I'm a Captain

Ilive2fish

As of noon today I am a Coast Guard certified Captain....after months of hard work and lots of studying I passed all four tests with a total of 160 very difficult questions. They covered Rules of the Road, Maritime Law, Seamanship and Navigation. (I am now very familiar with the waters off of Long Island Sound, that's the chart we used for the plotting section). One test I got 100% and the rest were over 90%. I post this not as a pat on the back but rather as a source of inspiration to others. With everything going on today, you and only you can accomplish what you set out to do with the right attitude and work ethic in order to better yourself. Don't wait on others to do it for you. DO IT !!!!! I now join the ranks of other Captains (Kirk, Crunch, Morgan, Sparrow, America, Kangaroo, Hook, Solo, the one with Tenille, Ahab, Quint, Jonas Grumby aka The Skipper on Gilligan's Island, Picard, Ramius, Nemo, etc.) I will soon post information regarding fishing and diving/snorkeling charters that will be available from me and my brother in law Carlos Paez for your use in the Fabulous Florida Keys....and thanks to my daughter Nicole Lima-Gabaldon in son in law Jorge for the shirt and hat...Captain Lima out....

dragon bait

Congratulations 

The Parker

Congrats cap 

lemaymiami

Got mine many years ago, 1996.... then I learned how little I knew... Most of the lessons I had to learn after that captain's license should have come with a box of band-aids.

Congratulations on your achievement.

Gary M

Nice job. Reminds me of learning to fly! 

What License did you get? Did you do at At Home Course? Classroom with other students? Night classes?

catchemup

Congrats Captain Ilive2fish.

Got my 100 ton in '87 after three years on the bridge of a guided missile destroyer. Wouldn't know how to  hold a sextant any longer let alone use it. It used to be celestial navigation and DR [dead reckoning] then loran A then loran C...now GPS. Phew ....some transition in navigation.

Steve_raleigh

Congratulations 

Gotsea

Congrats Captain, that takes a lot of dedication and will to accomplish, that said,  out of curiosity are they still teaching celestial navigation, sextan and DR? 

Ilive2fish

took the course at home and on line...got the 6 Pack...no celestial or sextant but yes on DR....lots of material to cover...hardest modules were Rules of the Road and Navigation/Chart Plotting...have to pass those two modules with a 90%...the other two with a 70%...it's not easy and I already was very familiar with chart plotting...took me three hours to finish the tests...five others taking the tests, two left within the first hour (either they really knew their stuff or decided to just leave and try again some other time) and the others were still at it when I left and there was only one hour left to finish...

Garysmo

Congrats captain......

Salty Dawg44

Congratulations, Captain. I took my test and was sworn in at Coast Guard Base Charleston (SC) in 1983. No schools then, just a lot of documented sea duty needed to even get to be elegible to take the test. Other things on the test then were segments in disaster control, and radio procedure, as they were licensed then and required on every passenger carrying vessel. Just about had to memorize Chapman's. LOL.



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Whalermatt

Congrats Cap!!

The Cat's Eye

Gotsea said:

Congrats Captain, that takes a lot of dedication and will to accomplish, that said,  out of curiosity are they still teaching celestial navigation, sextant and DR? 

They started teaching celestial navigation again at the Naval Academy, so i have read.

Many years ago I took all the courses for the 100 ton license but did not have the helm or deck experience to take the test. It was so long ago I couldn’t do a simple noon day sun shot today. The sextant work did come in handy to find charted wrecks before LORAN. All you had to do was use the sextant horizontally to measure and match the arc between points of land or a navigational marker, and the  charted wreck. Of course this was useless unless you could see a navigational aid or a point of land.. I also employed a very expensive hand bearing compass that I still have today.  I found many charted wrecks before Loran was developed, especially west of Key West. 

Sometimes just for the Heck of it, I take compass bearings on a few offshore wrecks where ranges are not possible just in case they scramble GPS. (Then some fish might return to them LOL)