August 21 & 22 — Days 44 — Benjamin River to Castine to Belfast — 16NM & 10NM

 The two passages began alike in still water, and we passed a lighthouse in each. 

Pumpkin Is. light with the green buoy in the first passage and Dice Head Light among the pines on the second.  But the wind never came up during the first passage. My one attempt to unfurl the small jib lasted only a few seconds and ended in failure. On the second passage, once we had cleared the Bagaduce River, on the north shore of which rises Castine,  we cut the engine and sailed, albeit an average speed of 1.8 knots, for about an hour and a half. 

Then the wind came up and it was a fun exciting sail most of the may in to Bellfast. We had a chance to play with the schooners each filled with paying passengers out cruising from port to port.

Here in Castine are, from left to right: State of Maine (the training ship of the Maine Maritime Academy, ILENE on mooring and one of the charter schooners. She and another, ended up docked in Belfast.

In a sense, every port town is alike, with a street along the waterfront such as Water St., Front St.,, etc., and other streets perpendicular to it going up hill away from the water. Both Castine and Belfast rise steeply from sea level. They are essentially in the NE and NW corners of Penobscot Bay. And they bring out memories of our prior visits and of Bill and Sando who we first met in Castine because they recognized ILENE as a Saga, and connected with in Belfast (and many other places) in later years. We dined with them in Castine’s fine dining restaurant which was closed on the day of this visit. Hence Thai food in a quirky corner place this time.

Last time we walked in the eastern part of town and I jokingly called Castine the town with the greatest number of wooden sign posts memorializing trivial moments in 17th Century history per capita in America. A few random examples:

But the reality is that Castine has a proud, keen and active interest in its history. This time we roamed west, toward the lighthouse in the pines, but did not get that far (it was hot) and we stopped at the free admission Wilson Museum. Wilson, with his PhD from Columbia from before WWI, was an archeologist, anthropologist and collector. He purchased and lived on the island across the Bagaduce River from Castine. The museum has a thorough explanation of the various ages of Earth’s geologic eras, artifacts from native peoples from around the world, and the history of the town, the State of Maine and the Wilson family. Quirky but an interesting 45 minutes. We stopped to mail a check at the “second oldest continually operating U.S. post office in the U.S.”

We saw the newly arrived students of the freshman class of the Maritime Academy practicing at soccer and marching.

We were at a mooring right off from the tumbledown old fashioned Eaton’s Boatyard — in the family for generations.

In Belfast, Lene tripped and fell getting from the dink to the dinghy dock and the harbor master provided an ice pack, antiseptic and bandaids. After a rest in her office for half an hour while the shock of the trauma receded, we walked up the main drag. The Old Professor’s Book Store, is still there, but under new management after the death of the professor who used the store to sell off his library. We stopped at the Belfast Co-op Market for provisions and dined at waterfront Nautilus.

I’m flanked by a pair of Ilenes and Cruiser in his favorite “one foot forward” reclining pose.

August 20 — Day 43 — Frenchboro to Benjamin River — 19 NM

 We left Frenchboro with the Ferry taking people off the island.  After he passed us we put up main and small jib with wind in the teens from our side. Well a bit too much wind so I put a reef in the Main. We sailed almost the whole way without the engine, except when passing through Casco Passage which took us from Blue Hill Bay west into Jericho Bay. We put in two tacks to get close to Casco Passage but we could not be tacking through that passage so furled the jib and used the diesel until we were through it. After crossing Jericho, we entered Eggemoggin Reach, the northernmost internal E-W passage in the area. It is wide and straight and divides the islands to its south, mainly Deer Island, from the US mainland to its north. John Steinbeck in his last book, “Travels with Charley”, about a road trip around the US in a pickup converted into a camper with his standard French Poodle, Charley, described his visit to Deer Island, crossing the suspension bridge that we sail under each time. In the Reach the wind dropped to less than ten knots and our speed was no longer more than seven knots, but half that. Lene likes to go that speed. Serenity. The Reach is a favorite with us because of Bucks Harbor at its western end, but a main attraction there is its restaurant, which was closed on Sunday. But the Cruising Guide mentioned Benjamin River, a big fifty foot deep hole cut into the north side of The Reach, guarded by a significant shoal that blocks off most of the entrance, except at the extreme right in this photo.

It is rimmed by moorings near its edges, where the water is less deep. With our 300 feet of chain, we could have anchored with 150 feet of chain in the vacant center with plenty of swing room. But I did not think of that (nor did the Cruising Guide suggest it) until the morning. We took a rental mooring. The only attraction ashore is a market 2.6 miles away and we did not relish a round trip hike of that duration so we did not even lower the dink.

Our neighbor was Grayling, a beautifully restored former sardine transporter. In the morning the mooring rental operator came by to collect his fee. We had been unable to raise him on Sunday.

Aug 19. — Day 42 — Northeast Harbor to Frenchboro, Long Island — 12NM

 We slipped our lines at noon for the 3.5 hour passage to one of my favorites, but it was a tough and dangerous passage. I should have paid more attention to the wind speed and direction instead of blogging. The wind was at 17 knots true, on our nose, requiring tacking out through The Western Way, which is the N-S Avenue out of the south side of the Mount Desert Island archipelago. Yes, Long Island is south, but actually it is SSW, where the wind was coming from. Also, I had failed to put in a reef. Flying by the seat of one’s pants is dangerous. We got out past the reefs at both sides of the Western Way and a couple of miles more and then we hit a lobster pot float. Our speed slowed from six knots to two, gradually, as we towed a crate along the bottom.  I had to act fast lest we get dragged across another of the ubiquitous lobster pot floats. We furled the jib and then dropped the main. But the second of those two moves should be gone while facing into the wind. In this case with the stern anchor provided by the crate, our stern was facing the wind. It was a struggle to pull down the sail while standing on the coach roof in ocean swells maxing at six feet in hight. Then the plan, risky, was to try the Yanmar, but if the lobster rope is caught on the prop, this could damage the prop and the hull and choke off the engine. The alternative of donning wet suit, lowering the dink so I could get back in, tying a line around my waist and jumping in with knife to cut the rope was not appealing. I imagined getting a concussion when ILENE came off a high wave and crushed me as it fell the five feet. So the acid test: put the boat in forward and let’s see what happens. (Fortunately we were far away from reefs as we drifted.) Well we started moving forward and then immediately made two 360 degree turns, a figure eight as it were. And we were free at last, and motored with high rpm’s but slowly because our speed was broken by the waves and wind on our bow, the last five miles to Frenchboro. During those miles a super vigilance against lobster pot floats was maintained. The height and force of the seas dragged the floats temporarily under water. And we listened for the bilge pump. It comes on for a half a second every two minutes even when the bilge is dry to test that condition. If more regularly, or for longer duration it would mean a hole in the bottom through which water was rushing.  No pictures of the excitement.

Once on a mooring in Frenchboro, the day brightened markedly. We walked to the library which has resumed its former practice of remaining open 24/7 on the honor system (they trust us not to steal stuff) with good Wi-Fi. I got the prior posts posted.

We had lobsters with butter, lemon, cole slaw and corn on the cob at Lunt’s Deli.  ($35) I had a hankering for a slice of their homemade blueberry pie made with the small local blueberries, but I was full. Here is Davida, our chef, bringing  our lobsters up from the sea, ILENE’s hull visible at the top.

Their shells were rust colored, not bright pink; very rare.
Next: our dinghy at the dock, ILENE at the far left and the tall mountains of Mount Desert Island in the background to the right.

The night was the least calm of those we have experienced so far on this cruise. A bit of the big waves crept in and rocked us a bit because we were moored north the the ”L” in “Lunt’s Harbor” on this hand painted billboard map of the island.

Aug 17-18 — Days 40 & 41— Eastern Bay to Little Cranberry Is. to Northeast Harbor — 36

 Before I get started, I neglected to mention a significant event occurred in the Eastern Bay anchorage. My Communications Officer called US  Customs and Border Protection to let them know we were coming ashore at Mt Desert Island and would stay aboard under quarantine until they could come inspect us. But there has been a change of methods.  Now there is an app, CBP ROAM. One has to download it and load  all your info on it. Lene spent an hour trying over and over to get this done with multiple passwords and authentication devices. If alone, I would have given up, claimed “asylum seeker” status and become a “man without a country” for a while. Thank God for Lene! They wanted us to photograph our passports into the system as well. Then a reply to the effect:  we are considering your application and will get back to you. Half an hour later an email: “You are approved.” No need to to go to an official port of entry. So the new system is both harder (for non IT people like me) and easier. We were back in the USA, both physically and legally.

The first of the two passages in this post was rather unpleasant, despite sightings of a finback whale, a pod of dolphins and a grey seal. There was zero wind so the seas were flat, making the wildlife more visible. It was cold and grey, with drizzle and, being back in Maine, lots of toggled lobster pot floats to dodge. I crossed one of them and realized it, too late, when the toggle was being drawn to the boat by our keel or rudder. I immediately shifted neutral to avoid getting the line wrapped around the prop, and then turned sharply and hoped the line would drop off, which it did. Another anxiety problem was that we did not have a reservation and rain was forecast for the next day. My Communication Officer had calls in at three places as we headed toward the point where we would have to head North to Northeast Harbor, continue west to Southwest Harbor, or turn south into the anchorage between Big and Little Cranberry Islands. Finally the Islesboro Dock Restaurant by the ferry landingon Little Cranberry got back and said we could have (A) one of three free town moorings far from them or (B) their own mooring near their dinghy dock for $40. We took option B, what with the fog growing thick, lowered the dink, somewhat dried the seating area of the dink with the chamois cloth and dinked in for dinner at the restaurant. No internet or Wi-Fi. A cold rainy night but warm and dry in our snug home.

Next day was mostly a work day. The Harbor Master of Northeast Harbor, on the mainland of MDI, said there would be moorings or off-shore floating docks available, but no reservations — call when in the harbor. We stopped at Clifton’s Fuel Dock in the Harbor (where we waited several hours for CPB to show up when checking in from Nova Scotia in 2017) to refill both water tanks and fuel tanks. Once on a floating dock, we went for lunch, grocery shopping, laundry and showers. Then cleaned the boat interior. So Lene had all she wanted: full fuel, water and food, clean laundry and a clean boat. 

I plotted out the first very rough draft of our itinerary from here to Block Island with a target date of September 10, leaving five days to get home from there (though we could do it on one overnight sail)  and room for slippage due to bad weather days before then. It includes lay days in Boston, Hyannisport and Martha’s Vineyard in case friends are available when we come through.

A few boats away I spotted ”Fika”, the Saga 43 shape so easily identified. We later met John and Susan and their crew, Jackson snd Bosn, English Cream Goldens. A Fica is a sort of Scandinavian coffee klatch with food, an act of hospitality, Susan told me.The Cumberland home port is in Maine, not Maryland. Fika is a few years newer than ILENE, and our new friends have sailed her the last three years.

The remaining picture,  like those above, were taken by Lene on the sunny morning of our departure. 

August 14 - 16 — Days 37 - 39 — Digby NS to Grand Manan Island, Lay Day and Back To The USA — 48 & 44

 We left Digby with a nice slack tide in the Gut, the only problem being the ferry at the dock which we passed. I tried to be a good citizen by calling to ask if we should wait for her to go out or go out ahead of her. The answer was that she would leave in five or ten minutes so we hurried to get past her, but then she stayed for 20 minutes — annoying.

 We put up sails once through the rough spot in the Gut. Fog became a recurring visitor, as it did on the second passage in this report, occasionally very dense, sometimes better, with up to half a mile of visibility, and other times totally absent.

Again in good periods we were making seven knots with Main and jib, other times less. From hearing the ferry’s fog horn when she came out behind us headed to Saint John and “seeing” two fishing boats headed south along the coast of Nova Scotia, but only on AIS — no boats til a mile off Grand Manan.

Grand Manan, I always thought was a French name but I was only half right; it means Big Island, with only the first word from French, the second being a contraction of the Native American word for island, Mananuk. It is about 13 miles long and much closer to the Maine side of Fundy than the Nova Scotian side.  So the shipping separation lanes to Saint John,  each a mile wide and separated by a mile wide “median strip”, were crossed during our passage to Grand Manan. These lanes are designed to prevent collisions between incoming and outgoing freighters. We crossed the northbound lane in deep fog and the southbound in clear sunlight. The former was not very scary because such “big boys” transmit AIS and would show up big on our radar. This is the west coast of the big island from eight miles out. As we got closer we could see a lot of the coast of Maine and New Brunswick at its sides.

We were told to take any available yellow mooring in North Cove and there were several of them, and free. Fortunately, the strong winds, which later died out, were from the west so the island blocked the big waves. The blue-green boats in the next pic are in the employ of the nearby fish farming operations. The huge ferry dock is off screen to the left. Behind the crane on the raft in the foreground, you can just barely see a blue sailboat, which will come into this narrative later.

The lay day was not a very good one. Our hike to the north end was marred by a steady drizzle which also prevented the vistas from the island’s heights and by boggy trails through campgrounds with lovely big tents and living areas covered by suspended tarps that families had set up. Swallowtail Light House was mostly oconcealed by scaffolding to permit its resurfacing.

Then a long walk south for milk and bread, a mediocre lunch out and, after depositing Lene aboard I went in to fill three empty one gallon fresh water bottles. No water at the dock so I walked to the ferry office to use the sink in their men’s room. But a sign said “not potable.” What to do? The ladies in the office said to fill from the five gallon bottled water fountain. “Three gallons?” I asked. Yes was the reply but it ran dry after 2.5 and I was not about to complain. We have plenty, now. 

But then the problem happened which provided opportunities for so many people to help me. All sailors love helping other sailors; for me, less so being the recipient of help. But I got a lot of help from many people in North Cove.

 

The dinghy outboard would not start. We do not have oars, just canoe paddles, which work if Lene is with me, but are very inefficient when alone. I hailed Mark of the beautiful light blue 47 foot Cambria sloop mentioned above, “Spirit of Tobomory” out of Toronto. I asked to use his tools, which he provided. He was rafted against an out of season fishing boat tied to the high concrete fishing dock. Mark provided tools but in the process of my adjusting things the spring sprung off, out and into the 30 foot deep frigid water. Now our only hope was a mechanic. Mark called Lene for me so she should not worry. He allowed me to photo the mechanism and sent the pics to Lene’s phone. A retired gentleman named George, watching from the fixed concrete dock high above, said he knew a great local Yamaha mechanic but could not recall his name or number. He offered to take me there in his truck. But it was blocked by two tractor trailers, one behind the other, on one side of the broad pier and two cranes on the other side, waiting to take the load, high sided four foot wide canvas bags of fish food for the nearby aquaculture factory farming operation onto the boat to take them there. But the boat was not there yet. Amazingly the drivers moved their trucks to free George’s pickup. He took me to the place he knew, but the secretary there said that Darryl (his phone is 506-662-3361 should you need such services) had left for the day but gave me his number to call in the morning. George drove me back. I got back on the dink and prepared to paddle out perhaps 150 yards to ILENE. But an aquafarming work boat was passing by and when hailed, towed me in the dink out to ILENE. I had a poor night’s sleep over anxiety about the next day. 

We had previously asked George and a companion about the tides if we want to leave that day, and learned that 11 am was the time to leave (noon if we stayed another day).

 The activities offered at Grand Manan, in addition to hiking (some long trails but they expect us to drive to and from the trailheads),  electric bikes and whale watching tours. None of these had great appeal for us. There is an arts scene, but not for those without motor vehicles.

So Grand Manan provided less for us than we had  expected.

We called Mark and he said we could raft up ILENE to his boat, but he planned to leave at 10:30.

We called Darryl who came ou to the dock while we moved our boat to it. He did not have the spring, which would have to be ordered, but explained that the mechanism involving the spring is designed to idiot proof the outboard to prevent people from starting it while in gear. He removed and gave me a part to be saved and reinstalled with the spring this fall. We tested the outboard and it works. He also taught me about the air valve on the gas tank and suggested a way to prevent water seeping into the squeeze bulb primer. He asked for $40 Canadian, worth $30US. We thanked him profusely and were off.

Here is “Spirit of Tobermory” on the way out.

The two passages from Digby to Maine represent our third crossing of the Bay of Fundy. The first was in 2017, across its mouth, from the southern tip of Nova Scotia to Mt. Desert Island on return from our cruise  that summer. The second was from St. John to Digby across its northern end. This time it was a diagonal SWcourse leading back to Maine. The bold cliffs of the north and west sides of Grand Manan were obscured by fog at the beginning, but came into view.

 

The tide was wrong at first; we were too early. But as adverse tide slowed and was replaced by more favorable tide out speed picked up. We used Main and Genoa and turned off the diesel. The wind got lighter and we slowed gradually, to less than four knots before we furled and motored. We started with two alternative potential destinations in mind. Cutler, where we stoped while outbound was nearest. Roque Island came next, a favorite, but not this year. We went further to a “new” anchorage (for us) in Eastern Bay by Great Wass Island. Very close to The  Cow Yard, where we stayed on the way out.

The green line I drew on at the right shows our route to and from The Cow Yard. The red line, north through narrow straight and clear Main Channel Way, is how we went in.  A high pink smooth marble wall to starboard. Most of the area north of us in the cove where we anchored, is filled with a commercial fish farm, seen only in silhouette in the pretty, untouched sunset picture. And for our way out next day we plan to exit through wide but rock strewn Mud Hole Channel, further west. Here are views from ILENE on anchor with  60 feet of snubbed chain in 20 feet of water.

Oh, and here is our boxed set:

Days 35-36 — August 12 & 13 — Saint John NB to Digby NS & Lay Day There — 48 NM

 A beautiful bright sunny windy day for a great exciting fast passage.  We were off mooring from 6:40 a.m. to 2:04 p.m. Five miles to the Falls where we felt some churning; that short part of the passage was no job for autopilot.

This is the rock from upstream with the next photo after we passed around it.

Then three miles through Saint John Harbor to the Bay of Fundy. We gave a lot of room here to a two tug operation in pushing the freighter sideways to the dock.

Once out in the Bay it was a straight 35 NM shot, pretty much due south to Digby Gut. We put up the reefed main, then added the small jib, and a few minutes later, shook out the reef. With apparent wind wind about sixty degrees off the starboard bow in the teens, we made between six and eight knots. Exhilarating.

Digby Gut, like Plum Gut (and what could have been called Hellgate Gut) is where a lot of water flows fast. I had not read up on Digby Gut. It is the passage, about half a mile wide and quite deep enough through which Nova Scotia’s huge Annapolis Basin ebbs out into the Bay of Fundy. We seem to be headed toward the land at the left side of the photo, but the computer shows our Course Over the Ground, (different from heading due to tidal flow) shows us moving for the dead center of the Gut. The tide flowing out of the Gut slowed us from six knots to 1.6, in a field of whitecaps.

Once through the Gut we furled and motored the last four miles to the Royal Western Nova Scotia Yacht Club. It’s floating docks rise and fall thirty feet with the tide. An aluminum ramp descends from shore to the dock. The right half of the ramp consists of a flight if 47 aluminum stairs to make climbing easier. At high tide the ramp is level.

The Club gave is clear directions to one of its four moorings where we attached in eight feet of water at low. The electronic chart showed soundings of “3”. In New Brunswick and the US that means there is a depth of only three feet of depth at low tide at the location so marked. Every paper chart prints a notice whether it’s soundings data are in feet, meters or fathoms. The electronic chart did not tell is that it had switched from feet to meters in crossing the Bay of Fundy from one Canadian province to another.

Digby is renowned for its scallops and we arrived during the town’s 48th annual Scallop Days Festival. Grilled scallops in “scallop rolls” for only $10. And the three scallops in each roll were about 2.5 to 3” in diameter! And delicious.

We met our friends Greg and Wanda, who befriended and hosted  us in Halifax in 2017. They visited us in NY the next year and I sailed with Greg on Yves’ boat from Bermuda to Halifax the year after that. We had planned to visit them in their even more fabulous home on the east side of Nova Scotia on our way to Newfoundland. But that has to wait for a visit by air in the off season.

They drove across their island and we spent a day with them.

We shared a two bedroom suite at the Digby Pines golf resort with them (our first night off the boat after a few months aboard) had dinner and breakfast with them there, and they chauffeured us up the east coast of Nova Scotia to Port Royal and The Habitation, both museums on the Annapolis River. The exhibits taught of the turbulent period of 1604 and following (including what we call The French and Indian War) . Then Miq Maq (native Americans), the French, the British and the Acadians (North Americans who considered themselves French) were warring over possession of North America — and particularly over Nova Scotia. This area on Nova Scotia’s west coast was the site of Nova Scotia’s first capital. Museum activity was good because it rained most of the morning.  After lunch, they drove us back to Digby and headed across the province back to their home near Lunenburg. And at the end of the last day of the Scallop Days Festival, during a lightning and thunderstorm, the folks put on quite a show.

Greg told us of whale watching near Brier Island, down the coast a bit, a favorite spot for most every species of whales to cavort. Others said we should go as well. But in the end we decided to skip Brier Island and move on to Grand Manan tomorrow. First inserting it before Grand Manan would create a “V” shaped track that these old bones do not currently favor. Also there is uncertainty about where we could tie up and tales of strong currents. So we are off for Grand Manan at tomorrows high tide.

 

Days 34 & 35 — August 10 & 11 — Evandale back to the RKYC and A Lay Day There — 23 NM

It was our first day with the sails up after half a dozen passages without. Well motor sailing with only the small jib. We were on close reach courses for the first half, and then without the engine but assisted by tidal flow with the wind a aft the beam during the second half of the passage. New Brunswick style lighthouse. 

At the Royal Kennebecasis YC. (my initials) where we stayed our first two nights in the River, it was the Thursday of the biweekly catered dinner. Oh, but the caterer requires reservations byWednesday night, so we were out of luck. But not really. Two members who were not going to the  Club’s catered dinner offered us a ride to Mi Mi Mi, a Chinese restaurant half a mile away. Good food. Good conversation with a woman at a nearby table who was  waiting for the rest of her friends to arrive. She is a sailor too, and learning of our plan to walk to the supermarket, about a mile away, and get a cab back to the club with our bags of groceries, offered us her car. We took the groceries to the dink, drove back to the restaurant, and walked back. It can be tough getting in enough walking while cruising.

And speaking of the kindness of strangers, back in Gageville, Lene lost a hat when it blew off while we were trying to get to our mooring. Of well, just property, no personal injury. We did not stop to try to retrieve it and I thought it had sunk. Biodegradable waste. But here at RKYC we heard an Ahoy! A stranger had rescued the hat and remembering our boat, brought it over to us. No reward accepted.

We had planned to exit the River though the reversing falls on the 11th, and sail to nearby Dipper Harbor. That was because the high slack on the 11th was too late in the day for the crossing of the Bay of Fundy yo Digby Nova Scotia (about 50 miles) that same day. But the weather was heavy rain and my mate came up with the clever idea to better our lives that my stubborn plow ahead manner had caused me to overlook. We have plans to meet our Nova Scotian friends, Greg and Wanda, on Saturday. The change is to exit the falls at low tide slack on Saturday, skip Dipper and head straight for Digby. It will work with a 6:30 a.m. departure, crossing the falls at 7:30, and arrival in Digby by mid afternoon. We have a reservation for ILENE and will spend the night in a hotel. So what about the layday?  All morning, heavy rain. This time we met Glenn, the owner of “Ishmael 1”, the other Saga 43 moored at the RKYC. Plans for breakfast or dinner failed, but Glenn graciously drove us to and picked us up from a movie theater where we saw Oppenheimer.

And now, early to bed, for an early departure tomorrow.