If any fellow cruiser has advice for Captain Wilmington, please click follow the “Click Here to Submit Cruising News” button/link to the above right. We will post your replies for all to share.

Any fellow sailors/boaters out there who have had a total hip replacement. I would like to know how you adapt/adjust your movements so that you can still enjoy the Big Blue!. My replacement is 3 weeks old, and I am looking forward to spring boating.
Thanks
Capt Mike Wilmington

Mike,
I had a total hip replacement (anterior method), Jiffy Hip, in 2007. I was ambulating the same day and left 3 months later taking our boat from Yorktown, Va to Savannah, GA with no problems. We have since cruised Chesapeake Bay and just spent 5 months last winter in Charleston, SC on the boat. My doc put no restrictions on me and I haven’t needed any. I can’t speak to the traditional posterior method that involved cutting the glutemus maximus muscle. Hope this helps.
Jake Smith

I had a total Hip replacement on 8/1/11, and was back on my trawler 10/ 10/11. That was after both knees in 4/10/11. The hip was a piece of cake, compared to the double knees. We cruised the whole winter/spring of 2011/12, and are now cruising again, since 9/12.
Roger Hayes

I am in my mid-70’s and still active. I had hip replacement surgery in 1999 (right hip) and 2007 (left hip). I carefully followed my surgeon’s recommendations following surgery. If your surgeon recommends therapy, do it. After three months I was able to ride my horse, ski, bowl, play golf, and boat.
To have a good result you must not stress the implant while it is fragile and your muscles are still weak. Avoid falling and sports like tennis that include twisting and short stops.
I recently had knee replacement. After three months I was back bowling and golfing. Boating waited for good weather.
Good luck!
Ann Kendrick

Thanks for the good advice, and thanks to the Cruisers Net for posting my message. My doc says the 90 degree rule is forever, and that rule puts a crimp of sorts into my singlehanded sailing. The advice boosts my spirit and I am ready for spring!!!
Capt Mike,
Wilmington NC

Mike,
I would recommend you get a second opinion from a surgeon who uses the Jiffy Hip anterior method of hip replacement. The 90 degree rule does not apply.
Jake

Jake, my surgery was posterior, and I was sent home with 3 rules’¦’¦no crossing legs, no pointing of foot inward on op-leg, and no bending at the waist more than 90 degrees’¦.
Mike

You might want to check this site about hip replacement: www.zimmer.com

Back on 10/11/12, we brought to the attention of the cruising community BIG news about the updating of our “ARGUS” data layer (on our site’s “Chart View” module). Once again, the strategic partnership between the Salty Southeast Cruisers’ Net, Survice Engineering’s ARGUS Project and EarthNC (Earth Nautical Charts), was yielding BIG dividends!

NOW, THERE IS EVEN MORE GOOD NEWS ON THIS FRONT! And, as always, this superb service is being made available to the cruising community at NO CHARGE. You don’t have to buy anything, join any organization, nor even provide a user name or a password! How’s that for an “offer you can’t refuse!”

First, let’s hear directly from ARGUS’s creator, Captain John Hersey, of Survice Engineering:

Claiborne,
The new ARGUS ICW solution set that you posted in the article about on your website (see /argus-solution-sets-updated-just-in-time-for-the-fall-2012-cruising-season/) reflected all new data gathered through September of 2012. Since then, as the two ARGUS research vessels, Altair and Chez Nous, have been moving south, we’ve been updating this ICW solution set daily to reflect their incoming soundings. This test of near-real-time updates provide Chez Nous (the follower in this case) with the benefit of Altair’s observations from the day before, as well as your other readers with the same updated look at current conditions as both vessels travel south.
Thanks,
John

OK, please allow me to translate. Where before, updated ARGUS data was being fed into our EarthNC produced “Chart View” pages on a more or less quarterly basis, now, this data is being updated DAILY as the two research vessels, Alair and Chez Nous, work their way south down the AICW.

As usual, an example is worth another thousand words, so let’s look at a real instance of how this new data has been integrated into the existing ARGUS sounding information.

Please follow this link, which will open a Chart View page centered on the AICW, just south of Fernandina Beach, Florida:

/cruisersnet-marine-map/?ll=30.649836796880713,-81.47873295183024&z=14&argus=1

First, be advised that I have set this link to automatically open the ARGUS layer, but if you were just going to any of our Chart View pages, it would be necessary to find the “ARGUS (MLLW)” check box just above the chart image, in the second (moving left to right) vertical row of check boxes. After clicking the “ARGUS (MLLW)” checkbox, the ARGUS legend will appear, as well as the color coded sounding circles, indicating MLW adjusted depths gathered by the ARGUS research craft.

Take a look at the voluminous sounding data recorded on this section of the Waterway, NOW FRESHLY UPDATED BY THE JUST GATHERED SOUNDINGS SUBMITTED BY ALAIR AND CHEZ NOUS!

THINK THIS MIGHT JUST BE A SIGNIFICANT TOOL IN ANY NAVIGATOR’S ARSENAL! We think so too!

One question we are often asked is how our users can easily get to our Chart View pages. Well, of course, by clicking on ANY of the chartlets in our various marina or anchorage directory listings, you will be taken to a Chart View page automatically centered on and zoomed to the marina or anchorage in question. You can then drag the chart in any direction, and for any distance you need to reveal your waters of interest. HOWEVER THERE IS ANOTHER, VERY USEFUL WAY TO FIND YOUR WAY TO OUR CHART VIEW SERVICE!

Locate the red, vertically stacked stacked menus on the right side of all Cruisers’ Net pages, and then select your coastline of interest, “South Carolina” for example. Click on “South Carolina” and a drop down menu will appear. Now, locate “SC Chartview” and click on this menu item. A sub-sub drop down menu will appear, with a list of South Carolina’s ports of a call. To continue this example, click on “Georgetown, SC.” A Chart View page will open, centered on Georgetown. Activate the “ARGUS” layer by clicking the ARGUS checkbox, and look at all the good, just updated sounding data on the Sampit River, bordering the downtown Georgetown waterfront. Again, you can then drag the chart in any direction, and for any distance you need to reveal other waters of interest.

This feature works in exactly the same fashion for all our coastlines. not just South Carolina. Take a few moments to give it a try.

We know the cruising community will find this updated ARGUS data to be very useful. Please join with me in thanking Survice Engineering as well as EarthNC for making this service possible, partnered with the Salty Southeast Cruiser’ Net. OK, go to our site and check those latest soundings. Good luck and good cruising to all!

Cruising News:
Just wanted to say that we just used the argus readings from Fernandina to Cocoa and they were extremely accurate and very helpful..Thanks for the good work..it took some of the stress of the ICW away..We have a 61/2 four draft and the ICW can be very interesting..
Roberta