It was nice to be able to call ships by name, and see them as far as 80 nm away. This is with a Garmin AIS interfaced to our little Garmin 546 plotter. It was especially nice when an approaching ship that was going to pass less than a mile to starboard altered course to pass to port. When I talked to the man on watch he said "dockside to dockside" in a Scandinavian accent. Also very nice as we approached to shipping lanes off the coast and saw more than 80 targets. And even better when the wind died and the motor would not start on the edge of the shipping lane, after dark, of course.
We are off the boat right now, driving our campervan around England, soon to take the ferry back to France and then head back to Portugal and the boat. Then into the Med for the summer.