Solr's faceting feature. As a part of faceting, it supports the key
local parameter as well as excluding tagged filter queries, just like other types of faceting do. This allows multiple heatmaps to be returned on the same field with different filters.
Set to
to enable faceting. facet.heatmap
The field name of type RPT.
The region to compute the heatmap on, specified using the rectangle-range syntax or WKT. It defaults to the world. ex:
. facet.heatmap.gridLevel
A specific grid level, which determines how big each grid cell is. Defaults to being computed via
). facet.heatmap.distErrPct
A fraction of the size of geom used to compute gridLevel. Defaults to 0.15. It's computed the same as a similarly named parameter for RPT.
A cell error distance used to pick the grid level indirectly. It's computed the same as a similarly named parameter for RPT.
The format, either
(default) orpng
You'll experiment with different |
Here's some sample output in JSON (with "…" inserted for brevity):
counts_ints2D=[[0, 0, 2, 1, ....],[1, 1, 3, 2, ...],...]}
The output shows the gridLevel which is interesting since it's often computed from other parameters. If an interface being developed allows an explicit resolution increase/decrease feature then subsequent requests can specify the gridLevel explicitly.
The minX
, maxX
, minY
, maxY
reports the region where the counts are. This is the minimally enclosing bounding rectangle of the input geom
at the target grid level. This may wrap the dateline. The columns
and rows
values are how many columns and rows that the output rectangle is to be divided by evenly. Note: Don't divide an on-screen projected map rectangle evenly to plot these rectangles/points since the cell data is in the coordinate space of decimal degrees if geo=true or whatever units were given if geo=false. This could be arranged to be the same as an on-screen map but won't necessarily be.
The counts_ints2D
key has a 2D array of integers. The initial outer level is in row order (top-down), then the inner arrays are the columns (left-right). If any array would be all zeros, a null is returned instead for efficiency reasons. The entire value is null if there is no matching spatial data.
If format=png
then the output key is counts_png
. It's a base-64 encoded string of a 4-byte PNG. The PNG logically holds exactly the same data that the ints2D format does. Note that the alpha channel byte is flipped to make it easier to view the PNG for diagnostic purposes, since otherwise counts would have to exceed 2^24 before it becomes non-opague. Thus counts greater than this value will become opaque.
The BBoxField
field type indexes a single rectangle (bounding box) per document field and supports searching via a bounding box. It supports most spatial search predicates, it has enhanced relevancy modes based on the overlap or area between the search rectangle and the indexed rectangle. It's particularly useful for its relevancy modes. To configure it in the schema, use a configuration like this:
<field name="bbox" type="bbox" />
<fieldType name="bbox" class="solr.BBoxField"
geo="true" distanceUnits="kilometers" numberType="pdouble" />
<fieldType name="pdouble" class="solr.DoublePointField" docValues="true"/>
BBoxField is actually based off of 4 instances of another field type referred to by numberType. It also uses a boolean to flag a dateline cross. Assuming you want to use the relevancy feature, docValues is required. Some of the attributes are in common with the RPT field like geo, units, worldBounds, and spatialContextFactory because they share some of the same spatial infrastructure.
To index a box, add a field value to a bbox field that's a string in the WKT/CQL ENVELOPE syntax. Example: ENVELOPE(-10, 20, 15, 10)
which is minX, maxX, maxY, minY order. The parameter ordering is unintuitive but that's what the spec calls for. Alternatively, you could provide a rectangular polygon in WKT (or GeoJSON if you set set format="GeoJSON"
To search, you can use the {!bbox}
query parser, or the range syntax e.g., [10,-10 TO 15,20]
, or the ENVELOPE syntax wrapped in parenthesis with a leading search predicate. The latter is the only way to choose a predicate other than Intersects. For example:
&q={!field f=bbox}Contains(ENVELOPE(-10, 20, 15, 10))
Now to sort the results by one of the relevancy modes, use it like this:
&q={!field f=bbox score=overlapRatio}Intersects(ENVELOPE(-10, 20, 15, 10))
The score
local parameter can be one of overlapRatio
, area
, and area2D
. area
scores by the document area using surface-of-a-sphere (assuming geo=true
) math, while area2D
uses simple width * height. overlapRatio
computes a [0-1] ranged score based on how much overlap exists relative to the document's area and the query area. The javadocs of BBoxOverlapRatioValueSource have more info on the formula. There is an additional parameter queryTargetProportion
that allows you to weight the query side of the formula to the index (target) side of the formula. You can also use &debug=results
to see useful score computation info.


text:
Stewart Subsidiary Helps Belize Empower Land Owners
June 16, 2011
The Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment of Belize, in collaboration with Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), have awarded Stewart Global Solutions, a division of PropertyInfo Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Stewart Information Services Corporation (NYSE: STC), the Land Management Program III–Expansion of the Land Information System contract. This contract is part of the third phase of Belize's National Land Management Program (LMP), intended to develop a national land policy framework focusing on both private and public sector development through secure land tenure.
Stewart began work in Belize in 2006, when the company was awarded a contract for the development and implementation of a land information system. Stewart's proprietary land information management solution, landfolio, has automated and integrated Belize's public land records and cadastral maps under a single software platform. This solution provides the government with a comprehensive property management toolkit to oversee and administer its property records.
"Stewart Global Solutions has been a trusted consultant for the Government of Belize in working through a period of institutional and technical reforms seeking to improve both the implementation of land policy and the efficiency and effectiveness of our land administration," noted Beverly Castillo, chief executive officer of Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment. "Implementing landfolio has greatly helped our land administration in a number of ways, including decreasing the amount of time it takes to register property, offering the ability to register property in six government district offices throughout the country rather than just one location at our capital, and providing the capacity to access to all registration documents through the government's electronic database."
Land Management Program III – Expansion of the Land Information System will be implemented within a 15-month period and involves an expanded implementation of Stewart's landfolio solution to the departments of Planning, National Estates, Valuation and Inland Revenue/Cashiering.
"Stewart Global Solutions is proud to continue its work in Belize," said Jill Urban-Karr, executive vice president of Stewart Global Solutions. "Because much of the challenge of implementing a land information management system is not only technical, but human resources-related, Stewart is developing mechanisms to ensure project sustainability for the Government of Belize and their technical staff once the Stewart consultancy is completed."
Building on the company's core belief that social stability and increased prosperity are created when citizens own their homes, land and/or buildings, with clear, readily transferable title to their property, Stewart provides a wide range of solutions, including landfolio, consulting services and property information management that promote individual private land ownership.
"We have been providing land information modernization solutions for more than 30 years within the U.S. and 20 years internationally," said Stewart Morris, Jr., president and co-CEO of Stewart Information Services Corp. "Stewart offers a full suite of products and services created to protect land rights and improve the security, transparency, accessibility, accuracy and reliability of land information. We are, in fact, the only company with the resources needed to help countries at any stage of development, from land policy to land registration and cadastre solutions all the way through to guaranteeing the validity of property ownership and mortgages."
Through its offices in Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, Europe, Latin America and the U.S., Stewart offers the following core products and services:
- Consultation on land law and privatization
- Development of land policy and regulatory frameworks
- Improving the conveyancing process
- Instilling comfort and security for mortgage lenders to facilitate investments
- Issuing title insurance and related products
Contact ALTA at 202-296-3671 or [email protected].


text:
Concord Hospitality Earns Marriott High Speed Internet Certification
RALEIGH, N.C., January 22, 2013—Concord Hospitality Enterprises, one of the top-ranked hotel developer/owner/operators in North America, today announced that it has been certified by Marriott International to provide high speed internet service to all Marriott-branded hotels in North America. With this certification, Concord becomes one of only 17 certified service providers authorized to install and maintain the complex internet needs of individual Marriott hotels.
"Reliable high speed internet access is no longer an option for hotels, it's a necessity," said Brian Cornell, senior vice president information technology for Concord. "At Concord, we've invested heavily in making sure that our hotels provide a consistently superior technology offering, and by certifying vendors, Marriott is assuring that level of service across its brands. Prior to Marriott deciding to embark on a certification process, we had been self-installing high speed internet for all of our owned and managed hotels since 2000, so we were well aware of the challenges and the opportunities."
The rigorous certification process involved nearly nine months of testing on key pieces of equipment and laboratory examinations to ensure the vendor's ability to assure online safety, reporting compliance, configuration capabilities, equipment standards and much more.
"There were some 200 vendors providing services to Marriott hotels at the start of this process," Cornell said. "We made a strategic decision to pursue this new line of business by investing in a new testing lab and a custom-built, web-based reporting system so that ultimately we would be one of the few companies with demonstrated capabilities to meet Marriott's high standards.
"Some hotels will be understandably reluctant to switch vendors," Cornell added. "However, this program will ensure that hotels consistently receive enterprise class equipment and the right levels of maintenance and service support. We are the only certified vendor that also owns and operates hotels, so I'm confident that our unique understanding of hotel operations will enable us to earn the confidence and business of our fellow hoteliers."
Concord's team of engineers and technicians is supported by a US-based, 24-hour customer support center that will handle routine connection issues commonly experienced by travelers.
About Concord Hospitality
Concord Hospitality Enterprises Company, an award-winning hotel management and development company based in Raleigh, N.C., manages 90 upscale select-service and full-service hotels offering more than 12,000 guest rooms in 24 states and two Canadian provinces. The company operates hotels and resorts under such well-known industry elite brands as Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt, Starwood, and Choice Hotels, as well as select independent boutique hotels. Formed in 1985, Concord is routinely listed among the nation's top management companies and recently won some of the industry's top honors from Marriott International and Hyatt. Concord properties are some of the most awarded hotels in the country, having won nearly 100 top honors in the past two years. For more information, visit www.concordhotels.com.


text:
Multiple Mailings
You've set up your profile and now you are ready to start mailing, so where do you begin? What do you do if you are spoilt for choice? Chances are you're going to mail more than one person... Read More »
Meaningful Matches
Are you getting too many matches or too few? If you've looked at your match scores with other members you will have noticed that it's a two way calculation that generates the match score... Read More »
First Mails and Dates
How do you start off an email love affair? What do you talk about on a first date? Whilst first impressions do count, long term success relies on getting to know each other... Read More »
Opening Lines
When it's time to contact someone for the first time, what's the best approach? It's all a question of style: your style. Read More »
Getting Noticed
It's all about getting noticed! Here are a few tips to get the most out of flirting or dating online... Read More »
Online Dating Safety
So you've taken the plunge and set up a profile online... What now? Here are a few practical safety guidelines to think about. Read More »


text:
The first question is "what is junk/noncoding DNA?" And the answer is,
"Non-coding" in this context means "non-protein-coding." An important function of our DNA is to specific the sequences of subunits (amino acids) in the proteins that (along with other types of molecules) make up our bodies. When molecular biologists discovered in the 1970s that about 98% of our DNA does not code for proteins, some biologists called non-protein- coding DNA "junk."This is misleading. You can consult the excellent article by Ryan Gregory on the origin of the term "junk DNA" to see what it meant in 1972: A word about "junk DNA". The bottom line is that the original meaning of the term "junk DNA" was much closer to what we now call pseudogenes. "Non-coding DNA" is that portion of the genome that does not encode amino acids. In the original paper by Susumu Ohno (1972) there was plenty of discussion about functional noncoding DNA (centromeres, regulatory sequences, spacer DNA). In addition, every scientist in 1972 knew that there were functional genes for tRNAs and ribosomal RNAs in the noncoding DNA.
There was never a time when knowledgeable molecular biologists equated "junk" DNA and "noncoding" DNA. That doesn't mean that there weren't slip-ups from time to time as less knowledgeable scientists published articles on genome organization. There are even modern scientists (and science writers) who make the mistake of confusing "noncoding" with "junk."
My point is that if you are going to answer the question accurately then you should represent the consensus view of most scientists who know that lots of noncoding DNA has a function. You should also attempt to present the modern view of junk DNA instead of implying that forty year old concepts still hold sway. The modern view is that junk DNA is that part of our genome that has no known function. It does not include noncoding regions like regulatory sequences, RNA genes, centromeres. telomeres, origins of replication, recombination hotspots, splice sites, minimal intron length, and scaffold attachment regions (SARs).
The interviewer is Denyse O'Leary and her sympathies are clear in the followup question, "Why was it called "junk" in the first place? And why does all this remind me of one of those auction program episodes where someone is storing leftover carpet nails in what turns out to be a Ming dynasty vase? My mom loves those."
Jonathan Wells answers,
According to Charles Darwin's theory, all living things are descendants of common ancestors that have been modified solely by unguided natural processes that include variation and selection. In the modern version of his theory—neo-Darwinism— genes control embryo development, variations are due to differences in genes, and new variations originate in genetic mutations. In the 1950s, neo-Darwinists equated genes with DNA sequences (Francis Crick called DNA "the secret of life") and assumed that their biological significance lay in the proteins they encoded. The 98% of our DNA that does not code for proteins was attributed to molecular accidents that have accumulated in the course of evolution.There's so much wrong with this answer that it's difficult to know where to begin. Maybe I'll just summarize in point form and elaborate in the comments if anyone wants to discuss it further.
"The amount of DNA in organisms," neo-Darwinist Richard Dawkins wrote in 1976, "is more than is strictly necessary for building them: A large fraction of the DNA is never translated into protein. From the point of view of the individual organism this seems paradoxical. If the 'purpose' of DNA is to supervise the building of bodies, it is surprising to find a large quantity of DNA which does no such thing. Biologists are racking their brains trying to think what useful task this apparently surplus DNA is doing. But from the point of view of the selfish genes themselves, there is no paradox. The true 'purpose' of DNA is to survive, no more and no less. The simplest way to explain the surplus DNA is to suppose that it is a parasite, or at best a harmless but useless passenger, hitching a ride in the survival machines created by the other DNA." (The Selfish Gene, p. 47)
Since the 1980s, however, and especially after completion of the Human Genome Project in 2003, biologists have discovered many functions for non-protein-coding DNA. If the Ming vase is a living cell and the leftover carpet nails are "junk DNA," it turns out that the nails are not only made of gold, but they also make an essential contribution to the beauty of the vase.
- Implying that junk DNA has anything to do with Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection is totally wrong. No matter how you define "neo-Darwinism" the fact remains that most biologists who believed in adaptation were very skeptical of junk DNA precisely because it didn't fit with Darwin's view of evolution. The idea that as much as 90% of our genome could be junk was very much a minority view in the 1970s and it's probably still a minority view.
- Dawkins was writing about selfish DNA when he wrote that passage in The Selfish Gene. Selfish DNA is not junk DNA. It has an adaptive purpose and a function. It is completely wrong to claim that Richard Dawkins was a big fan of junk DNA in the 1970s. Dawkins makes that very clear in The Extended Phenotype when he proposes various explanations for the extra DNA in our genome.1
- The statement, "The 98% of our DNA that does not code for proteins was attributed to molecular accidents that have accumulated in the course of evolution" is wrong. There was never a group of knowledgeable scientists who thought that all noncoding DNA was due to accidents. Beginning in the 1970s, there were some who thought that a majority of our genome is junk and some (I am one) still think that as much as 90% could be junk. It's worth emphasizing that this view (that most of our genome is junk) was promoted by a relatively small number of scientists and never adopted as the consensus view of the majority of biologists.
- It is misleading to imply that many functions of noncoding DNA have been recently discovered. The only discovery that could even remotely fall into that category would be additional categories of small RNAs that weren't known before. The well-characterized examples account for less than 2% of the genome. Everything else is speculative and controversial.
In a word, evidence. The first to emerge was the fact that almost all of an organism's DNA is transcribed into RNA. (So although most of it may be non-protein-coding, it codes for RNA.) From a Darwinian perspective, this is surprising: Why would an organism struggling to survive devote so many of its internal resources to producing supposedly useless RNA? Indeed, since 2003 it has become clear that non-protein-coding RNAs perform many essential functions in living cells.Among those of us who advocate junk DNA there are very few who have changed their minds in the past decade. Why is that? It's because we simply don't believe that the "evidence" of widespread transcription is meaningful. Those scientists who oppose the concept of plentiful junk DNA may have taken comfort from the transcription data but their minds weren't changed either. The truth is that there was, and is, a genuine scientific controversy and it has not been settled in spite of what the Intelligent Design Creationists tell you.
Pseudogenes constitute one type of so-called "junk DNA." These are segments of DNA that resemble segments that elsewhere (or in other organisms) code for protein. Yet RNAs transcribed from some pseudogenes have been found to function in regulating how much protein is produced by the DNA segments they resemble.Even if you added up all of the known examples of this phenomenon from every investigated species and stuffed them into a single genome it wouldn't amount to more than 0.01% of the genome. And there's no reason to think that the phenomenon is anything more than an interesting exception.
Repetitive DNA, in which a non-protein-coding sequence is repeated many times, is another type of so-called "junk DNA." Yet repetitive DNA is now known to regulate many essential functions, including embryo implantation in mammals.Also misleading. A few examples from diverse species do not make a difference. Indeed these exceptions tend to "prove the rule" rather than overthrow it. Wells is deliberately misleading his audience but he's in good company since there are many scientists who do the same thing. In order to have a serious impact on the junk DNA debate it's not sufficient to show that a few bits of repetitive DNA have gained a function in some species. You have to show that this generalizes to the 50% of the genome that's made up of repeated DNA of various sorts.
There is also growing evidence that non-protein-coding DNA can perform functions that are independent of its sequence. One example is the region of a chromosome (called a "centromere") that attaches it to other structures in the cell. Another example is the retina in the eyes of nocturnal mammals, in which non-protein-coding DNA acts like a liquid crystal to focus scarce rays of light.There are many known functions of noncoding DNA. They've been known for decades. As a general rule, the proponents of junk DNA seem to be better informed about these regions of the genome than their opponents. It hasn't made a difference in the past and it doesn't now. (Centromeres account for about 2% of the genome. They fall into the 10% that's known not to be junk.)
Denyse's last question is about me. "Can you interpret this for me, from Larry Moran (University of Toronto evolutionary biologist): "I don't demand civility, but I do demand accuracy. When Denyse and her friends say that Darwinists promoted junk DNA I have to draw the line." But he must be referring to my observation that originated in Francis Collins's (US government's chief 2000 genome mapper's [!]) statements in a well-received and widely read book. Are there two types of truths at work here? Evidence, and … what? "
When I use the term "Darwinist," I mean someone who accepts and defends the theory I describe in my answer to Question 2. Crick and Orgel were Darwinists in this sense; so are Miller, Dawkins, Coyne, and Avise—all of whom have promoted the myth of junk DNA. When Collins published The Language of God in 2006, he not only promoted junk DNA but also wrote that "Darwin's theory of evolution, that is, descent from a common ancestor with natural selection operating on randomly occurring variations" is "unquestionably correct" (pp. 127, 141). Sure sounds like a Darwinist to me.Several of these scientists have written about pseudogenes and the fact that their existence provides strong support for evolution and strong evidence against the existence of an intelligent designer. Most (all?) biologists understand that pseudogenes are an example of junk DNA. Wells has chosen the one example of junk DNA where there's an overwhelming consensus. They are junk.
Collins also wrote that intelligent design is a "God of the gaps" position that is doomed to collapse with further advances in science (p. 193). But Collins has it exactly backwards: He and other promoters of the myth of junk DNA have put their faith in a "Darwin of the gaps" argument that must now retreat in the face of new advances in genome research.
But that's not what the scientific debate is about. Pseudogenes are not a myth. They are a fact, and they make up as much as 2% of the mammalian genome. The scientific debate is about whether most of our genome is really junk DNA. I think Francis Collins supports this idea, with some reservations, but I don't know about Jerry Coyne or Kenneth Miller or Richard Dawkins. John Avise is, of course, one the main proponents of junk DNA being a majority of our genome. His book Inside the Human Genome: A Case for Non-intelligent Design was published just last year (2010). It's for those needing an antidote after reading the upcoming train wreck by Jonathan Wells.
It is extremely misleading to claim that "Darwinists" promoted the idea that most of our genome is junk. Most biologists are skeptical of that claim and that's especially true of those who would be comfortable calling themselves "Darwinists."
Denyse closes with one of her characteristic comments.
Okay, everyone, back to work tomorrow in Darwinworld, where facts like these do not matter in the least.That's why I call them "IDiots." Facts matter to real scientists. The tough part about being a scientist is deciding what's a fact and what's not. Well showed us that he was not up to the task of behaving like a real scientist when he wrote Icons of Evolution and I suspect he's about to provide us with another example of misinformation and selective reading of the scientific literature.
1. Dawkins recognizes that there is some junk in our genome—pseudogenes are a good example—but that does not mean he buys into the idea that a huge percentage of our genome is just junk.


text: FULTON Pearl River Wildcats easily disposed of Northwest Mississippi Rangers here Monday in the quarter-final round of the MACJC State Tournament underway at Itawamba CC and now moves on to Wednesday 3 p.m. men semi-finals battle against East Mississippi.PRCC, the MACJC South Division No. 2 seed, trailed North No. 3 NWCC 28-27 at the half, but dominated the last 13 minutes of the contest to take a lopsided 75-59 victory.North No. 1 East Miss opened the day action against South No. 4 Jones County and bombarded the Bobcats 103-70.In Pearl River match up, the score was tied seven times and the lead exchanged hands four times in the first half. Daterris Rogers was fouled attempting a trey at the 12:44 mark and sank all three free throws to snap a 13-13 stalemate and Yondarius Johnson banged in two more foul shots a minute later to make it 18-13 PRCC, but those were the last Wildcat points for the next seven-plus minutes.Meanwhile, Northwest regained the lead at 19-18 when DeMarcus McVay pulled off a three-point play at the 8:37 mark. Just under four minutes later, Tevin Moore basket capped a 13-0 Ranger run to give NWCC a 26-18 lead its largest of the game.Pearl River closed out the half with a 7-2 scoring run to cut Northwest lead to 28-27 at the intermission.In the second half, the Wildcats opened with a 16-12 scoring surge to go up 43-40 and The River never looked back. Josh Carpenter three pointer capped the run and PRCC went on to build its lead to as many as 21 points 66-45 with 6:10 left.From that point, Northwest outscored Pearl River 14-9 only to come up 17 points shy of victory.Everick Morris paced the Rangers with 19 points (4 assists), while McVay added 13 (eight rebounds), Dominque Harris (five rebounds) and Darius Woods (three steals), eight each; Kenyatta Jones five, Jordan Hulsey four (eight rebounds), and Tevin Moore two.Quentin Watkins out of Lanier High in Jackson led the Wildcats with a game-high 21 points (five rebounds, two treys, three assists, two steals), while Zane Knowles, a Grambling State (La.) transfer from Nassau, Bahamas, added 18 (11 rebounds), Daron Bell of Bay High 10 (10 rebounds), Josh Carpenter of Oak Grove High nine (five assists, two treys), Johnson, another Grambling transfer who hails from Plain Dealing, La., nine (five rebounds); Rogers of Wayne County High four, Jyrus Carriere out of St. Martin High in Biloxi and Marcus Rawls of Picayune High, two each.Northwest hit 50 percent (eight of 16) at the foul line to Pearl River 79.2 percent (19 of 24), while the Rangers were 23 of 64 (35.9 percent) from the field to the Wildcats 26-of-61 (42.6 percent) effort. From three-point range, NWCC was five of 25 (20 percent), while PRCC was four of 18 (22.2 percent).The River dominated the boards with 46 rebounds (16 offensive, 30 defensive) to Northwest 37 (15 offensive, 22 defensive), while the Wildcats committed 15 turnovers to the Rangers 14.Pearl River Lady Wildcats, the South Division No. 2 women seed, takes on North No. 3 Coahoma at 8 p.m. Tuesday in the women quarter-finals.


text:
Twins blank Central Division foe
Published 11:01 pm Monday, August 12, 2013
MINNEAPOLIS — Andrew Albers threw a two-hitter in his second career start and the Minnesota Twins backed him with a pair of home runs to beat the Cleveland Indians 3-0 Monday night.
Albers (2-0) allowed just two singles, walked none and struck out two.
Brian Dozier and Trevor Plouffe homered to help the Twins win for the eighth time in 11 games.
Prized prospect Danny Salazar (1-1) gave up three runs on three hits with three walks and five strikeouts in four innings. The slumping Indians have lost seven of their last eight and are in danger of sliding out of the playoff chase.
Jason Kipnis and Yan Gomes had the only hits for Cleveland.
Albers, a soft-tossing lefty from Canada, had Tommy John surgery in 2009 and made his big league debut at 27 years old in his last start. He threw 8 1-3 scoreless innings at Kansas City and now has ripped off 17 1-3 straight scoreless to start his career.
He kept the Indians off-balance with an assortment of breaking pitches all night, outshining the overpowering Salazar in the process.
The 23-year-old Salazar blazed through Cleveland's minor league system, striking out 129 in 21 outings. That didn't stop when he got called up. A fastball in the high 90s, a superb changeup and the benefit of facing hitters who have never seen him before helping him rack up 17 strikeouts and walk only two in his first two starts.
The velocity was there in start No. 3, but the command wasn't. Dozier hit Salazar's second pitch of the game out of the park and Plouffe hit a 96-mph fastball out for a two-run homer in the second.
Just when Salazar appeared to be settling in, he walked the bases loaded with one out in the fourth. He was able to wiggle out of the jam without allowing any runs, but with so much on the line for the Indians as September approaches, manager Terry Francona didn't leave him out there.
Albers was ahead 0-2 on 10 of the first 20 batters he faced, never hitting higher than 88 mph on the Target Field radar gun. He had a perfect game going until Kipnis blooped a soft single to center field with two outs in the fourth and got some help from some spectacular defense along the way.
Dozier ran about 30 yards, laid out and hauled in a pop fly over his shoulder to get Carlos Santana in the fifth and shortstop Pedro Florimon made a brilliant sliding stop of a grounder up the middle in the seventh, then threw out Nick Swisher from his knees.
NOTES: The Twins have scored their last 22 runs off home runs. … The Indians placed INF Mark Reynolds on release waivers on Monday. … Francona said LHP Scott Kazmir "is doing really well" after saying he had a "dead arm" in his previous start. The plan is for him to get an extra three days' rest and start on Aug. 18 at Oakland. … Twins press box attendant Peg Imhoff celebrated her 75th birthday on Monday night. Imhoff has worked for the Twins for 38 seasons. … Twins RHP Zach McAllister (4-7, 4.01) is scheduled to pitch for the Indians on Tuesday night against RHP Samuel Deduno (7-5, 3.38) for the Twins.