It’s that time of year again and we are quickly approaching Boat Week 2007 and the Emerald Coast Poker Run. We had a fun time on the water yesterday collecting up a few more pictures for our Poker Run map available at EarthNC. The map includes this year’s stops, the new Poker-Run related no-wake zones, and photos of local bridges and ramps. Look for us to be out photographing on the 18th in our Regal 2760 ‘Southern Comfort’ and check back for our photo gallery to see if we photographed your boat.

Needing a fix of bluewater fishing action? The Sportsman Channel has a show for you. Billfish Adventures follows the crew of “Sorry Dear”, a 55′ Viking sport fishing boat, as they go after Panama’s largest species including striped marlin, black marlin and Sailfish. (more…)

Why bother with a boat, cut bait, and chum when you can catch sharks from your balcony with a pork chop? Anglers in Australia’s “Gold Coast” region of southeast Queensland (central east coast of Australia) can bull shark fish from home along hundreds of miles of brackish canals. This quote from the UK Telegraph on shark fishing along the canals of Australia’s Gold Coast says it all: (more…)

Florida leads the nation in shark attacks and this month the ‘hot’ zone seems to be the central Florida coast around St Lucie county. Over the April 1st weekend, two people were bitten within an hour along the same stretch of Atlantic beach. Fortunately, neither attack was life threatening. See our map below. (more…)

CNN is reporting the rather rare instance of 2 people falling from the Cruiser Liner Grand Princess and living to tell the tale. We were especially interested as we often watch the Princess cruisers sail from Galveston around 6pm each evening via the AIS feed on VesselTrax.com
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The Florida Sun Sentinel reports the unfortunate death of 3 recreational divers on the ex- USS Spiegel Grove off Key Largo (see map below). According to the article: (more…)

In a sign that warmer times are on the horizon, the Santa Rosa Mall in Fort Walton Beach, Florida will host its annual spring boat show on the 17th - 25th of February. The boat show includes both indoor and outdoor displays and most of the local dealers bring over a wide selection. We’re investigating the possibility of setting up a DestinSharks.com booth starting on the 20th to demonstrate the EarthNC marine charts and conduct boat-owner surveys. We’ll keep you posted.

If you’re shopping for a boat for the 1st time we suggest you read our Boat Financing 101 article prior to going to the show.

It’s official, Google Earth Version 4 is no longer a beta. Frank, at gearthblog.com has a good overview of the new features and had updated his Google Earth tutorials for the new release. If you’re still using Version 3 - it’s way past time to upgrade and see what you’ve been missing.

Use the button below to get the current version of Google Earth: (more…)

Local kiteboarding shop XLKites hosted Damien LeRoy (not the rider in the picture) and the 2007 Cabrinha Pro Clinic tour and demo in Fort Walton Beach today. DestinSharks.com photographer Sarah was on hand to capture some great kiteboarding action as local riders took to the water today. After sunset, the Gulf Coast Kiteboarding Association cooked up a BBQ for the tired riders and friends. Wind permitting, Damien will take to the water again tomorrow morning at Leeside Park on Okaloosa Island before returning home in the afternoon.

Click on the photo to visit our online album from today’s riding.

As reported at Cnn.com and Foxnews.com an avalanche buried cars along US Highway 40 on the route from Denver to Winter Park Colorado. Fortunately, there are no reports of fatalities. We hope this continues. We’ve put together a simple KML file for Google Earth which marks the pass. This is a rugged area and has been subject to avalanches in the past.

If you don’t have Google Earth, you can download it free.