Thought I'd show you how I typically have the helm set up when underway. We don't even have 100 hours on the boat yet, so I'm sure this will evolve.

The two outside screens are PC monitors being driven by one PC. The inside screens are Garmin 8617 MFD's.  

The PC screen at left is running the Maretron monitoring application. It's showing the status of most of the items being monitored, and an engine room camera.

The first MFD is showing the cruising area in a scale that shows the general area. 

The second MFD has our chart in one window, in a larger scale, so we can see depths right in front of us. Note the AIS target, our buddy boat Kazuma. The other window is showing our Fantom digital radar. We use this for not only what is ahead, but what is behind as well. 

I need to play with the setup and see if I can eliminate one "stack" of the various "numbers" as two are redundant. 

The right side PC screen is dedicated to the Axis HD cameras. 99% of the time we have this camera displayed, the view straight out the back.  

We have the two VHF's. One is on 16, one on the channel we are using for the buddy boat. You can of course do this with one radio, in dual mode. But it's nice to do it this way. 

The CAT screens tell me we are burning 5 gals an hour on each engine, we are making almost 9 knots. Not bad for 2,000 horsepower, combined. 

The two small displays under the CAT displays are also Garmins. On the left is one that can display any number of screens, typically we have it showing weather, i.e. windspeed, direction and so on. The one on the right is the autopilot screen. Have to say I'm really liking the autopilot operations.

My android phone sits on a charging pad, acting as a hotspot for the boat's PC and whatever else we want to connect.  So we can bring things up on the internet right on either PC screen. We also have important manuals and other resources on the PC so they are just a click away.

I have a secondary charting application, Coastal Explorer, on the PC as well. Haven't really used it yet. The plan is when we get to more tricky waters, say in Alaska, we would view two charts that utilize separate chart datum. 

And outside those big windows, is the smoke that bad?  No, just how I did the exposure for this shot to show you the helm in proper light. 

I just published the blog post below. I'm standing at the helm, Deb is captain. Using my phone as a hotspot, I had enough signal to connect to the blog host. Took this picture about two minutes after publishing the post below. Cue Deep Purple!

Our first real cruise! Unfortunately there are a lot of forest fires in B.C. and the air is pretty bad. We are learning the boat, having fun cooking (tiny bit of drinking!) and other than the fact that basically there is not much to see but smoke things are pretty good. 

First night fun. Our "wine bag" we bought in a small town in Tuscany. Some bubbly that was a present from new friends. Our "Endurance" wine glasses (yes, they are actually named Endurance!). 

We are buddy boating with Ron and Kim. They enjoy good cooking and food just like we do. We will have some dinners on Mahalo, and some on their boat Kazuma.

Our anchor is 176 lbs, it's about five feet long. So this kelp ball is 6-8 feet around. Always something with anchoring, no? This is Montague harbor on Galliano Island.

Putting the bbq to the test. Asian pork ribs, roasted potatoes, grilled zucchini, corn on the cob. Nice work surface where I could do pretty much everything on the f/b deck.  We had done a few mile hike ashore today.

Finishing up with a couple artistic shots. Sailboat in "smokeset."

This one is for you, Linda D! (She's a great photographer who is also an active boater.)

After seven high effort weeks of commissioning, provisioning, and outfitting, today we say goodbye to home port Bainbridge Island. "A three hour tour, a three hour tour." Wait. That's not it... "A three week tour, a three week tour."

Heading to Seattle is a short trip for us. It's only 35 minutes by ferry, that averages about 15 knots. We went slower, I wanted to test the watermaker again. And plus there's a lot of commercial traffic. This is what 1,000 feet of container ship looks like filling up a helm window.

Moored at Bell Harbor, it's about a ten minute walk to Pike Place Market. Where we can get the freshest fish in the area. We punished the Visa card with a 3 lb dungeness crab, some enormous shrimp (small lobsters), halibut and king salmon.  Expect to see some killer meals on the blog as the trip unfolds.

But the real reason we came to Seattle today was to see Phantom of the Opera. We have season tickets at the Paramount theater, so we just worked this performance into our schedule. 

And without further ado, the first pictures from Deb's iPhone on the blog! We turned on the exterior blue lights before we left and Mahalo looked so awesome when we returned.

Another of hers.

Deb really has her own creative eye. I very much enjoy her photos! 

Everything looked so awesome tonight I even fired up the underwater lights and got out my real camera. I think Mahalo makes the Seattle skyline?

My dock neighbor Bill is highly impressed with the lazarette. Yesterday he was working on his new system for storing/deploying his tender. He needed to open up this bracket a bit, so I volunteered Mahalo's vice. It's wonderful having a vice on board!