June 30 -- Portsmouth NH to Portland ME

Maine at last! In only took 19 days! We could have done it a lot faster but our cruising style is to stop and small the roses. One can drive from coast to coast in three days, and that's a pretty efficient use of scarce time if you need to do it that way. But in St. Louis you won't have had time to visit the Arch, nor the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Similarly, you can sail your boat for eight hours a day, or more, put her to bed, eat, sleep and then do the same thing the next day. But we like to enjoy our travels, including the passages.
Today began with a view of the bridge being reconstructed over our dock.

Then a submarine, mostly underwater, to the right:

The Naval Shipyard announces itself:"Estab 1800"

Early morning coastal fog:

 

Our passage took  from 7:15, slack at high tide in Portsmouth, to 3:20  this afternoon when we got on a mooring. We had favorable tide the entire way, thanks to our Portsmouth Marina operator, Steve, who told us what time to leave. Unfortunately, except for the last five miles of it, when a nice breeze came up, we had the main up but the motor was doing almost all the work. The steep ocean swells coming to our starboard quarter rocked the boat and shook what wind there was out of the widely spread sails.  But at least the threatened rain did not show up.  Lots of lobster pots though, this being Maine water, even in 150 feet of water a mile and a half off shore.                                                                                                                                                                                                   In '02 and '08 we tied up to the dock here at Portland Yacht Services, but this time                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 we took one of their moorings. A great yard for fixing whatever is broken. We had a long list including torn sails in 2002. This year I want to visit Hamilton Marine's giant marine store, next door, to finally get the bits we have needed, but not urgently, all along. So tonight a dinner aboard, a quiet night. Tomorrow is for shoreside activities.
Here is the famous Portland Light welcoming us on the way in.

June 28 and 29 -- Lay Days in Portshouth NH with History and Musicals

It rained our first night, sometimes hard, until about 11:30 next morning, and was foggy until 10am the second night. Timing the tide is important because there are times when the tidal rush downsteam would push us into the 67 foot Hinckley (Rolls Royce) in front of us if we tried to leave at the wrong time. See the turbulence in the water rushing past us? It was stronger at the height of the tidal ebb.

 I visited the John Paul Jones House here, the first of several old preserved houses in this city’s downtown area. These houses were fortuitously preserved because for long stretches the town was too poor to build anything better.

JPJ was not born here, did not die here, did not own the house and did not live there long. But he lived there as a boarder while his first US ship, the Ranger, was constructed here in Portsmouth at the expense of the Continental Congress. He was born and raised in Scotland and died and was buried in Paris, but his bones were exhumed and deposited in a sumptuous vault in Annapolis by President Teddy Roosevelt, about 150 years after his death. He used Ranger, and later the Bonne Homme Richard, to serve in our nation’s birth struggle, by harassing British shipping around England, sending the prizes he captured to France. His one great battle, which made his reputation, but not his fortune, was on the Bonne Homme Richard against the British warship Serapis, a larger vessel. At one point Serapis’ Captain asked “Are you ready to strike your colours?”, i.e., surrender. JPJ shot back his most famous, perhaps his only famous line: “I have not yet begun to fight!”  And at the end of the day it was Serapis that surrendered, and JPJ and his crew sailed that battered craft to France to have it repaired; Bonne Homme Richard was so damaged by the battle that it sank! This victory was not very significant militarily, but like Doolittle’s Raid, early in WWII, it had a tremendous impact on the morale of our incipient nation. David had stood up to the Goliath of the British Imperial Fleet  --  and won!  JPJ was a popular hero though after the war he spent a lot of time trying, unsuccessfully, to pursue claims for compensation from our government.

There was a display of conflicting newspaper editorials at the time of the War of 1812 over whether we should go to war with England again. And to this day Portsmouth is a liberal Democratic enclave in a conservative Republican state.  Its fate has depended on wars. They led to ship building which caused prosperity and at their end: depression, when the shipyard workers were laid off and the sailors and soldiers returned home.  And of the depressed portions of this vicious cycle was born the town’s tourism industry, with houses like JPJ’s, a big draw.

Another wing of the house was dedicated to a very thorough display of the activities leading to the 1905 Treaty of Portsmouth. Ever hear of it? The negotiations were convened by the invitation of President Teddy Roosevelt to end the Russo-Japanese War. That war, later described as "World War Zero" because of its extensive scope and extreme bloodshed of modern weaponry, was fought on the lands that Russia and Japan were fighting about: China and Korea. The negotiations, formal and informal, took place over a period of weeks at 38 venues (such as restaurants, theaters, yacht clubs) in Portsmouth under the long distance guidance of Teddy Roosevelt. The signing was at the Naval Shipyard. TR won the Nobel Peace prize for his efforts. Like Camp David, but more public and for a bigger war, and with similar long term effects: the combatants went at it again in WWII. The display showed an hour by hour account at each venue, of the activities that led to the signatures. The Tsar’s emissary was Baron Witte, same name as our male cat, sorta.

Lunch aboard ILENE, a visit to the supermarket by public transportation (fare 50 cents for a ride of two miles on a bus made to look like a trolley which comes by every 30 minutes), a shower, dinner at a local fish place and then Sondheim’s  “Sweeney Todd” at the Seacoast Repertory Theater,

which is around the block from our dock, and goes down deeply into the area of Portsmouth's old waterfront docks. And a good night’s sleep, like all the nights aboard.

Next day I got a haircut and visited the local farmer’s market before the serious sightseeing. First stop: The Governor John Langdon House. Before he was a three term Governor and a member of the Continental Congress he had made his money in ship building and commerce, including the construction of JPJ’s Ranger and others for the revolution. An elegant house from the front and big in the back

but the intricate pine moldings were painted gray to look like plaster; what a waste, wood is so beautiful. But plaster was the style in London, whose fashions Mr. Langdon sought to follow. His family was quite intermarried at the cousin level, to keep the money and early-settler pride under tight family control. I also learned here that Portsmouth had been a center for the construction of fine wooden furniture. Then after a brief stop in the local synagogue (Conservative) for the final ten minutes of Sabbath services (I was not dressed for the place but they accepted me), I visited the Warner House, circa 1716,

located two blocks from our dock. Here the colonial Governor had lived, and it was not quite as elegantly restored or furnished as the Langdon House, but interesting none the less.

 After lunch my next stop was the Strawbery Banke, a collection of 30 old houses, fifteen of which were open to the public, each displaying an aspect of life several centuries ago. By this time it was mid-afternoon and I had neither the time nor the energy to do the place justice; and the $17.50 admission price also deterred me as did the fact that I have visited Colonial Williamsburg several times. 

On the way back to ILENE, I visited Prescott Park, restored from a seedy red light waterfront district into manicured parkland by two determined Prescott sisters. There I viewed the juried art exhibit on display, and the Piscataqua” (the accent, I have learned, is on the second syllable), a lateen rigged “gundalow” a most unusual looking boat, apparently local in design, and used originally for cargo and now, with a motor, for passenger excursions.

"Annie" was being presented in the evening in that park, al fresco for whatever donation one wished to make. Annie was as light and fun as Sweeney Todd had been dark and brooding, and much more singable, a wonderful night of theater.

We enjoyed Portsmouth and there are more historical houses to visit on our next trip. The Harbor Place Marina, the only one right at downtown, was great for a rainy weather stop. Here are Steve and his friend Carmen, saying goodbye after collecting our rental fee.

June 27 -- Newburyport, Mass to Portsmouth, NH

We motored the 15 miles once outside NBP to the entrance to Portsmouth, due to light wind directly on our nose. And there was about a knot of adverse current too. The current was favorable in the Merrimack, pushing us downstream, and  then changed and helped push us up the Piscataqua River.  But it was adverse, by about one knot, while we traversed the entire Atlantic coast of New Hampshire. The Piscataqua is the border between NH and Maine. In fact, Portsmouth and Kittery Maine are like Brooklyn and Manhattan, except they are in different states. And between them, and a hub of economic activity for both cities, on Peavey island, is a huge U.S. Navy Yard, devoted to refurbishing ships, especially submarines. This is another new port for ILENE.

The distinguishing feature of the passage was the first appearance of fog, not the deadly 50 feet fog, but 200 yards (for about a half an hour) is too close for comfort. The Captain directed the crew to “Put down that cell phone and maintain an intense watch!” while he vacuumed the cabin. It was also rather cold, though I did not feel this as much as Lene did. Other than that half hour, visibility ranged from .5 to 2 mile; decent.

We passed Portsmouth Harbor light in Fort Pitt and headed for dockage at The Martina at Harbor Place, which is the back of an office building built at the end of a row of old warehouses that lined the city. We are in the heart of the downtown of this historic city, the only boat living aboard in the marina which is gated for security.  Lene brought the boat in for a perfect landing against a tide that flows quite strongly here.

We took a walk into town, got oriented to the history of the place,

came back, showered and dined aboard.

We left NBP at about 8:20 and were all tied up by 1:30, ahead of the anticipated 2 pm rain. The rain began at about 5:30 and is expected to stay here with us, and keep us here, for the next few days before the jump to Portland Maine.

June 25 and 26 -- Rockport to (and in) Newburyport

Passage across Ipswich Bay was timed to have us arrive during the final two hours of the flooding tide to carry us upstream in the Merrimack River, but not sooner because the current then, in the middle of the tide is too strong -- currents can reach six knots. Because the wind was from the west and the tide flowed to the west, this can set up dangerous steep waves over the bar at the mouth of the river when the both the current and wind are too strong. In fact the Coast Guard broadcasts advisories not to cross if conditions are severe. Today conditions were mild but still there was more turbulence over the bar than in open water. And I divided the 15 miles in the Bay into three hours and with the winds moderately light I put up only the Genoa and made speeds between four and six knots. Lene enjoyed this port tack sail, heeled no more than 15 degrees.

 

While crossing the bar and  heading upstream, Lene was appointed to use the iPad to help identify the buoys and keep us in the middle of the channel. We lucked out in arriving at the bridge just in time for its half hourly opening.

Once on our mooring at the Merri-Mar Marina (in the Merrimack, get it?), we dinked ashore, only 100 yards, to pay our bill and check out the marine store, which did not have the things we wanted. Heading back out to the boat, the outboard died. Fortunately we were only a few feet upstream from the marina dock and the current carried us back to the dock. Meanwhile, let me try it,” I said to Lene. When I squeezed the rubber ball pump, inset in the black hose that carries fuel from the tank to the engine, gas spurted out of the side of the hose. It was cut by pressure of the lifting line when the dink was hanging on the davit bar the last two days. I will have to check it more carefully from now on to prevent a repetition. But the cut was only about an inch from where the hose attaches to the engine. And the parts guy at the marine store/repair yard got the broken end off, cut the good part of the hose flush, sold us a hose clamp and put it on for us to secure the hose again. $4.13, the cheapest boat repair ever.  Also our new Maine electronic chartplotter chip had arrived!

We dinked about a mile downstream with the tide, tied up at the dinghy dock, did the laundry, shopped for a few groceries, and after dinner drove the dink back up stream against the much weaker current.  Again rain in the evening.

Our lay day was gray with periods of rain but hot. The grayness meant relief from the sun and the day in town meant relief for my shoulder which has a bit of pain from too much winch grinding.  I went ashore to fill our dinghy gas tank, only ½ mile walk each way, pay for our second night’s rent and fill three one-gallon water bottles. We brown bagged our lunch and ate with some new friends Lene made. One of them wants to  be a cruiser and  peppered us with questions, which I love. Then Lene got her nails done while I toured the Custom House Maritime Museum. (Readers who dislike museums: please skip the next paragraph.)

The Customs House was built in 1835 and in a most elegant Greek Revival style. We learned, at the customs house museum in Salem, in 2008, that before the enactment of the Income Tax in 1913, customs  -- the taxes imposed on imported things -- was this nation's primary source of federal income. So the Customs House in a shipping port like Newburyport, was a big deal and well constructed.  The museum’s treatment of ship building was not as thorough as in the museum in Bath Maine which we visited in 2008. It noted that the town was the victim of its own success:  As the builders, owners and captains got richer and richer, they wanted bigger and bigger ships until the ones they wanted were too big to cross the bar of the Merrimack and the shipping was conducted in Boston or Portland. Shipping was the most entrepreneurial “high risk - high reward” industry of that time. They also had a good display about the Coast Guard, which considers this town its birthplace. Alexander Hamilton (we last met up with him in his birthplace, Nevis), as Secretary of the Treasury,  ordered construction of fast boats, built here, called Revenue Cutters, to protect the Nation’s income by hunting down smugglers. This revenue service got merged with the lifeboat service and about 200 years later, after further mergers with the lighthouse service and others, into the Department of Homeland Security. There was a good treatment, including many large photos, of a few of the many merchant vessels wrecked in Ispwich Bay. It was a death trap for heavy merchant ships which could not sail closer to the wind than a beam reach and got caught in the bay by north winds, unable to sail out. Interestingly, those who elected to remain aboard were saved while those who got into lifeboats frequently died. They had a room displaying nautical charts from the period prior to those of the U.S. Navy’s Hydrographic office, but it did a poor job of explaining them. Another section displayed this town’s contribution to the Civil War, which included a ship of relief supplies sent to England to support the people there displaced from their textile work by the war's disruption of the flow of cotton. A room was devoted to John P. Marquand, whose books mocking but sympathizing with upper class people, were set here, where he made his home. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1939  for “The Late George Apley.” Maybe a suggested read for my book group?

Then we sat for a couple hours in the town’s very good public library, with the NY Times, before a good dinner and a movie, Frances Ha, at the only urban cinema in town, formerly a store, before a dink ride back to feed the kitties and a good night’s sleep.

June 24 -- Boston to Rockport

A rather uneventful 36 mile passage due to almost no wind, so we motored the whole way. We put up sails but the wind left them hanging listlessly. We took down the main to give the wind a better shot at the genoa, but no change.

Until we were rounding Cape Ann, or more precisely, Thatcher Island, just a bit off shore at the tip of Cape Ann, with its distinctive twin lighthouses.

Then the wind picked up on our starboard bow and the current turned adverse and strongly so, immediately. If it had been stormy you can bet that I would have given the Cape  and its off lying rocks a much wider berth. Once around, it was only three miles to Rockport.

This is a tiny picturesque rectangular port, protected by a seawall but open to the east. It has a big pier extending into the rectangle from the other, western end. On that pier is the Sandy Bay YC where we took a mooring, or to be more precise, were helped by the staff to take two moorings, one fore and the other aft. Fore and aft moorings permit them to pack more boats into a small space.





Here is a  view of ILENE, and our neighbors so you can see just how tightly packed we all are.

The harbor features what they call "Motif One", the most photographed fishing shed in America, and being tourists we added to that number.

We also visited the other side of town: Bearskin Road, a collection of one shop and gallery after the next to which tour guides bring bus loads of tourists. Pretty quiet on this early season, late afternoon weekday.

Lene bought a dress for herself and a cherry strudel for me and we scored the freshest tasting scallops ever, which Lene cooked aboard. As we were sitting in the cockpit to eat them, we heard the rumble of thunder, saw the lightning and cleared below. It was quite a storm with torrential rain and high winds, and some water got into the boat because, trussed up fore and aft, we were not facing into the wind. We were glad not to be at sea in that, and it cooled off the 90 degree temperatures we had been having all day.
During the day we got our missing chip mailed to us at our next stop, Newburyport, and our mooring reservation there, including advice on how much clearance there is under the bridge there, and when is the best time to cross the bar at the entrance to the Merrimack River to get there.

June 23 -- Day Sail with Hugh in Boston

Between March and June of 1967 Hugh and I served on the USS Hammerberg DE 1015. He relieved me as Anti Submarine Warfare officer of that warship. About 18 months ago Hugh found me via Facebook, there being no other persons, to my knowledge, with both my first and last names. Since then we have been threatening to get together. Heck, it has only been 46 years! And today that meeting finally took place on our peace ship, ILENE.  Hugh, also retired, is quite an active environmentalist here in the Boston area, and tours on a motorcycle creating YouTube postings on his travels, analogous to this blog, except video and voice narration rather than still pictures and written words. Hugh brought his son, Harry (the photographer) and Harry's son, Levi, age 10 and already an active sailor in the Community Sailing Program on Boston's  Charles River.

We sailed from about 11 to 5, out of the harbor and back. Regrettably, the tide was against us both ways and the forecast 12 to 14 knot wind did not materialize until about 2 pm and then it was stronger than that. Still, a good time was had by all with an achieved speed of nine knots through the water on a beam reach with too much sail up -- but it was fun. So we replaced the genoa with the jib and reefed the main and got things back under control again. For me it was a pleasure to have three generations of sailors from the same family  aboard, the two older ones with lots of experience and local knowledge of these waters and the islands -- about 32 of them! --  in the harbor, now part of a national park.  As Captain, my responsibility for the safe and proper navigation of our boat never ends. But today I relaxed and  delegated most of that responsibility to a knowledgeable and trustworthy crew. I especially enjoyed seeing Hugh and Harry patiently and persistently teaching Levi, an eager learner, the waters, the charts, the buoys, the shoals, and the ways and whys of the sea. It was a pleasure having them aboard. At the end we got back a bit early so motored over to see Old Ironsides with the Bunker Hill Monument,as background to the left.

Ilene did not join us for the day sail, but enjoyed a day in the City, on her own, and took a walk in the Boston Public Garden
and shopped on Newbury Street before joining Hugh's wife, Arlene, who took her to a supermarket after which they joined Hugh and me for an excellent dinner at Taranta, a terrific Peruvian-Italian restaurant in Boston's North End, including a piece of white fish from the Amazon that grows to 600 pounds.

Hugh and I promised not to let another 46 years go by without hooking up again, possibly in New York, for Columbus Day with Levi.

June 22 Scituate to Boston

Good bye Scituate!

10:00 to 3:00, for about 30 miles to Boston, unfortunately most of the way against tide that grew to two knots.  It was nice and warm and dry with a slight haze but no fog. Lene spotted a marine mammal as we exited Scituate, but not close enough to determine whether it was a seal or a whale. We started on a broad reach after jibing upon exiting the harbor and eventually as we headed westerly to enter Boston, we had to tack a few times and motor-sail for two miles. But from many miles away the Boston Skyline appeared.

My problem was that as many people feared in Columbus’ day, we sailed off the end of our electronic charted world. Its chip provided a chart from the southern tip of New Jersey until outside Scituate. So I had to insert the next chip, which covers from Block Island to the Canadian Border. But somehow it is not aboard with the other chips covering down through the Caribbean, though I cannot recall having removed it from the boat since our last trip to Maine on this boat in 2008. What to do?

In the short run there's good old “dead reckoning” but with an electronic assist. Our paper charts have magenta lines between selected commonly used buoys, with the magnetic course and distance between them. And the chart-plotter still shows a readout of our "magnetic course made good”. By steering (or having auto pilot steer) a course made good which matches the course indicated on the chart, we are on the right course. And since time, speed and distance are functions of each other, and we know the length of the magenta line and our approximate(ever varying) speed, we can calculate when we should be looking out for the landmark buoy.

The intermediate term solution was that Lene’s iPad has the iNaviX application which uses the iPad’s built in GPS and charts downloadable for free from our government. It does a very god job of showing where we are on the chart, which way we are moving, and the way to an easily selected waypoint. But it either lacks some of the functionality of the built in Raymarine chart plotter or I do not yet know how to use that functionality. And another feature of the use of the iPad is battery life. We can keep charging it from the ship’s battery through a 12 volt cigarette lighter type plug, in the cabin, so once a long leg is set, we turned it off, brought it inside and recharged. And the iPad turns itself into a sleep mode after a few seconds of being left alone, necessitating a delay of a few seconds to wake it up when you want to read it.

The long range solution, because the iNaviX is intended as a backup, is to restore the original, by buying a new Maine chip to be sent to us by Fedex at our next port, Rockport Mass.

Boston is a large harbor, but its entrances, though well marked are narrow between many islands in the path. And it was a bustling sailing community this fine Saturday with many boats, underway, mostly going out to sea. Cities are exciting places.

Our only other stop in Boston was on the way back on our 2002 honeymoon trip, on our smaller boat. Today we took a mooring at the Boston Waterboat Marina (what other kind of boats are there? UPDATE: The boats that brought fresj water out to boats anchored out in the harbor used this place as their base: waterboats!), where we stayed last time. The advantage is location: it is right off the New England Aquarium, in the heart of downtown. The disadvantage is also location: it is near the municipal ferry dock and except at night, this causes noise and wakes. In fact, it appears that the MBTA runs under the harbor under our mooring and we hear it rumble by at regular intervals. At least that's the only explanation for the persistent recurrent loud noise.

Dinner aboard and early to bed.

June 21 - Ptown to Scituate, a Lovely Friendly Little Town

Our 30 mile passage across Cape Cod Bay began at 7:30, both because strong winds were expected in the afternoon and because we wanted to explore this picturesque town where we had never been. Early in the passage I deduced the origin of the name Race Point, at a tip of Cape Cod: the tide surely does race past there, and today it raced against us. But once past the Cape we were able to come a bit more off the wind and our speed picked up. We began with reefed main and small jib but then the wind diminished, so we put up the Genoa and finally motor-sailed in very light air, the last two of the six hours.

On the interior walls of PTown's Pilgrim Tower are many blocks of granite donated by and engraved with the names of 17th century Massachusetts villages. One such block bears both the English and Native American name of today's destination: "Scituate - Satuit".

We took a mooring at the Satuit Boat Club and the friendly launch driver (who corrected my pronunciation of the town) dropped us off in town after taking a Club member to his boat. He also took our bag of showering things to the clubhouse so we would not have to carry it. In town Lene got her coffee and after checking out several restaurants and shops, we walked the shore road past the Club to the far northern reaches of town.

Lene rested on this bench overlooking the northern part of the harbor, with our boat out there and her coffee cup behind her. Town is south, at far right. Tide is near dead low, exposing the rocks at left.  We went to the Cedar Point community of cedar shake covered homes, like those that cover the former lighthouse keeper's home. Scituate is a suburb of Boston- a half hour commute. The point is where the now ornamental lighthouse is located.

  Local legend has it that the two young Bates sisters, daughters of the lighthouse keeper, saved the town from being sacked by the British during the war of 1812 by furiously playing the fife and drum, causing the invaders to think that a whole regiment was defending the town. A lovely legend for sure; truth, maybe. But that's my cynical side.

I walked out to the end of the seawall that extends out past the lighthouse and protects the harbor from nor'easters. Why; because it was there. That threatening rain cloud sprinkled only about five small drops on us while we walked back to the Club. There, after we had taken our showers, we met the same member who the launch operator had taken out to his boat before taking us to town, Bill Ketter. We got to talking and he not only recommended a restaurant, but drove us to it.

This is not a food blog but we had memorable food at The Mill Wharf. I ordered a Quahog  (a large stuffed clam for those not from New England), largely so that Lene could have a taste, her first of this delicacy, with large chunks of clam mixed with the bread and spices. I had "Lobster, Mac and Cheese" with large chunks of the meat of a whole lobster baked with the nice fat macs and Gruyere. And though I'm known to eat heartily, half of it came home with us for lunch tomorrow. At dinner we met Jim and Cynthia,who live here and sail a small simple boat.

We invited them to come aboard for a tour of ILENE, which had the side benefit of a car ride back to the Club. Like I said, a very friendly town.

June 20 -- Another Day in Provincetown

Did  I mention that we took a dock last night? Easier for our passengers to disembark, but that is not why we paid $100 more than the cost of a mooring. The reason was water access. The club where ILENE wintered chased me off without water with a heavy per diem fee at a non-water dock. And the Harlem YC's hose, to bring water out on the dock, had not yet been repaired from the hurricane damage last fall when we left.They had higher priority repairs to make.  So on the dock we filled each of the two tanks, pumped them dry and refilled. Now the water no longer tastes at all  like propylene glycol, the non-toxic antifreeze we use to winterize the boat. And this morning ILENE got the first thorough scrubbing of her topsides this year. If I was really industrious, I would compound off the few black marks and give her a coat of wax.
We have some interesting neighbors at the dock such as the fleet of whale watching boats and this excursion schooner. I took a ride on her predecessor, "Hindu," with my two older kids, before I was a boater, in the mid seventies.

Here is ILENE with the big monumental tower behind her.

I climbed to the top of the tower in the afternoon with Alex, Mark and Sarah. (this picture is from the base of the tower after the descent.) Sad to say good by to Alex  until my next trip to Oregon in the late fall or winter.

And above is ILENE, back on a mooring again, from the top of the tower. She is the larger white dot, close to the end of the pier, to its right. The docks extend from the left side of the pier.

The tower was built as a monument to the Pilgrims. The "Mayflower" landed in Provincetown first,  for a few weeks, before its leaders sought a place on the mainland near Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, across Cape Code Bay. The tower was built between 1907 (cornerstone laid with Teddy Roosevelt in attendance) and dedication in 1910 (with President Taft present). This is the same general time period  (pre WWI) when The New York Public Library and Grand Central Station were built; a national edifice complex period.  Its granite blocks were cut in Stonington Maine, where we may visit, and shipped here by schooner.

When I hauled up and secured the dink on its davit bar tonight in preparation for our passage to Scituate Mass tomorrow, my thoughts turned to Ahab and Ishmael and all the other whalers who had to lower boats when they detected whales and raise them again after the hunt.

June 19 - Sailing with Alex out of Provincetown

My granddaughter, Alex, smiling on the rail and all serious at the helm. At age ten, her first time sailing and she can steer, including through the tacks.  (Hence she has one of the three qualifications of an "Able Seaman" of the Royal Navy. They have to be able to "Hand (handle lines), Reef (work aloft reefing sails) and Steer." My fear: "Bring a book for her as defense against potential boredom," was completely unfounded. She lives on the west coast and the only other time she was aboard, perhaps five years ago, it was blowing 30 knots plus. So I wisely did not leave the mooring at the Harlem YC that day and have waited a long time for this day.

With winds at about 15 knots from the north we stayed close to a beam reach, on a westerly course toward Plymouth, on the mainland, and then back. We made speeds of about 6 - 7 knots under reefed main and small jib. A beautiful 4.5 hour sail.

Others on board included Ilene, in her new Block Island hoodie,

Peewee (Alex's other grandfather, from England, who is an experienced sailor),

Alex's father Mark, shown here later, on land,

and Mark's sister, Kate (also from England and a first time sailor).

After we docked (to get water), Mark returned and chauffeured us to the supermarket and back, and then to the home they rented here with a view of the Harbor. (This photo fails to do the view justice.)

for a delicious dinner with all of them and the rest of the party which included, left to right: Alex's grandmother, Eileen, Mark's wife, Sarah,the aforementioned  Kate and Sarah's cousin Christina.

I was ecstatic the whole day. Alex can steer and enjoys sailing!!

June 18 -- Phinneys to Provincetown

A great breakfast because we had time. This was due to the need to delay our start to catch the beginning of favorable tide in the CC Canal at 10:22 am. Time to enjoy the sunrise and the calm dry air, the promise of a beautiful day. We were delayed even further because it took me so long to use the salt water washdown  pump at the bow to wash about ten pounds of oily black sludgy mud off of the links of 110 feet of anchor chain. A few ounces of it made it onto the deck. Also, the windlass stopped after most of its job was done 2/3 of the was done, and had to be reset, because the chain piled up too high in its locker until shaken down, causing a circuit breaker to trip. Further delayed by a gentleman from a nearby boat who chose this particular time to dink over and talk to us.

But the delays, it turns out, were not so unfavorable. Specifically, when we got to the Canal, the current was NOT favorable. What had I done wrong? Maybe I got mixed up and actually got the start of the flow in the wrong direction meaning bad and worsening tide for the entire length of the canal would be facing us. Lene checked again and my mistake was not so drastic: I had just read the time for yesterday, which was indeed 10:22. But today the good flow started at about 11:30 so the delay balanced out the mistake, sort of. But I have to be more careful!

At the near end of the canal we saw the Mass Maritime Academy's training ship, the Kennedy,  last pictured in this blog in Charlotte Amalie harbor, St. Thomas, USVI, last winter.

Once out in Cape Cod Bay the wind was on our nose at about five knots true and 10 apparent with our motor assist. So we continued motor sailing almost all the 23 remaining miles to Provincetown. We tacked a bit east of the direct line and then north of it. I cleaned a bit while Autopilot steered. The last couple of hours were darned unpleasant, with 23 knots apparent, motor-sailing like the blazes with an ugly cold rain-threatening wind .Lene remained comfortably below, which is as it should be. We are on a mooring here and await a great day forecast for  tomorrow. Here is P-Town's Venetian style tower,taken from the pierwhere our dinghy was while we went ashore to pay our bils, take showers and dine on Portuguese food at the Goveernor Bradford:

June 17 -- Block Island to Phinneys Harbor, Mass

A long passage of more than 50 miles, so we got started at 7 am and motored at near six knots to be sure to get to our destination: a port near the western end of the Cape Cod Canal. The three options were Mattapoisett,  Marion and Onset., all on the mainland (north) side of Buzzards Bay, more or less near the entrance to the canal. The Canal's tide starts to run in our favor at 10:22 am tomorrow, so we want to be near, to jump in for the shot to Provincetown.

There was not enough wind and it was from behind us, to sail. There was a moderate ocean swell, maximum five feet, coming in to shore from the south, rocking our boat as we slid over each crest. These were not waves, with whitecaps, just ocean rollers.  We passed three large ocean freighters and averted course to pass behind the first of them. They appeare to be crossing our bow from port to starboard and with the rollers crashing on their bows, it looked like they were going forward. But in fact they were anchored in 110 feet of water, about three miles off the Rhode Island coast.

Then about ten o’clock the wind came up from about 120 degrees off our starboard quarter and we shut off the engine and averaged a bit more than seven and a half knots. The wind shifted further astern and we ended up wing on wing,making 6.5 knots, for the final half hour before dousing sail to traverse a passage to our anchorage.

And we ended up on our anchor, in Phinneys Harbor on the Cape Cod (south) side of Buzzards Bay.  Lots of room around us and we have 110 feet of chain out in depth of 30 feet at high tide.  We are secure on anchor ready for a home cooked meal in a spot with a nice view.

And we have hot and cold running water at last. The replacement  part arrived in Essex, but when I installed it and turned on the fresh water pump to test it, water leaked out of the bowl at a rapid rate. I removed and reinstalled the bowl, with the same result. So I called Brian, of  Headsync, the firm that installed the water maker back in 2010. He said maybe the black plastic top into which the bowl is screwed, should be replaced. But upon dis-assembly, I learned that some of the white plastic fittings had been glued in to the old part and I had no such replacement parts. But with the device taken apart, I thought to screw the bowl on right side up, rather than upside down. I asked Lene to hand it back to me which she did. Then I asked for the “O” ring.  I explained what that was (you may recall that the space shuttle takeoff disaster was attributed to a faulty “O” ring.) She said she did not have it, and I did not have it so what gives? I had the one from the broken bowl but it was put away. Then I looked down and saw what the problem had been all along. The “O” ring was lying at the bottom of the compartment dedicated to the water maker. I thought I had put it in originally, but in doing this job upside down it had fallen out and without the ring it leaked. Retrieved and installed and the thing no longer leaks and we have hot and cold running water at last. So I'm a hero to Lene who forgot that I caused the original problem by not winterizing the system fully and by dropping the "O" ring while trying to make the repair.