August 10 and 11 -- Somesville to Winter Harbor and Lay Day There, 18 Miles

A “sound,” I had always thought, is a body of water separating a smaller body of land from a larger one: Long Island Sound separates Long Island, New York from the mainland of the North American continent. If that definition is correct, Somes Sound is not a sound but a bay, cutting deeply into Mount Desert Island, a cul de sac, but with a lovely harbor at its terminus.

We left Somes Sound as we had entered, on broad reaches. Coming in we were pushed by south winds and departing pushed by north winds. We sailed under full main and genoa at about six knots, more in gusts. We passed the 140 foot Rebecca, which was being motored north, starboard to starboard. Once out of the Sound and into the Great Harbor of MDI we gybed to port and picked up better wind on beamier port reaches, though the wind was blocked somewhat by the Island itself. We passed he light on Beat Island, right in the Harbor. When we achieved nine knots, briefly, it was clear that we simply were flying too much sail. ILENE was heeled, but not at all like she would have been before the keel augmentation.  So we replaced the genoa with the small jib and continued across Frenchman’s Bay the wide body of water that separates Mount Desert Island’s eastern Bar Harbor side from Schoodic Point, which is considered the eastern end of the Mount Desert Region. We were zipping right along except for about 20 minutes during which God turned off his wind machine, leaving only the waves but not the propulsion.

Our destination was Sand Cove in Winter Harbor, on the east side of Frenchman’s Bay. This port had been scheduled as the first port of call of the Corinthians 2007 Cruise, our first Maine cruise aboard ILENE. But the port was scratched in 2007 due to rain and I had wanted to come here ever since.  Sand Cove is the largest and westernmost of the three coves at the northern end of Winter Harbor (so named because supposedly it does not freeze over in winter).

The Winter Harbor YC has its clubhouse and mooring field in Sand Cove. A very lovely club it is; not posh but rather old fashioned and rustic with large social rooms of wicker furniture, and an active program of racing. Founded only three years after the Harlem, they are proud to be the home of the “oldest complete continuously-raced fleet of sailboats in the country” a fleet of nine matched Winter Harbor 21s, all of which float on adjacent moorings in front of the clubhouse

and they are actively raced each week of the season. They have a pool that guests like us can use and a snack bar type lunch, with self busing of your dirty dishes and an automatic 20 percent tip. Good showers and launch service and an unusual rule: no internet is allowed in the clubhouse. So the posting of this blog will have to wait. We started to walk to town but were picked up by Hop and Marianne, long time members who told us a lot about the history of the place. Apparently, up until about ten or fifteen years ago, an influential member had caused the Club to get a reputation as being “not friendly to visiting cruisers”. Quite the opposite of that is true these days. And, for example, the launch operator drove over to the IGA to pick us up with our groceries.

To join you must own a home in the community and you may wish to join the adjacent community nine-hole golf and tennis court club as well. Very few of the members in their directory list the Winter Harbor area as their primary home. Rather, they live in Florida, North Carolina, California, Boston, New York, DC, etc., except in the summer when they live on Grindstone Point where the Club is located, and frankly there is not much to do in this neighborhood other than the activities that the club provides.

We had planned to spend the night as a good hopping off point to Roque Island, this summer’s furthest destination, and the longest passage since we arrived in Maine. But we learned that the town’s 56^th Annual Lobsterfest was being held the next day so we added a lay day in Winter Harbor. We missed the blueberry pancake breakfast and were too pooped to stay for the parade and fire works, but enjoyed the other activities. There were lobster boat races in the morning.

Lobstermen work hard and it is rather lonely work. But today in fourteen different classes, based on fuel and size, they raced and had a whale of a good time doing it.

We could see the races from our mooring but saw them better, closer, from our dink. These boats are made for dependability, but not speed. Yet the races, for each class, were drag races over a straight course for about a mile. No engines were blown and no one was hurt.

Then came the lobster dinner with communal seating.

It included the lobster, corn on the cob, cole slaw, chips, beverage and a great slice of blueberry pie: $20. Or if you feel hungry (like Ilene was) add a second lobster for $5 more.

Finally, we visited the craft fair and Lene bought a few things. We just lucked out that our schedule coincided with the festival.