Underway again! Thursday, June 16, we cut the umbilical cord to our comfortable dock in Salem and made way for Maine!
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| Star Island, Isles of Shoals, NH |
We made a short first day out to Isles of Shoals, a group of islands off Portsmouth, NH, on the first really hot day of the season. The day was beautiful, but the seas were in a long, slow swell that didn’t agree with our crew member most susceptible to mal de mer, poor old Bubba, and made doing much other than sitting difficult for the rest of the crew. We picked up a mooring in Gosport Harbor off Star Island, a lovely place which we have never managed to experience on such a beautiful and eventually quiet evening. I found myself wondering about why that harbor and neighboring islands can seem almost eerie, the rambling but modest old white hotel, the out buildings and high stone rip rap around the harbor, the lack of life other than sea birds? Maybe it’s remembering the ax murders that occurred there back in 1873, which Anita Shreve wove into her 1996 novel The Weight of Water. Whatever, we shook that feeling, grilled burgers, watched the sunset begin and went to bed early!
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| Lobsterman's Shed, Phippsburg, ME |
After turning out of the harbor at 4:30 am the next morning, we set a 58 mile course for the mouth of the Kennebec River, near Seguin Island light and our cruise up river to Bath, Maine to visit my college roommate and her husband who live nearby in Phippsburg. For ten hours underway, we saw no land, only two fishing boats in the distance and birds, notably a large flock of Guillemots, which seemed surprisingly far south. (Guillemots are small, very cute, completely black birds except for one white spot on their back and wonderful red feet-- members of the same Alcid family as puffins.)
On a calm day a 58 mile course is a gift of time for doing projects, reading, baking or snoozing, but the seas were again rolling enough to keep us alternating watch with napping in our favorite chair. I spent some time thinking about why I felt so excited to be heading north again, as I really enjoyed our time in port in Florida and Salem. It seems to me it’s the difference in living on a boat much like we would in a house and going cruising-- and going cruising is what we’ve always loved about our summers in Maine and Nova Scotia. We move from place to place, mostly anchored at night or occasionally picking up a mooring, making runs to shore in the dinghy, meeting friends here and there and enjoying small town life along the Atlantic coast.
We can go north or south or east or west, which sounds like a ridiculous thing to get excited about, but when we’re traveling up and down the coast, it’s pretty much north or pretty much south. Actually, those days in the ICW that we wiggle around going more east or west are kind of frustrating, because the whole idea is going north or south! Although we have enjoyable and certainly interesting days on the ICW, cruising in Maine is really about enjoying the whole process-- not so much about getting anywhere very fast!
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| Lupines at Parker Head, Phippsburg, ME |
After a great weekend in Bath and Phippsburg with our friends, we made way for Rockland to have our genset worked on, or at least put back together from the unfinished work done in Salem. It was “just another beautiful day in Maine” --as we often say to each other-- as we headed toward Rockland, treated to a parade of five windjammers heading south with all sails set. It was a quick stopover in Rockland; but while the mechanic removed a part for repair, I gave Carry On a badly needed bath.
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| Schooners in Penobscot Bay |
With Carry On clean and ready for guests, we arrived at the Belfast town docks to meet friends from Marblehead. We spent one of our evenings on an anchor in Smith Cove and took our little boat over to Castine for the afternoon. Then back to Belfast for an excursion arranged by our friends to visit True North Farms, an organic vegetable farm started and worked by old friends of theirs who relocated to the Belfast area a few years ago. It was a special afternoon in a beautiful setting with the Camden hills in the background. We had a tour including all the farm equipment used in sequence to prepare the soil, make mounded beds and plant seed, as well as the fields, all neatly labelled. I was impressed by the incredible amount of planning required and the constancy of work to be done, and the dedication of two people who are only slightly younger than Paul.
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| True North Farms, Montville, ME |
We’re still hanging out here in Belfast, although our guests are gone. The weather has been gray and rainy, we have tasks that need attending, as well as feeling the need for a bit of down time. We need to go back to Rockland to have our repaired genset part reinstalled, but after Rockland we’re still up in the air-- Castine for a few days, then up to Southwest Harbor? Back here to Belfast? So-- no schedule for the near term and it feels kind of good!
