A Month in Maine

On the Sheepscot River, just below Wiscasset
Ken fishing from the cockpit in Seal Cove
High on the St. Saveur trail at Acadia National Park
Ken & Tammy on the marina launch in Camden Harbor. Perfect day!

We were fortunate to have a good long time to spend in Maine this summer -- the summer of ALL GOOD WEATHER DAYS !!! We left Cohasset on August 14 and returned on September 8. Our boat ran well and didn't consume too much fuel (phew!). The experiment with powerboating is going well so far.

We removed one couch (we had two) from Rising Tide just the day before we left. And we brought on a table and one temporary bench for the table. These did not get installed until a few days later but then got a lot of use. We had been using a fold-up table in the cockpit prior to August but with shorter days and buggy conditions at our preferred dinner time (around 7:30 pm) we needed an inside place to eat. We did eat well, with lobsters supplied by brother-in-law Matt in Marblehead for the first few days, freshly gathered mussels several times in Maine, plus fresh produce at farmer's markets and grocery stores along the way.

We met up with daughter Tammy in Camden and she stayed with us for a few days while she attended a bridal shower and wedding in that area. Tammy lives in New Mexico so we especially enjoyed a chance to combine her visit and our summer boating. She joined us one night at a Lincolnville, Maine restaurant with our friends Andy, Judie and Emily Hazen (from Lincolnville).

There were 5 nights anchored or moored in Acadia National Park. This is a wonderful place to visit by boat, with two boating-oriented towns -- Southwest and Northeast -- and a long fiord, Somes Sound. You can access several excellent hiking trails from a cove in Somes Sound, and stops for a free shuttle bus to the rest of Mt. Desert Island and the Park from Southwest, Northeast, and the village at the head of Somes Sound. We also connected up with two families from Duxbury while here; they were camping and took us to see their RVs and camp sites (plus provided dinner) after we took them all out for an afternoon cruise.

The second half of our trip was spent at several other Maine coastal locations. We visited Castine and were able to stay on the town dock for most of a morning while we explored the town and had lunch. We got a mooring from Warren Island State Park, which is part of the Islesboro Island group. On a walk around the perimeter of the island we discovered a campfire from the previous evening that had been built in an illegal area and had not been fully put out. Since there are only a half-dozen campsites in this park it is questionable whether anyone else would have noticed this smoldering fire before it ignited the nearby bushes. Ken ran to get a bucket from the nearest campsite and I used my hat to bring a few pints of seawater to put on the fire until Ken got back.

Following that adventure we spent some time in Rockland, a great place to eat out, provision, get boat parts, and access the internet at the public library. I also found a high school friend who is an artist and psychic in Rockland. Kitty Smith has a gallery near the library and we enjoyed catching up on all those years after I poked my head in when I saw her sign.

Hurricane Earl was threatening as we headed back through Muscongus Bay so we tucked into Seal Cove in the Damariscotta River. This is a great hurricane hole, protected on all sides, and we spent a few days on anchor. We swam in the water here, as well as in several other locations on our trip, quite unusual for Maine where the water is mostly too cold. We had a kayak with us on this trip, a new eight-footer, and the small coves we ducked into were perfect for kayaking. A surprise discovery in Seal Cove was a stream and waterfall pouring into the southwest corner, loud enough to hear while paddling around. By the way, the hurricane mostly bypassed Maine, but you never can be too careful.

A planned rendezvous with our friends Linda and Frank Cassidy was fun; we met them in Penobscot Bay, at White Islands, near Vinalhaven Island. Another chance for sundowners and dinner came when we scheduled a stop in Casco Bay at Cliff Island and rafted with Barb and Dick MacLeod. It was great to see our Maine friends!

We saw a lot of wildlife in Maine, including tuna off of Cape Elizabeth, seals everywhere, lots of porpoises, osprey adults and young in many locations, all types of ducks; Ken fished a lot and caught some mackerel in Acadia National Park. We spotted whales swimming along in our direction as we left Maine and entered New Hampshire waters at the Isles of Shoals.

All-in-all it is not too much different to have a trawler, going 8-9 knots (still pretty slow), anchoring in areas we would have gone to in a sailboat, and being out in the sun a lot as we were in our Tayana. Some of the small differences are that we got to carry a kayak on the forward cabin top, out of the way, and we got to pick the best anchoring spot in prime small coves maybe a bit sooner each day than we would have previously. We're still not brave enough to take advantage of our 34" draft but eventually we should be finding anchoring spots in by the beach. We'll save that for Cape Cod and Islands cruising!

NEW Rising Tide Visiting Friends and Family

We successfully brought the new Mainship from Milford, CT to Cohasset, MA about two weeks ago. We stopped in Marion and the Hartley side of the family got a look while we were at the Marion town dock. We also caught up with Peter Cassidy and the Perkins while we were in Marion.

Once in Cohasset we got down to business on the long list of repairs/replacements that it will take to bring the boat up to speed. We also took a 4-day trip to Marblehead to see family there and on the way back stopped in Hull to see our HYC friends, including Tom and Jean Fisher who have a Mainship, "Edgecomb". We expect to return to Marblehead for the July Fourth Weekend, to see Mike & Mimi Powers, and Dave and Suzanne Santry.

The pictures in this post are of our early visitors, sons Pete and Justin, Pete's friend Crystal, "Rising Tide" in Marblehead and the two Mainships in Hull.

Mainship 34 in Milford, CT

Here are two pictures of the new RISING TIDE, located in Milford, CT, and due to be brought to Cohasset soon. Keep checking for updates!

BONUS: Biloxi Mississippi Chapter

Ann Dacey on her Victorian porch on a sub-freezing morning in West Virginia

The new house being built in Biloxi for a Vietnamese-American couple.

Heidi spent a day with this crew in the soup kitchen in Biloxi, serving breakfast and lunch.

Watching the Superbowl with our new friends from Duxbury and Battle Creek.

After two weeks in Florida in winter 2010 we drove to Biloxi Mississippi to join up with a group of adults from Duxbury and Battle Creek, Michigan in a home-building project. This was a great experience, as the Duxbury contingent were new and interesting to us, and the Battle Creek people were lively, organized and fun. We were working under the auspices of the Back Bay Mission of Biloxi. We slept in bunk beds and cooked group meals in a commercial kitchen at the site. Biloxi is still rebuilding after a hurricane 4 1/2 years ago wiped out many homes and businesses.

Ken made trim for windows on a two-bedroom, two-bath stilt house, and Heidi laid down a subflooring and then tiles, with about 8 other workers. The owners of the house, a Vietnamese-American couple, came by after hours to check out the progress.

We had time to explore Biloxi and take in a wharf-restaurant in Pass Christianne, Mississippi. One of our companions was a minister from Kennebunkport, Maine, who was also at the Back Bay Mission during our week. There are miles of beaches in this area of Mississippi but the rebuilding is going slowly so only a few docks, water-front homes and businesses have been brought back, so far.

If you've never been to Biloxi, check it out for a future trip. It's a laid back area, has some casinos that the state feels are helping in the revival, and some older traditional buildings, restaurants and museums. And the waterfront is beautiful!

After bonding with our new Duxbury, Kennebunkport, and Battle Creek friends, we parted ways at the end of the week and headed back to Massachusetts. Our last stop on our winter non-boating trip was in Morgantown WV to visit an old friend (but she's not old!), Ann Dacey. We had a marvelous Valentine's Day dinner with "Dacey" and left with snacks of the evening's chocolate cake to enjoy the next day while traveling home.

Post Script: Winter 2010

Miniature golf with a nautical theme (we tend to stay as close as possible to water and boats) Kissimmee, Florida.

Addison & Ken at a nautical flea market in Ft. Lauderdale

We had lunch with Jack & Peggy at the marina where their boat is berthed in Lake Worth

The Toews girls on LOS GATOEWS taking a break from homeschooling in Lake Worth, Florida

Susan & Barry with Ken at their new mobile home in Florida before they rent it out and set sail on SWAN

Since Ken is retired and Heidi is taking a break from a temporary job, we were able to get away in January and drive down to Florida and visit several boat crews that were in the southeast coast area. The Perkins (our frequent companions and mentors in Florida last winter, Barry and Susan) had just bought a mobile home on Nettles Island, part of Hutchinson Island. They started their winter boat trip to the Keys the week after our visit. While visiting with Barry and Susan we also had a mini-reunion with Chris & Kevin Buckley from upstate New York. The six of us had all been together in Nettles Island last April.

The next day we found the Toews family on their catamaran and visited with Mike & Debbie and their three girls. The Toews had been in the Bahamas with us and also in Onset last summer. They are planning the next stage of their adventure which may include more land time and college courses for Debbie. On the same day we had lunch with some Canadian friends Peggy & Jack, who were in the area on their boat. They had summered their boat in the Bahamas and were back in Florida and heading north.

We also had a quick visit this day with John and Alida of VOYAGER II. We crossed the paths of John and Alida several times in the Chesapeake and going north last spring, talked with them on the radio a lot, emailed them, and almost had them visit us in Massachusetts, but never met them! Them have a mobile home in Ft. Lauderdale and keep their boat in Virginia.

The next day, after lunch and a walk on South Beach in Miami, we backtracked to Ft. Lauderdale as our friends Addison and Pat Chan had driven up there from Marathon where they are living on THREE PENNY OPERA. We had a great visit with them and two of their friends, at a nautical flea market(the friends had a booth), and later that day at dinner.

We spent our second week in Florida at a condo in land-locked Kissimmee. We did miss being on the water and watching sunsets everyday, but not having anchor watch sort of made up for it. Since we had never been to the Florida west coast, we took a side trip from Kissimmee to Tarpon Springs one day and hung around the docks there. We also visited Maitland, Florida (they have a great Audobon Center there with birds of prey) and rode bikes on a bike trail in Winter Garden.