2009 Log
8/16 to 8/31/2009
This is a two week period from our log for 2009. At the bottom of the page are links to this year's prior weeks; our earlier voyages are in Prior Voyages.
The Google Custom Search box immediately below is an internet search tool for more information on subjects and locations mentioned in our site. We hope you find it useful.
Updated on 01/28/2011
|
8/16/09 - We have a high sitting over us giving us clear skies and light winds. Today started with a beautiful morning. I tried to log on, no data service here. We headed out early, 7:00am, for Roque Island, Puffin territory once upon a time. Now there are only a couple of Maine Islands that have these colorful birds. We are about a week late to see them. The run was pretty uneventful other than seeing 8 seals enroute. They look a lot life old gray black labs swimming along the surface. Most of the lobster pots we saw had toggles; that's a second float 10-40 feet from the primary (smaller) one. A line runs between the floats about a foot under the water. It's a perfect design for snagging unwary boats. The entrance to the lagoon was a pass through tall granite rocks topped by evergreens - awesome. By 2:30 we were anchored with a dozen boats along a 1.5 mile sand beach; the most beautiful one I've seen since Florida. The owners of the island let cruisers visit most of the beach up to the vegetation line (they reserve a half mile of beach for family use only); the cruisers appreciate access and honor their wishes. We saw grandparents from a large British yawl sitting on the beach under blue parasols watching their children and grandchildren enjoying the sand and water. Further along the beach a half dozen power boats had rafted together, going ashore and setting up a large canopy under which they were having a shore dinner. 8/17/09 - A beautiful sunny morning here. Miles called that he was fogged in tight. He called later to say it had lifted enough that he was going to try to make the run. Ruth had her coffee while watching a seal fish near our boat (we knew he was fishing; had a fly rod and creel). Ruth went beaching while I sanded and varnished the bow pulpit seat and the swim deck. These two surfaces take the biggest beating from salt water and sunshine. They were epoxy coated 12/19/08 and varnished 2 coats. Usually after 90 days I had to strip them and recoat with 2 coats of Sikkens and 3 - 4 varnish coats. We'll keep an eye on this system to see how long it stands up and what fails first. Our SkyMate update this evening puts Aurora about 75% of the way across the Gulf of Maine headed for Nantucket. They should be in Nantucket sometime tomorrow if they don't duck into Provincetown. Ariel arrived about 4pm after motoring the entire distance from Frenchboro. Miles declared the trip BORING... no sailing. Two men were discussing cruising boats when the first asked "What's the difference between a sailboat and a trawler, they both travel about the same speed". The other replied "A sailboat only motors 90% of the time". Arian and Jan of S/V Squander sent an e-mail from Guatemala that they've listed their boat for sale. They are buying another R/V and driving to Alaska while they look for something in the 50-60 foot range. 8/18/09 - Hazy morning under a clear sky. Miles knocked on the hull while I was finding my face. Invited him for coffee and we talked over charts as we planned options. We're only 20 miles from the Canadian border, Eastport, but can't readily get there as the direct route has a 13 meter high bridge. Brad Abbott called, they had put in at P-town at 6am as the wind had built to 25 knots on their nose. They'd hoped to be able to clear customs and let the twins loose on the beach. No such luck, they had to go on to Sandwich for customs. We moved around to the north side of Roque looking for an anchorage that wasn't quite as bouncy as the one we were in. After we anchored Ruth beached while I read a book in the dinghy. Beautiful afternoon! Miles and Laureen went hunting, coming back with a bag of fresh mussels. Dinner was aboard AA, Laureen brought the cooked mussels and salad, Ruthie cooked up some spaghetti and sauce... delicious. We decided to stay here another day and go mussel gathering. 8/19/09 - Mile came over about 9 with a weather report. We are keeping our eye on hurricane Bill, due in our latitudes Sunday. It should be well offshore and tropical (no longer a hurricane but still nasty). Tomorrow we'll start running to a hurricane anchorage about 60 miles away. We stayed another day so we could go harvesting, coming back with 106 mussels... and the ingredients for a great linguini. We are eating way too well. 8/20/09 - Up at dawn on on our way back to Eastern Harbor on Mt Desert. It was basically a motoring trip. We rafted with Ariel on a mooring about 2pm and went ashore for $200 in provisions. Tomorrow we will find a place to wait out the storm. The harbormaster here says he will order and evacuation of the harbor if the storm veers this way. Evacuation to where? Ruth made her hot scallops for us tonight... mmmmuh! Love them. Miles & Renee went out for supper. 8/21/09 - Woke to pea soup fog. We'd planned to leave at 7am to find a hurricane hole. At 8 I went to the hardware store for engine oil. At 10 we were still waiting. Even many of the lobster boats were staying put. About 10:30 we left... the fog proved even thicker as we exited the harbor so we turned around and came back in. Luckily the mooring agent found a floating dock for us to tie to; Miles returned to the mooring we were rafted together on. Ruth made chili for lunch. Sure hit the spot on a cold damp day. We learned that the Canadian couple sharing our dock plan on doing the loop next year. They had all kinds of questions for us when they saw our gold flag. The thick fog stayed with us all day... 8/22/09 - and all night. It looks like we'll weather the fringes of Bill here as we can't see well enough to move further west. The mooring agent says this place is about as good as it gets. I guess we'll find out. The fog lifted to tree top height around noon. It has been so still and gray that we've had to run the engine to keep the batteries charged. It's been a long time since we've had to do that two days in a row. All we can do the next 24 hours is wait for Bill. 8/23/09 - Woke up to rain showers. They must be the rain bands surrounding Bill, now a category 1 hurricane. The rain sweeps over in waves, like a garden sprinkler. Our winds were in the low teens as the mountains are between us and the storm. We took the dinghy to shore and climbed the ridge east of the harbor to visit the gardens. What a vista enroute and a very nice treat to visit the gardens Mr. Curtiss had left to the people of Northeastern Harbor - beautiful. After the climb we returned to town and picked up a few groceries - Ruth was amazed to learn that people could still have charge accounts in a grocery store. Hey, it's a small town. Mid afternoon we heard and saw the fire department rescue squad head east. It wasn't until the 24th we learned that 7 people had been sweep into the sea only 3 miles from us. They had been watching the storm surge and a series of large waves caught them. A child was lost, the rest were saved by the Coast Guard. People just don't realize that seas converge and send large rogue waves crashing ashore. That said, we were nice and secure in Northeast Harbor. 8/24/09 - We took on fuel and water at Clifton Marine, at the mouth of Northeast Harbor, at 8am; then headed for North haven with Ariel. Enroute we came upon logs and timbers that had been flushed into the sea. We traveled in fog with visibilities ranging from 1/4 to 2 miles. We saw a lot of lobster boats on the radar and encountered a ferry as the fog was rising. I gave the horn two blasts and we both turned to port passing starboard to starboard. By 1:30 we had anchored in Perry Creek; an anchorage filled with private moorings. We found and open spot and dropped our anchor. AA had felt sluggish and wouldn't reach top speed... I suspected I had picked up a rope at Roque Island but had put off diving in 53 degree water. At Perry Creek it was 63 degrees so I put on my wet suit, had Ruth pour warm water into it, and went diving. Sure enough, we had a big nest of rope woven into the prop and hanging on the rudder post. Five or six dives and I had the mess cleaned off. Even with the warm water I will be able to hit the high notes for a week. 8/25/08 - I took my coffee to the cockpit and was shocked to find a boat that was on a mooring behind us was now beside us. I thought we'd dragged yet all my landmarks said we hadn't. Miles stopped in for his morning cupa and noted that the boat had moved up next to us at sunrise - probably because they touched bottom at low tide (13' here). Miles and I went mussel hunting, gathering about 60. We reseeded them to the bank after trying to get the mud off them and deciding a free appetizer wasn't worth the risk. We moved AA out into the bay overlooking North Haven so Ruth would have phone and internet. Miles and Renee stayed in the creek so Renee could paint. We can hardly wait to see which room she painted. Ruth had a bit of activity going so we stayed anchored in the bay. I liked the breeze and the expanded view. 8/26/09 - We were up early but didn't leave for Pulpit Harbor until 9:30a. Ruth sailed the first half, a tricky curve beating down a thoroughfare. I did the easy down wind leg. We were anchored a little after noon. Beautiful day with 10-15 knot winds. They are already preparing us for the next hurricane, Dan, slated to arrive Saturday. Must be global warming, I don't remember this many hurricanes in WI. Miles scored 4 small and 2 large lobster so we got together on AA to cook them. Nothing nicer the the meals Renee and Ruth put together. 8/27/09 - We headed to Tenant Harbor today enroute to Boothbay Harbor where we have reserved moorings to ride out Danny though the forecasts tonight indicate Danny is fizzling out. I can live with that. Our trip ended up being a motorboat ride as the wind died after blowing snot all last night. At Tenant we picked up a mooring that we'd used a few weeks ago and tried to pay for it. Last time they accepted our money, this time they said it wasn't theirs... so we didn't pay them. Ruthie was on a cleaning binge this evening, mold loves to grow on the inside of the hull in these cold waters. 8/28/09 - At 4:30am the first of the lobster boats headed out with boats leaving every few minute right up to the laggards that left with us at 6am. Tenant Harbor is definitely a working port. It was a short 20 mile hop to Boothbay; we arrived about 10am and picked up a mooring from Carousel Marina. We had a reservation for the next 3 nights to ride out Danny; who at the moment is looking like a nonevent... I hope. By 10am we were entering Boothbay and picking up our mooring. I like the feel of this harbor, the mix of tourist facilities, boat building and fishing. We took our dinghy over to the town dock and picketed up some final provisions a hopefully short rainy period - alcohol, snacks, the basics. We called for the pump-out boat; learning that he had taken a medical day off and wouldn't be in service Saturday due to the storm. Bummer, AA is constipated. Miles and Laureen have his brother-in-law Paul visiting today. It's the first time anyone from his family has seen the boat so they went out for a day-sail. I readied AA for strong winds: second line to the mooring, flags down, all canvas secured and zippered, dinghy strapped, halyards tightened and anything not lashed down removed from the deck. Now we wait. 8/29/09 - The rain moved in last night. We are in the forward fringes of Danny's weather system. At this point the storm is weakening and shifting east, away from us; this is a good thing. I'm thinking we won't see much over 30 knots tonight... yes, it's due around midnight. We have the heater running (for Buddy) as it is about 52 degrees outside. Seems colder with the winds. We are having meals of hot soups - they are perfect for these kind of days - and are playing scrabble; Barry plays, Ruth wins. Arrggghhh! 8/30/09 - Beautiful morning. Sunny, no wind and warmer. It stopped raining around 7pm last night and the wind died sometime later. The highest wind we saw was 26 knots. Essentially we could have stayed in Pulpit Harbor; but didn't want to take that gamble. Took a moment to help a retired lobsterman get back to the dock when his engine quit on him. He'd tried to hail a couple of boats but they had passengers and didn't chose to recognize his situation. Learned a lot about lobster fishing while we putted across the harbor. We again tried for a pump-out. No answer on the radio or the phone. Looks like we are going to have to dump at sea tomorrow. Domestic day, we grocery shopped and did the wash. Miles had borrowed the marina courtesy car so we provisioned heavy as we had an easy way to carry our purchases. 8/31/09 - Another month almost over... fog almost shrouded that fact. Miles and Laureen need to get to the Chesapeake for bottom paint and other maintenance so they are pushing south. We motored thru the Townsend Gut to Five Islands. After lunch we took a hike to a farm market, picking up smoked salmon and an interesting cheese. The owner was a Cheesehead from Illinois. We said no, IL folks are FIBS. Along the way we stopped at the cemetery. We were surprised at how old some of the headstones were; people who died at the age of 85 in 1822. Ruth noted that the women's headstones identified them as "wife of" as if that was their only contribution in life. Some headstones were exactly that - rocks with no inscription. Back to the boat so Ruthie can chase down clients for a paper package she's trying to pedal. Go girl! Chicken on the grille, corn on the cob and potato salad put us down for the count. A very nice way to finish a beautiful day.
|
Google searches Use the custom Google search at the top of the page to look for boating, sailing and cruising information related to any subject you'd like to learn more about. At the bottom of the page is a custom search box that looks specifically at our site for reference to the subject you center.
Ariel heading up a fjord toward Some Harbor
Our anchorage at the base of St. Sauveur Mountain
Petite Manan light enroute to Roque Island
This is a toggle rig, the pot is below the smaller upright buoy (the toggle connected to the trap) and a line runs just under the surface to the larger buoy laying on it's side. The trick is not to go between them. Easy... right?
Okay, in this relatively sparse cluster, which toggle goes with which pot and where is the safe pass?
The pot game, miss the dots
Cruising piper at Roque Island
USCG "visiting" a cruiser
Mount Desert approached from the east
AA (center of photo) on a floating mooring dock
Northeast Harbor, Acadia
Gate to the flowers
Lilies of the garden
Part of the gardens
Laureen shot Miles overlooking Jordan Pond - okay, photographed him.
Lobster pot rope retrieved from our prop
Large sailing yacht passes by our Perry Creek anchorage
How large? The small sailboat behind it is the size of AA
AA entering Perry Creek, photo by Miles
Sunrise at Perry Creek
Let's see what we caught...
mr2ducks... seederiddybiddywings?
First a tow away from the rocks
then delivery back to Sea Pier tied to his hip; world's smallest tug?
AA and Ariel in Five Islands Harbor photo by Ruth
Five Islands harbor front
Backwoods privy
Artifacts of Maine
A very cool boutique farm market |
Use this Google Custom Search for finding subjects on our site:
View our 2009 Logs