Category: Uncategorized

Quick course correction. Many of you saw my early announcement for the “Baniyas” story. That voyage is still very much on the chart—but along the way it became clear we needed one crucial volume first.

That book is now finished and available: Something Else Entirely, the origin story that follows Sparky from Coast Guard radioman through Langley’s quiet interest, WCC Chatham Radio, and his grind through FCC/USCG licensing and ROU apprenticeship. It ends with Sparky fully qualified and pointed at his first merchant‑marine assignment.

Baniyas will pick up from there, with Sparky at sea under sail‑orders that are anything but routine. If you’ve already been looking forward to that story, start with Something Else Entirely—it’s the missing piece that explains why he was on that ship, on that run, at that moment.

Ole Sparky’s back—and this time, the Love Run doesn’t just tempt him, it damn near eats him alive.

“The Love Run: Valparaíso” is a raw, fast, unapologetic plunge into the underbelly of the 1981 merchant marine world: union halls and hiring calls, old Grace Line steel, Puerto Rican hard cases with second families in port, brothels that run on unwritten rules, and a Chile simmering under Pinochet’s shadow while the music festival screams on the surface.

You follow Sparky from a kitchen-table hangover in the States to SS Santa Cruz and down through the Canal, until he hits Valparaíso—a port where the crew marches to the brothel in military formation, berets on, moonshine in hand, chanting obscene cadence on their way to “arrival-night romance.” You learn the house rules: no breaking the illusion, no butterflies, no cheating on your rented wife for the week. It’s funny, filthy, and brutally honest.

Instead of signing away seven nights to mama san, he takes his pay packet and his bad judgment to Viña del Mar: casino lights, the International Song Festival, high-end suites, horse-drawn buggies, champagne in the open air, and two Peace Corps beauties who drag him up into the hills and onto a ranch where lamb, jazz, and foreign aid collide with the reality of a military regime. The stakes jump from drunken sex and shore leave to the edge of an international incident—and Sparky, drunk and ridiculous, has to decide whether to stay in the story or walk out of it before it blows up.

This booklet doesn’t give you a neat love story. It gives you:

• A working ship with passenger-liner ghosts and a radio shack humming through sea days.
• Puerto Rican seamen running double lives between Newark and Valpo.
• A brothel that feels more real than any marriage certificate.
• A casino and festival where Sparky’s “no comprende” becomes both comedy and danger.
• A ranch party that reveals just how thin the line is between “exotic adventure” and “political powder keg.”

“The Love Run: Valparaíso” grabs you by the collar, throws you into the deep end of a world most people never see, and leaves you ashore with Sparky—broke, wiser, and still grinning. If you’ve ever wondered what really happens when a merchant seaman steps onto foreign streets with fresh pay and all the wrong kinds of confidence, this is your book.

You won’t find love here. You’ll find truth, liquor, sex, danger, and a hell of a story.

Part Two of American Apollo plunges you past the point of no return—into the collision, the cover‑up, and the quiet forces that turn one “accident” into a global warning.

A routine transit through the Panama Canal ends in twisted steel and jungle‑buried bow plates, but the real damage spreads far beyond the rock that stops the ship. A captain wakes to find his career shattered. A crew watches their voyage unravel into investigation and blame. And canal pilot Jose Morales—burdened by a promise made generations earlier—discovers what it really costs to turn a ship into a message.

Where Part One charted the approach, Part Two delivers the impact: the grounding itself, the tense hours on the bridge and shore, the political hands working in the shadows, and the way life at sea rolls on even as lives are quietly rerouted. You’ll feel the jolt of the collision, smell the canal jungle, and stand beside the men who learn how quickly a familiar passage can become history.

If you enjoy maritime thrillers, geopolitical tension, and character‑driven drama set against real‑world vulnerabilities, Part Two of American Apollo takes you from “this could never happen” to “this could happen tomorrow”—and doesn’t let go.

This website is new and evolving in real time as a work in progress. I’m making updates daily, building a decent storefront for my sea stories featuring Ole Sparky.

There’s a new addition to the menu, appropriately labeled Ole Sparky. Who is Ole Sparky? Click the tab and find out.

In SS American Apollo – Part One, Sparky enters a world of hurricane season, stress, confusion, and radio urgency, where skill matters and luck never lasts long. Future stories will send him into other ships, other close calls, and other situations where weather, machinery, and human weakness conspire to make life at sea memorable.

Early readers are already downloading American Apollo – Part One; Ole Sparky’s page will tell you who you’re sailing with.

Greetings!

Welcome to Walt’s new endeavor.

If you’re visiting from QRZ.com looking for Walt’s professional radio bio, you’ll find it in the menu. Walt’s ham radio bio is also available there; it includes details that are not posted on QRZ, while QRZ.com/db/w4wjk has some recent content and images that do not appear here.

Please use the menu to navigate this site and explore Walt’s most interesting and relevant material.

The purpose of W4WJK.com is to provide a platform where Walt’s unique career experiences can be documented and used as fuel for entertaining fictional content. Walter draws inspiration from roughly fifty years of globe‑trotting adventures.

Walt’s sea stories are intended to be entertaining and often humorous—particularly for fellow mariners who have lived life at sea, CW operators who enjoy a bit of derring‑do, and anyone who simply appreciates a good, well‑told story.

For many years, Walter shared these stories with friends and family. They were entertained, they laughed, and they frequently suggested that he write a book about his adventures. He never made time for it—until now.

This platform gives him a way to finally share many short stories that have lived only in memory. Walter’s daughters are pleased that he is documenting his colorful history for them; they are a central motivation for this effort.

In effect, this is how Walt is creating his memoirs. Whether a full‑length thriller or a more expansive memoir lies in his future remains to be seen.

Here you will find details about his experiences in the U.S. Coast Guard and Merchant Marine, information about his business background, and notes on his ham radio activities. These life experiences provide the credibility and background that set the stage for Ole Sparky’s adventures.

Walt is thinking that Ole Sparky will be the lead character in fictitious storylines based on real facts, actual events, and plausible hypothetical scenarios. The intent is to produce entertaining content that can be downloaded and enjoyed at your convenience. Shop now. w4wjk/shop

In the meantime, please explore Wide Eyed Curiosities and its inventory of strange and extraordinary products.