August 29 -- Marblehead to Cohaset

We were nearer the mouth of Marblehead Harbor and that may have contributed to the rollyness at our mooring all night. It was not a calm night and the humidity was intense in the fog, which continued through most of the night. It was like living in a cloud. Actually, we were living in a cloud. Lene opened the hatch over our bed with the result that the wind blew the fog through the screen which caught it and caused it to condense and drip onto the bed. And in the middle of the night a big crash. But it did not wake me. Lene did wake, however, to report that the percolator,awaiting the morning with six cups of water and the corresponding amount of ground coffee had fallen off the counter onto the rug in the galley, making a mess and breaking the new plastic see through insert at the top of the pot. Mess cleaned up and remaining part of plastic top placed into service with duct tape. No problem.

We got underway at 8:30 and once we cleared the neck we had a straight shot for the entrance to Cohasset, and averaged 6.8 knots with 10 to 15 knots of apparent wind off our port quarter, heading about 185 magnetic under main and small jib.When we had approached Marblehead, we had been able to see the skyscrapers of the Boston skyline; not today though we were much closer to Boston.

We had the opportunity to use our new app, Ship Finder. This monster was off our starboard bow as soon as we got on course, headed across our bow. This shot shows her after we got much closer and were clearly safe. Ship Finder told us that she was registered in the Marshall Islands as "Noreaster", 594 feet long, 96 wide, and drawing 38 feet. But most important it said she was making zero knots, in other words, anchored. Here is the view the toy gave us of this, after we had passed her, including the white line reflecting the loops Noreaster had made before anchoring. The blue dot is us on our way south from Marblehead at the top of the screen.

Cohasset is a tight little harbor entered through a shallow channel via one of three routes. We took the eastern way and between good enough visibility to see the buoys and Lene reading off from her iPad, it was easy, though a bit scary when passing close by visible rocks and with only two feet of water under our keel.

Cohasset has a pretty, traditionally New England style Village Green,

with the church at which they filmed the Witches of Eastwick, currently undergoing renovation.

The town also has a small and not very well organized history museum. Interestingly, it said that the men of Cohasset had scared off the British after they had bombed neighboring Scituate, where we had stopped on our way north in June. Readers of this blog will recall that in Scituate the claim is made that the two daughters of the lighthouse keeper scared the British away by playing the fife and drum, saving that town.

 Ilene had a surprise in store for me. When we walked into town from the dinghy dock, we passed the Cohasset Harbor Inn. She got the idea to spend a night off the boat, our first since June 10. And once she gets an idea in her head, there is no stopping her. Here is the view from our window with Rojay, our dink, furthest right at the dinghy dock in the lower left and ILENE's mast the tallest in the inner harbor, center.

We dined ashore after putting out lots of cat food for the crew, at the tapas place in the hotel. Pretty good except the alleged flan, while tasty, was a chocolate mouse!