Cruising the Coast of Maine, Marital Aids and on Westward.

I have a lot of catching up to do. We had “NO” internet or phone service for a week. Man was did I have a case of the DT’s. We were finally able to log on to the internet last night and go our phones to working tonight.

The cruise was uh, how am I going to put this, well, it was different. Our cabin was about the same size as the small bathroom, in our house, without the shower. The bunk was 6’-1” long, so you don’t have to do the math that is about 5” too short. There were two heads and one shower for 28 people. Carole and I had two showers all week. We were so cold all week there wasn’t a danger of breaking a sweat so there wasn’t much of a need to take one. OK that is the bad part. The good part was the sailing was really good. We had a mix of weather some sun, some clouds, some heavy wind and some light wind. (It was cold all of the time.) It was interesting to see how the boat sailed with all of the rigging and lines. The boat had no engine so we sailed everywhere. They did have the capacity to put in a small boat to push the big boat and would do that sometimes when leaving an anchorage or shifting the boat in an anchorage. Most of the time we sailed into and out of the anchorages. The captain’s goal was to take us to places we couldn’t get by car. The 1st night out we stayed at Swan Island, then back to the rendezvous with 14 other schooners at the wooden boat school. The 3rd night we were at Isle Au Haut, which is supposed to have the smallest post office in the US. The 4th night we had to run for cover from a storm and were anchored in a cove at Castine with about 8 other schooners. The storm passed to the south and with the protected anchorage, we only saw about 25 knot winds. The last night we were in a pretty little cove at Islesboro. We saw the boat at 10 knots several times during the week, with 7 to 8 knots being common. (For you non sailors that is hauling ass.) The boat even with all the sails up and at 10 knots had very little heel and a comfortable motion.

Just before the boats entered the anchorage at the wooden boat school, they were all sailing around each other. I have some really great action shots of them sailing (about 430 to be exact). So be careful if you tell me you want to see some photos.

You know I don’t talk about people but I am going to have to ask you to pray for some of the people of that boat with us. They were just too weird. Maybe we just hit it wrong but there were two other couples who hadn’t been on this schooner before. All of them picked the same week each year to go sailing and we would not have been able to go this week if someone hadn’t died. How do I know that? They had the funeral for one of them on Saturday morning and spread the ashes in the sea.

Oops, I almost forgot Michael wanted me to talk about the food. The food was really good. There were a couple of young girls who did all of the cooking on a wood stove. (I think their mothers must drive them to work they looked so young.) We had fresh baked bread every meal. Typically breakfast was either pancakes, French toast or eggs with some type of breakfast meat, bacon, sausage, ham, etc. and fruit. Lunch was mostly a hearty soup and salad. Suppers where some type of meat, pasta, vegetables with fresh bread and pies. It was all very good. When you consider they were doing it all on a moving, rocking, heeling wood stove it was damn excellent.

The trip is something I am glad we did but it isn’t something I want to do again at least in this life time.

Both of us caught colds from someone on board. For some reason we both snore when we have a cold. So I would snore for a while and wake Carole up, she would punch me and I would wake up and roll over. Then she would snore and I would wake her up. And then we would do it all over again. So our main trip on Sunday morning was to go to Wal-Mart and purchase some Marital Aid (Ear Plugs). Last night we both had the first good night’s sleep we have had in about a week. It was wonderful. Hot showers, shaving, clean hair, comfortable bed. It was just wonderful.

Today we left the Brooklin Inn. (Highly recommended and yes I do want to do that again.) We drove across Maine. The GPS took us on some roads that I swore we were lost. It was a beautiful path thru the mountains, along streams and glacier lakes. The leaves are just beginning to turn so every few mile we would hit a patch of brilliant red leaves.

Tonight we are in Bethel Maine at a B&B. We are the only guest. The couple we are saying with are very nice. Staying in B&B is a cool way to travel.

OK I left out tons of details. Maybe I will have time to go back and fill in some details later.