Christmas 2006 Letter

Merry Christmas To You All From Pam and John



We hope that your Holiday Season is filled with good health and happiness.

This year we celebrated another milestone. Pam turned sixty on September 19th! Cameron’s birthday is the day before so Pam shared her birthday celebration with her four year old granddaughter. Pam is still doing some contractual work for the Association.
It is amazing how much you can accomplish while at sea. Cell phones and the Internet are wonderful.

We have now been living aboard Compass Rose for 18 months. We spent this past summer in Annapolis as this allowed us to spend some time with the kids and grandchildren and cruise on Chesapeake Bay. In the second week of October we started our second cruise south and traveled the Atlantic Intercoastal Waterway for two months. We are now in Marathon in the Florida Keys until the middle of February when we plan to cross over to the Bahamas. The “plan” is to spend two months there and then be back in the Chesapeake by mid May.

Carson with his Lacrosse gear

Kim and Mike are as busy as ever with Carson (who will be seven in February) and Cameron. Carson is in the first grade and loves sports, especially Lacrosse and has earned many belts in karate. We had a real scare this past summer when he was hospitalized with bacterial pneumonia. He was in D.C. Children’s Hospital for 10 days. He is back to his old self again. Amazing how they bounce back.



John & Cameron

Our “Little Princess” Cameron is attending pre-school three days a week and keeps everyone on their toes. She is quite the little talker. She had her adenoids removed in December. She came out of the operation talking up a storm. What a trooper she was.

Kim and Mike have their hands full but they are great parents. Kim spends what spare time she has on the tennis court and Mike can be found on the golf course


Kim & Mike





Travis just completed his fifth year on the faculty at the Haverford School as Asst. Dean, Math Teacher and Lacrosse Coach. He was chosen the Teacher of the Year this past November. It is nice to see all his hard work recognized. He is very much at home in Philadelphia.

This Christmas will be a special time to celebrate our family’s gift of each other and the joy of being together. The whole family will all be together at Kim and Mike’s house again this year.

Hope all is well with you and your families. We wish you and yours a very Happy New Year. We pray for the many military families who are separated this holiday season and may we have peace on earth soon .

John & Pam

Compass Rose

3 Church Circle
PMB 146
Annapolis, MD 21401

John Cell (410) 913-9277
Pam Cell (410) 353-2912

Email: johnloving@yahoo.com
Email: pamcompassrose@yahoo.com

Marathon My Marathon

We made the 35 mi trip from Islamorada to Marathon taking the Florida Bay route rather than the Hawk Channel route in the Atlantic. The winds were 15-20 kts from the east which would have made for a very uncomfortable trip 'outside'. The Keys island chain provided a great wind barrier for the Bay route.

We hit the Seven Mile Bridge channel right at slack current (as planned) to minimize the current/opposing wind waves. It was a smooth ride through the bridge but as soon as we were on the Atlantic side the wind driven waves hit us smack in the face. Instead of turning directly towards Marathon, we had to continue east for 2 mi in order to 'tack' back and keep the 4-5 ft waves off our beam.

But we finally got to Marathon and tied up at the Cay Clubs at Marathon (new fancy name for the Marathon Marina) at 3:45pm. We are three slips down from the one we had last year; this gives us an even better view of the ocean to the west (yes, the ocean is southwest of us!). The sun sets directly off our stern.

Photo: Pam enjoying the view from the back of our boat.