July 26-28 -- Lay Days in Booothbay and a Night in Linekin Bay, 5 Miles and One in Hog Island, 12 Miles

We did everything we had planned on the lay day in Boothbay except for the movies which were not to our taste. We lunched at Kalers. I recalled a very memorable meal last time. I don’t remember what we ate, except how good it was. This time the food was fine but that extra spark was just not there. The lay day became a day and a half due to complications in stopping the leaking drain of the galley sinks. Grover’s Hardware had the plumbers putty but applying it required disassembly of the existing sink drains during which I broke both of them, one at a time.

Another call to our friend Dean. I would hate to impose upon him except I know how much he likes to help people. Fortunately, Grovers had the units, I got their last two, and Mike there was exceptionally helpful in disassembling the broken parts from those still needed.

I had a large vise grips and my father’s old pipe wrench, stored in a Zip lock bag to deter rust. (How many cruising boaters carry a pipe wrench do you suppose?)  but the unit in question really required a wrench capable of handling a nut that was 2 1/2 inches across. I worked at the job in the evening, during the night when I woke up because of it and the next day until two pm. A competent plumber with the right tools and parts could have probably done the job in less than an hour. Me -- ten!  But it is done and apparently not leaking.

But by two pm our plans to go the Hog Island had to be changed – too far for the amount of time remaining. So we motored, in fog again!, the less than five miles. to Luke’s Boatyard on the eastern side of Linekin Bay, a new spot for us. The northwestern side of Linekin is only approximately a one mile walk back to Boothbay Harbor. I had always been intrigued by the name of the place. My boat’s mate’s name is Lene, the second syllable of her offical nane: Ilene. But one of my terms of endearment for her is Lenikins. The bay is vast with lots of deep water.

We took a mooring at Luke's Boat Yard for only $25 for a well spaced mooring. In the morning when I dinked in to pay, Mr. Luke requested only $20! How often are the prices charged LESS than advertised. His is a working shipyard and offers no amenities such as showers and launch service, but the price can’t be beat.

The sail from Linekin Bay to Hog island started in bright sunlight. At last the end of the fog! But no, once out, the fog returned, though fortunately never less than two tenths of a mile. But is spoils the pleasure, requiring concentration and depriving the traveler of the vistas.

Wind was from the south and we tacked south to the Atlantic. The wind was a beam reach heading east, but lightened to almost nothing as we went along. There were five foot ocean rollers coming in which bounced us and our sails around so much that when we got to two knots we furled the genoa and motored under main alone. The little arrow atop the mast spun around to every direction as the waves rocked the wind out of the sails. The only tricky part of the navigation was at the northern end of Hog Island where it got very narrow with lots of rocks that emerged when the tide ebbed. Only the white slab of rock at the top of the high pile about 2/3rds of the way to the right was visible when we came in near high tide.

Hog Island is a nature sanctuary operated by the Audubon Society.

The Society welcomes visitors who appreciate nature and provides a few mooring at the north end of the island. Today the office was closed, well actually the facilities were not locked, but no one was on the island except us. Here is a view into a narrow inlet cut into the island from the boat during a non fog interval,

followed by a view of the boat, telephoto through the fog (which returned), from the other end of the inlet.

There are trails around and through the island and we walked, for an hour. We met no one except this guy in a tree.

And we met Anita,

who sails a Pearson '26, solo, out of the Centerboard Yacht Club in South Portland. They can handle a boat with our draft and provide launch service across the bay to DeMillo’s Marina on the city side of Portland Harbor.

We invited Anita to breakfast the next morning.

July 25 -- Sebaco Harbor Resort to Boothbay Harbor, 19 Miles

1. The heavy fog persisted so a quiet morning in which I tried to discover the source and then, from our friend Dean of s/v "Autumn Borne", the fix, for a small leak from the galley sink drain. Thanks, Dean! I also spent some time comparing the newest Embassy Cruising Guide for New England, which we acquired during this cruise, with the old out of date one. But some of the changes are not improvements. They deleted the chartlet for the anchorage at Sakonet where we stayed: there is no money to be made from anchorages. They deleted the arrows from the charts showing the direction and strength of tidal flows, why? They created a whole new large section devoted to "Mega Yachts" -- that's where the money is. But they also made some improvements in addition to updating the information about each place mentioned. For example they have drawn the shape of the docks of each marina, improving NOAA's charts. I also copied out information that I had written on the pages of the old book into the new. 

We set out at noon when the fog had lessoned. With heavy rain predicted for the 26th, we selected the mooring field of Tugboat Inn in Boothbay Harbor as our destination. Here one can find both ketsup and plumbers putty, a barber shop, a book store and a movie theater, and a free shuttle bus to get us around. In short, a good place to wait out a rainy day.
The fog continued, though mostly not as heavy, until our arrival at 3:45. Strong wind from the south so we motor sailed southward and detoured a bit west of south to keep a bit of wind in the mainsail during the first part of the passage when big waves and tidal current were heading us. Once we turned east we shut down the engine and sailed the rest of the way into the harbor, but using only the main. In fog slower is better and headsails make for speed and impair sight and hearing. So without the headsail, the full effect of adding more than five percent to the boat's weight, at its very bottom has not yet been tested.

Above is a picture of the route taken from the MFD from the left down, across and to the upper right - the red dots at bouys. The pink line shows our track and it goes into the lower left corner, away from the heavier black line with t he arrows to show how we tried to avoid motoring directly into the big seas. The boxes have something to do with the tide and I'm not sure what it means yet.

July 24 -- Orr's Cove to Sebasco Harbor Resort, 8 Miles and a BIG Mistake

The mistake occurred yesterday but though this blog tells the story warts and all, I couldn't bring myself to tell you about it then. I rinsed the water tanks with fresh water and a bit of Clorox before filling them with fresh water. In the process I put about ten gallons of water into one of our two fuel tanks. It's not that they are not clearly labeled!
Ilene was not pleased with me but I was much more angry at myself. I did not realize the error until I tried to pump the chrorinated water from the tank and none would come out. Yes, idiot, because you hadn't put any water into that water tank! Then I made matters worse by switching the fuel tank selector to draw fuel from the other tank, the good tank. -- but accidentally switched from the good tank to the bad. So in the morning, after the engine got warmed up, it quit. Great Island Boat Yard used their work boat to tow us, by the hip, to one of their moorings. They needed our dock space for another boat. We lowered the dink and went ashore to ask the experts but they recommended "fuel polishing" by a company that does this, but it was not available for a week. Fuel polishing is sort of like a huge expensive kidney dialysis machine but which extracts water from diesel fuel.
With Lene's help I pumped out the water from the hose, replaced both the Racor filter and the secondary Yanmar filter and bled the air and remaining water out of the line. Three hours, with help from Lene in holding hoses so they did not leak all over the place. I was pleased with myself at being able to fix the problem, temporarily. For the duration of this season we will use only one of our two fourty gallon diesel fuel tanks. Next winter I will empty the contaminated tank and remove it. Then either clean it or replace it with a new one.
After lunch we set off at about 12:30  for either Five Islands or Love Cove. But it had grown far windier than the 7 to 9 knots from the south that had been forecast and it was foggy and the area was full of lobster traps. And I was temporarily unmanned by my own stupidity. No more derring do for  today. So even when we saw some sun. we went to the familiar nearby Sebasco Harbor Resort mooring field, used their launch to get showered and enjoyed Lene's delicious home cooking. Not much of that on the road trip. Restaurant food is more fattening, less nutritious and more expensive.
One good thing today though: we met up with Naomi and Kevin who sail a Southern Cross 28 out of Padanaram in Buzzards Bay. We hape to see more of them.
A cool quiet foggy night, despite the south winds which blow right into the harbor, but the rocks break up the waves. We had to close the hatch over our bed: the fog (clouds, really) get blown by the wind and directed by the hatch covers through the mosquito net where it collects into drops that fall off the screen onto our heads.

July 16 - 23 -- Snow Island to Orr's Cove, Two Miles (And a Car Trip to Quebec City)

More cleaning in the morning before and after the two mile motor to The Geat Island Boat Yard to have them install the 1140 pound lead slab cast by Mars Metal of Canada to the bottom of our keel. The heads, the emptying of the refrigerator and freezer and the cleaning of their interiors, vacuuming, the distribution of the perishables, the emptying of the water tanks which were starting to smell foul, and then by car to Waterville, only one hour of the five to Quebec City.
Our crew did not really like hotel living. It was traumatic for them and caused them anxiety. They found strange little hidden places to hide in each hotel room and did not eat very much, which for Witty is quite a change. They were very happy to get back to the boat at the end of the adventure, and slept off the afternoon in the aft cabin. Lene got beauty treatments while I explored what Waterville had to offer. A six foot wide steel suspension bridge called "Two Cent Bridge" for the toll that used to be charged for workers to walk to work from the residential side of the Kennebac River. It was built in 1901, 14 years after the much bigger Brooklyn Bridge.

The college art museum was closed. I bought hand tools for the boat at Harbor Freight.
The drive to Quebec City was marked by torrential rainstorms that caused us to pull over to the side and wait. After the bridge across the St. Lawrence River, we proceeded east an the Grand Allee, which changes its name to Rue Saint Louis, and ends at the Chateau Frontenac Hotel, the iconic landmark of this old walled city, seen here from the only higher ground, The Citadelle.

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The construction along the Grand Allee was all new since my first and only prior visit to this city which was in about 1985. Then the hotel was the skyline but now has several neighbors. Hotel at left, taken from the excursion boat.

Our B &B

was on Rue St. Louis in the walled city, about half way between the Frontenac and the Citadel. We watched the Changing of the Guard  ceremony in the Citadel. The red coated soldiers of the off-going 24 hour shift, the on-coming shift and in the band all marched in and out under their bearskin hats, looking very British but marching to orders barked in French.

The Regimental macot, a billy goat with his horns painted gold, played his part too. They made it into a hour of pomp that perhaps Mr. Trump would have enjoyed. A bit silly but fun. I returned for the tour of the fortress

and the museum the next day.






 I also visited the Museum of Civilization, which was a bit disappointing, due to lack of focus, though it had a model boat!

The highlights of our time here were with Manu and Michelle who not only joined us but, for example, brought along five other friends, most of who also know Greg and Wanda of Halifax. This was at dinner at the Quebec YC

which has slips for 300 boats at docks protected from the forces of the St. Laurence by massive seawalls.

I spent most of that evening talking with Yves, whose 39 foot French sloop is currently in Grenada. Subject to all of the vissicitudes that make sailing plans tentative, I was invited to sail with him and Manu from Bermuda to Halifax next July. If this comes off, Lene will fly to Bermuda with me a few days earlier and thence to Halifax where she will hang with Greg and Wanda while we are at sea.
The next night we were invited by another of the group, Bernard, to his house in the woods, overlooking a very long stretch of the babbling Montmorency River, for a home cooked dinner including meat grilled over a wood fire in the yard. If Bernard sends me the photo he promised, I will add it to this post in lieu of this sentence. The view is truly majestic. From his house, which he built from wood he sawed from logs, no sign of mankind infringes into the view: no home, road, path or powerline.
We also walked on the Plains of Abraham, on which the decisive battle was fought in which the British took Canada from the French, before our Revolutionary War and to the garden dedicated to Jean d'Arc located there

Manu, Lene and Michelle

before an excellent French lunch in a restaurant revolving atop an office tower. M and M also had lunch with us at another French restaurant they knew where I had my Poutine (one dose per Canadian trip). This time the fries came with duck confit and cheese curds.








Speaking of the Montmorency River, it terminates at the Falls of the same name which tumble a greater distance than the height of Niagara Falls though with less width or volume of flow, into the St. Lawrence.. We saw the Falls twice, first from an excursion boat that took us up and down the St. Lawrence, and the photo was shot from under the bridge seen in the background ogf the next photo. Then later we visited the falls more close up, by car.

Our last three nights away from our boat were in a hotel in Freeport Maine, a town that Lene loves because it is the home of L.L. Bean as well as about 80 other outlet stores. We shopped and Lene got more stuff for me than for herself. We also took in a regional theater group's program of six one act plays. Amusing, but Lene's WEDREPCO group is so much more professional.

And one day of touring Portland, though it was a nasty rainy day, our first such day of this cruise, a good day to be ashore. We stopped at Portland Yacht Services and the moorings had indeed been removed, but no docks have been built yet. We also saw, for the first time, the Portland Head Light that we pass each time we enter or leave Casco Bay.

One of our previous visits here we walked to the Victoria Mansion, built as a lavish home by wealthy people in 1858 and with original furnishings, only to find it was closed that warm sunny day. This time it was open and duly magnificent though not like the Breakers at Newport.  And we also took in a movie, "Leave no Trace" which is small but excellent.
Finally we returned to the boat, and provisioned her with $275 of mostly perishable food, paid the yard, returned the car, watered the boat and spent the night at their dock. Great Island Boat Yard finished the job on time and a bit under budget. The folks here are quite a pleasure to deal with. Here are views of the keel before and after.

It should make a difference to her sailing performance. We will find out tomorrow.

July 15 -- Potts Harbor to Snow Island, 13 Miles.

We had two breakfasts today: the frst early normal one was after the kitties woke us up for their breakfast. The second was when the Dolphin Marina launch delivered more of those free blueberry muffins and coffee.
Then a seventeen mile round trip bike ride on the Marina's bikes to Ship to Shore, a convenience store. My muscles are not sore but my butt is. That Lene made this trip shows you how far her sciatica has receded. She is cured!
A grey threatening foggy day but visibility was good enough to go, Lene practiced using the MFD to sail along the plotted route. No wind so we motored. The sun came out and the wind came up when we anchored.
We've been to Snow Island before. A pure lovely anchorage area around the island, not deserted, but not crowded either. It is known for warm (by Maine standards) water, but I did not test this out. [This next pic, added in March 2021, an arial view sent to us by the Great Island Boatyard on Harpswell Island, where the shoe was attached, in the right foreground, also shows Snow Island, a bit south and east, sheltered by the large piece of mainland at upper left.

This time Snow Island was very suitable because it is only two miles from the Great Island Boat Yard, where we have an appointment tomorrow.
Then chores: cleaning, cooking, placing distilled water in the batteries that needed it, tightening the bolts that hold the forward head toilet bowl onto the pump that is its base to stop a microleak (only while pumpimg) and completing the application of plastic waterproofimg spray to saturate the top of  bimini so it will keep the rain from dripping through.

We also got ready for our upcoming Canadian adventure.

July 14 -- Falmouth Forsyth to Potts Cove, 8 Miles

First mango sweetpotato pancakes with Tom and Tina.

I can't give up opportunities for pancakes, i.e., guests. Then I cleaned while Lene watched tennis. We are planning to eat up our fresh provisions in anticipation of hauling the boat on Monday.

After lunch a motor passage on a zig zag route between the islands. Light wind, the shortness of the  course and the frequent course changes caused me to raise only the small jib to augment the engine. The only excitement was a motor boat which lost power and called the Coast Guard, near us. The CG switched the conversation from channel 16 to 22, as is customary. Those who are interested in such gossip switch as well. Normally these events take place many miles away but this episode was only two miles from us. The owner identified his boat as a Hinkley motor yacht. This conveys "I have money so take care of me." The boat had power but no transmission and feared he was drifting onto the rocks. The CG suggested dropping anchor but the owner had only 75 feet of rode and the water was that deep, though eventually, when he drifted nearer, the did drop anchor. Another sailboat was nearer to the vessel than we were and offered help, which was declined. A towboat arrived and the little drama ended for us nosybodies.

Dolphin Marina is the attraction here at Potts Cove with excellent service, lots of freebies and a very reasonable price. ($35) for  mooring. We discovered this place  last August and said we would be back. Last year it was a lovely sunny day. Today, while we had only a few scattered drops of rain, it was cold and gray. They offer bycycles and kayaks to transients and perhaps we will use them tomorrow morning if the weather is more pleasant. Lene did laundry (no fee for use off the machines) and I tried to blog, but discovered that while I got internet and could type in words, sending photos from the phone camera to computer, was not working. Next time, and there will be a next time, if the seas are calm and the skies sunny, we will take a fifteen minute dink ride in the ocean to Eagle Island, the summer home of Admiral Perry, which is a park.

Dinner was really great with their signature free blueberry muffin instead of bread and a memorable delicious halibut with hazelnut sauce, I rarely comment on our cuisine, but this fish was notable. Portland is fifty miles away by car and folks drive out here for the food.  Parking lot full of cars at dinner time.

I have to give a special call out to Emily and Chris. They treat customers as if they owned the business -- with expert attention, intelligence and care. Management should give them each a raise.

July 13 -- Isles of Shoals to Falmouth Forside, 61 Miles

7:30 to 4:15; a long day -- it would have longer but for Wimbledon, which caused us to motor to get "there" faster. We sailed the first hour at a beautiful 6.5 knots on a broad starboard reach. We were part of a moving triangle of three boats, each a mile from the other, that were more or less keeping up with each other. We never knew their names. But then the wind got lighter and we were only making four knots. Lene had subscribed to a service that permits her to watch tennis on her iPad. But when she tuned it said: "Sorry, this service is not available outside of the US." We were seven miles from the coast and did not close it until the entrance to Casco Bay.

So the Admiral ordered the Captain to motor. Lene was an avid and expert tennis player until I ran into her 21 years ago and, with the aid of the sea, seduced her into a life afloat instead of tennis. But her atavistic tennis tendencies arise for the Grand Slam events. I can't complain about a few hours of  motoring, as compared to slow sailing; I'm very glad that she accompanies me. We were also able to sail without engine the last hour -- so peaceful. And it was fun going around the various islands in Casco Bay to reach the Portland YC at Falmouth Foreside.

Good news: I joined the 20th, or even the 21st century today! Yes, I created and followed a "route" on the new Raymarine MFD. Until now I plotted out each passage on a paper chart, from point A, to B, etc.,  to the destination. Then I drew lines from each point to the next with a ruler, measured the length of each line (segment) with dividers to determine its length in nautical mles, added those lengths together, and came up with the passage mileage, e.g., 61 miles today.  But on the MFD (and the old chart plotter had some sort of capacity to do this too but I did not use it) I place points (red dots, called "waypoints") on the electronic chart by touching its screen at each place, in turn, where we turn to get to the destination without running into shallow water. The MFD draws lines (with arrows showing the direction) between each pair of dots, and creates a table showing the length of each line and the cumulative total. It also knows our speed and shows our ETA  at each point and adds them to tell us the ETA for the destination. Of course our speed changes with the wind speed and direction and our angle to it but it gives me an answer to Lene's question: "When are we getting there?" I'm still clumsy with my screen touches, because other types of touches do other things on the MFD, but I will get better. And the machine has an even more advanced feature which I am declining to use. It is called Auto Route or something like that. It knows our boat's draft and where we are, and if you tell it where you want to go, it picks out the waypoints automatically, as the GPS in your car tells you  where to turn to get to a given address. This would take all the work, er fun, out of navigation.
Also, underway, up to now I navigated on a one-waypoint-at-a-time basis, placing the next one once ILENE reached or was close to the one in effect then. This meant some fumbling of thought in picking out the next one on the fly. Now all of them are picked out in advance with lines connecting the dots. And we do not have to follow the route. We can tack back and forth across it and also, even when not tacking, we have placed the waypoints safely off the buoys in question but sometimes we see that we can cut a few shortcuts on the wrong side of the buoy. This will make sailing much easier.

We had planned to take a mooring at Portland Yacht Services. We have stayed every past visit to Portland. It is so convenient to everywhere in that fun city. But they are undergoing "major renovations" and have no moorings available right now. I fear that they may be making the place into another Provincetown. That may, sadly be the way that the world is turning. So instead we took a mooring at the Portland YC at Falmouth Forside, about four miles up on the west side of Casco Bay. We have stayed there before. $37 for a mooring, a bargain for the services provided including big white fluffy towels in the modern clean shower house.
There we hailed Tom and Tina on "Goody Two Shoes" who had come in the day before and were on an adjacent guest mooring. We did the water, garbage, shower and dinner thing. The Club overlooks a huge mooring field for 300 boats from high on a bluff over the Bay providing a great view. A long wide  boardwalk slopes down over the rocks to the floating dock. A tiny portion of the moored boats is shown below.

They have a quirky alcohol policy. As told to me: some members objected to the cost of a liquor license so they did not get one. But members bring in their own bottles and the Club employs a bartender to mix it into drinks for them. Not a problem for us because Lene does not drink at all and I very little. But later the bar tenderess came over and said they had some "leftovers" and would I like a free Dark and Stormy. Yes, delicious. Maybe it was the items we selected, but dinner was a bit of a dissapoinment as to the food, though service and ambience were great.
Another quiet night.

July 12 -- Rockport to Isles of Shoals, 23 Miles

11:30 to 3:30. Why such a late start? Lene wanted to watch Wimbeldon on her iPad, and to order tickets to a play for which the electronic box office did not open until 11. And we had to arrange for the payment to Mars Metals in Canada for the lead slab to be afixed to ILENE's keel.

But excellent good news. Lene's sciatica is vastly improved. She will be back 100 percent soon. My dire fears that this cruise would have to be terminated for medical reasons have proved to be unwarranted. The show goes on!

I replaced a missing cotter pin and wondered how it went missing. I turned an upside down coupler of the main to the mast right side up and considered ways to temporarily  repair a small tear near the bottom of  that sail's luff on a temporary basis before the rough fall winds make it worse. At the end of the season, Paul Beaudin at Doyle Sails will do it on a professional permanent basis. Finally I gave consideration to a problem with the connection of the boom to the mast.

hey are connected by an aluminum fitting on each which two fittings are connected to each other by a stainless steel bolt, a fancy one with hooks welded on top that are needed to put in a reef and a hole for a shackle that holds that corner of the sail. We there is a squaking that grease has not resolved. visual inspection shows that the boom is moving, maybe a 32nd of an inch by eyeball. I think the stainless bolt is wearing away the inside of the holes in the aluminum fitting. I think this can wait until the fall, though it is annoying, but it obviously must be attended to. [Insert photo here.]

Once underway, the seas were confused and rough from the prior storm but the wind was light and in front of us.We put up sails to stabilize the boat but motored all the way. I steered 15 degrees to the lft to get the sails to fill. As the time passed, the winds gradually came aft to a beam starboard reach, which permitted me to sail the course to the waypoint but get even lighter. Hardly any traffic on this bright sunny Thursday afternoon.

We passed the tower of the light on White Island, which had been visible from way off, to port

and the hotel on Star Island to starboard.

The cute ferry "Thomas Laughton", passed us on her way back to Portsmouth from Islas of Shoals.

We took a free mooring that the Portsmouth YC maintains here in Gosport Harbor, which did not get crowded.

We dinked ashore to the dinghy dock at Star Island, as usual, and then ran into a problem with the very polite college kid who was working there: "No dinghys allowed." "So how do yacht people get ashore", I asked. "You have to take our launch but it is not working today."  Hmmm.  "Well you can use your dink to tow one of our wooden rowboats out to your boat and then row it in."  Finally we showed him -- and his manager --  the page in the Hotel's own website which said that no more than seven dinghys can tie up at the dock. Problem solved. It is a magnificently beautiful place.

The website also said that yacht people could dine in the hotel, if space is available, reservations preferred, for $18 for a communal family style meal. But that did not happen because the hotel was completely full of guests that week. Don't worry, we have plenty of food aboard.
We looked at the cove on the back side of the islands where we anchored last fall on a dark and stormy night.

Today it was so clear that we could see the New Hampshire coast, seven miles away, the black line at the horizon.

July 10-11 -- P Town to Rockport, Mass. 49 Miles, and Lay Day There

Eight hours of motoring. Sails up but the winds too weak and from behind us to do us much good. The longest stretch, all but about six miles around the curling cape of Provincetown to the tip of Cape Cod at Race Point (at the beginning), and the last miles from Thatcher Island off Cape Ann to tiny Rockport, was a straight shot for 40 miles. In order, Race Point light, the Thatcher Island twin lights, (an artful touch: shot through the open window of our dodger), and the light on Straitsmouth Island.

Sunny and warm but I'd rather be sailing, like yesterday, but too long to go slow. We crossed the Stellwagen Banks, famous for whales, but the only one I saw on this trip was 3/4 of a mile away, through the binoculars. She or he jumped entirely out of the water to the delight, I'm sure, of the passengers on the large whale watching boat nearby. I had trained my binoculars on that boat because 1) AIS had given me the name of the boat so I knew it was a whale watching boat, 2) they usually figure our where the whales are playing and 3) the boat was stopped so I presumed they were seeing whales. We crossed the traffic separation lanes approaching Boston Harbor but saw no commercial shipping. We viewed the coast line, 15-20 miles west, but Boston's skyline, ten miles further, was obscured by the distance and the light ground haze.  Witty on the prowl, toward Lene's cushioned knees.

Again we selected Rockport (this time over Gloucester), as the stopping place between Provincetown and Isles Of Shoals -- to put in more miles the first day so we would have less to do the second.
Here in Rockport we were assigned to a floating dock closest to the Sandy Bay Yacht Club. To the left of the photo is the most photographed  red fishing shack, the highlight of Rockport Mass tourism: Motif One.

A close-up.




Lene brought the boat to the floating dock perfectly, and our lines were caught by Tom and Tina of "Goody Two Shoes", a Gozzard 39 out of Maryland's Eastern Shore in Chesapeake Bay.

Lene asked if they wanted  to go to dinner with us and they accepted. Nice folks. After they rowed their dink ashore to walk their big dog, Lucy, Alfie Girl naughtily explored their boat. This is their first Maine cruise so we talked about favorite spots. Lene will email a list to them.
Before dinner, at a restaurant on the dock, we showered, filled our water jugs and sat around reading on the YC's front porch, overlooking this tiny packed harbor. The club does not have a restaurant but brings in catering to its small dining room. It was founded in 1885, two years after the Harlem, and is very friendly with an active vibe among its mostly mature members, With dues of only about $400 per year, it has 300 members but room for far fewer boats. So most members keep their boats in Gloucester and there is a 20 year waiting list among members for moorings in the harbor. We noticed a group in three quartets of Mah Jongg players and another group of perhaps ten women which meets on the deck overlooking the harbor to share discussion and the refreshments that they bring -- residents, summer residents and visitors, who are all friends. I told them that their group was like the Harlem's Old Salts Club but without the lunch and sailing. The Clubhouse from Motif One, with ILENE's stern.

A quiet night, excpt for the heavy rains for an hour at ten. Some charts were left out and are spread about to dry.
While I often say that we like to sail, not motor, I have to confess to being a bit of a hypocrite. The lay day here was caused by a prediction that the course to Isles of Shoals would be a 21 mile beat into apparent winds with gusts to 25 knots. Some wag (provenance is disputed) said that "Gentlemen do not sail to windward."  Gentlemen were apparently defined as persons of leisure, the idle rich (like us retirees) who have time to wait out the need to beat to windward. So we stayed and may have to motor when the windstorm subsides. Our floating dock is a very reasonable $43 per day, in cash, placed in an envolope in a locked box.
On the lay day I did some cooking and cleaning, some reading and writing and then, after lunch, a walking tour of the town. Lene stayed aboard to rest her sore leg. I visited its beaches, this is Front Beach from its western and eastern ends,

some suburban looking streets, the Historical Museum (which was closed) and the whole length of its main drag, starting at its western end which is more upscale and less crowded and ending on the point at the end of Bearskin Neck where ice cream stores, souvenir shops, beach clothing and even tatoos abound,
But most of the walk was visiting galleries and the Rockport Art Association Museum. Several stand out. One was Rusty and Ingrid where the process of artistic silk screening was performed in back and its results were sold out front by the two young women entrepreneurs: scenes from New England venues in three colors. I did some silk screening of posters announcing lectures during college and it was fun to see the process done in a professional manner. I also liked David Arsenault's work, including his take on the twin lights of Thatcher Island. His mentor was Hopper.  But I spent the most time with Steven and Donald who retired from the ministry and medicine (the black and the white) to operate Decouvert Fine Art. They specialize in small drawings on paper in red pencil and charcoal from several centuries ago, the genre of Michelangelo that was exhibited at the Met last winter. We talked about many arts and sailing until I tore myself away. Dinner aboard and a cool peaceful night.