2008 Maine Cruising Notes #2
We have now spent three weeks cruising since we left the yard in Yarmouth. We have put about 140 miles in the log, and have reached Belfast, ME at the top of Penobscot Bay. We have visited new harbors and revisited old favorites, made new friends and enjoyed visiting old ones.
Following our new interest in birding, one of the new places we visited was the Audubon Preserve at Hog Island in Muscongus Bay. We stayed on one of their moorings and spent two days birding and exploring the trails on the island. This preserve and the camp date from the 1920's. Roger Tory Peterson was the first to survey its wildlife for the Audubon society as a young man.
We were invited to have supper with the group at the camp one day, a very interesting experience. It was "family week" and there were a number of grandparents there with grandchildren. These grandparents had been there as children forty and fifty years ago.
However, there are always reminders that nothing stays the same. The weather this year has been warmer, quite a number of days reaching into the 80's, but also with more fog. Last year we never were caught out in really dense fog. This year we sailed from the Sheepscott River to Boothbay Harbor in fog. A few days later we passed Pemaquid Point with about 200 yards visibility. A number of other days we stayed in port waiting for the fog to lift.
We have noticed a number of other interesting changes. Lobster trap buoys are easier to avoid. Close to major centers of lobstering activity there are still dense "mine fields" of these buoys to avoid lest we get caught on the warps. But, in deeper water and further from port they are almost rare. The price of fuel (high) and lobsters (low) is definitely having an effect. This is one of those good-news/bad-news things. Fewer trap warps to avoid, but a hit to the economy of the lobstermen and businesses and towns that depend on them.
In this same trend we have noticed that most of the boats we see cruising are from Maine and New Hampshire with fewer from southern New England. It also seems that there are fewer out of state license plates in parking lots. When I filled the small 2-1/2 gallon gasoline tank for our dinghy outboard motor and got small change for a $20 bill, the concept of oars became more interesting. Again, this looks as if it might be a slim year for an area that depends so much on tourism.
We have no TV and only occasionally pick up a newspaper. When I do get news on the Internet, I am reminded how lucky we are to be spared the daily barrages of "infotainment" and sound-bite overload, most of which is either repetitive, inconsequential in the long run, nothing we can do anything about, or all of the above. Cruising as we do, cut off from most news of the "real" world is a true luxury.
Hope you all are doing as well...
Jay & Jane on TROPICBIRD
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