Did I call it, or what? In my last post on the mysterious whereabouts of Dutch teen sailor Laura Dekker I predicted she would next appear in Durban or Port Richards, South Africa. And now comes word that she has in fact safely arrived in Durban after sailing 47 days non-stop (over 5,500 nautical miles)...

I haven't mentioned teen sailor Laura Dekker in quite some time, because, as I expected, her voyage--a standard westabout milk-run circumnavigation--has so far been largely uneventful. But now she's in the Indian Ocean. She left Darwin, Australia, headed west over a month ago and soon should be arriving at her destination. Only thing is... we...

Some good news from the Danish foreign ministry today: the Johansen family (parents Jan Quist and Birgit Marie and their teenage children Rune, Hjalte, and Naja), along with two crew, who were captured by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean over six months ago, were released yesterday and are in reasonably good health. The Danish...

As if the murder of four American cruisers last week wasn't enough to shine a big spotlight on the Indian Ocean's Somali piracy problem, the big crisis this week is that the Somalis have grabbed a Danish family of five, including three kids (ages 12 to 16), who were en route to the Red Sea...

Somali pirate attacks on yachts have been much in the news lately, what with a) the heartening good news that bluewater cruisers Paul and Rachel Chandler were finally released unharmed on November 14 after being held hostage by a Somali pirate gang for 388 days; and b) the sickening bad news that yet another sailing...