great lakes current map

here is an amazing visual representation created by researchers working at the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL) that depicts how the currents are moving across the Great Lakes – this is a screenshot from today:

but you should really check out the website, as it is constantly updating, and you can see the ebb and flow and swirling of the currents out on the Great Lakes.

this visualization is made possible with the same computer code that is being used to create the amazing wind map of the United States.

HT: Huffington Post article

a natural wind indicator?

a while back I posted about making my own wind indicator for sailing in light wind on my Sunfish that uses a piece of PVC pipe to “clamp” right onto the upper spar for my sail.

I thought I was pretty crafty, and it was just about as cheap of a home-made solution as I could come up with, but then I saw this 3rd panel in a comic called “Basic Instructions” by Scott Meyer.

apparently, I just need to sail more often with my shirt off…