I use the Nebo app to keep track of Nano’s progress as it makes its way to our rendezvous point in the NYC area.

Nano, the boat I’ll soon be boarding for a nearly 2-month trip from New York to Chicago by way of the Hudson River, Erie Canal, and three Great Lakes, left the Portland area of Maine yesterday morning. I’ve been tracking it using the Nebo boating app since then.

Nebo is a popular system for boaters, especially those doing the Great Loop. I suspect it’s because the American Great Loop Cruisers’ Association (AGLCA), which I discussed in this blog post, offers discounts on the hardware you can install on your boat to automate tracking and trip logging. Indeed, most of the boats I’m seeing on the Nebo app are sporting the AGLCA logo as their profile pic — this is kind of cool because it makes it easy to see who may be on the same route as you. But while the automated features require hardware and a paid subscription to the service — which I assume offers additional features — anyone with a smart phone can set up the mobile app on a phone and enable manual tracking. It looks like that’s what First Mate Dianne did, since her account popped up on Nano as a crewmember yesterday, too.

Around midday, I checked their location again. They were at a marina near Gloucester, MA, at the end of a waterway that cuts the small Rockport peninsula from the mainland. They were done traveling for the day.

I sent Dianne a friend request and she accepted it. We exchanged a handful of messages yesterday. She sent a few photos — including a lobster tank in a supermarket and a fishing boat from a NatGeo channel show — and reported that the ocean was choppy but sunny and “delightful.” I was delighted just reading her comments.

(Capt Paul has not accepted my friend request. Not quite sure why. Maybe it’s because he knows he’ll soon get his fill of me. I’m going to try hard to behave.)

This morning, I checked again, keeping in mind that I’m three hours behind them — Pacific Daylight Time here and Eastern Daylight Time there. They were under way, off the coast of Boston. I started taking note of other Looper boats in the area. Curiosity had remained behind in Gloucester, but Done Tacking was ahead of them in Cape Cod Bay. I began wondering if I’d see these boats along the way once I boarded.

This morning, Nano was off the coast of Boston.

A little while ago, I checked again. Nano was now much closer to shore in Cape Cod Bay. (Done Tacking had already gone through the canal that separates Cape Cod from the mainland; you can see it near the bottom on the left.) I think Capt Paul’s plan had to been to spend the night at the mouth of the canal, but I don’t expect him to stick exactly to plan. My preliminary look at the weather shows rain in the area for the next few days; he might try to make some distance today in case he gets stuck at a marina waiting for weather to clear. I’m sure he’s considering the conditions and his options — much the way I consider weather and options when I’m doing a long cross-country flight in my helicopter.

Anyway, I’ll be tracking Nano as I continue to prep my home for my house sitter and pack up what I hope will fit into my luggage for the trip. I hope First Mate Dianne sends more photos. I believe she said she was going to blog the trip; I’ll try to get her blog’s URL so readers can see what she has to say about the trip as it happens.