Up Down East - Maine
Our last day in Boston included a delightful visit by the Odria family. Their three girls were so much fun. A trip through the Constitution Museum was filled with interactive activities for kids. Then exploring the USS Constitution was a treat for us again, sharing it with Carlos, Nadia, and the girls, Anna, Carla, and Alma.
After the Odrias departed, we were headed to dinner but stopped on the docks to talk to folks using wheelchairs. After our rant about the poor accessibility of this marina, we learned they were on the specially-built catamaran, The Impossible Dream, out of Miami. (www.theimpossibledream.org) We have seen them in NYC at Liberty Landing last year and again this year. Then, they are here at the Charlestown Marina. They have a partnership with the Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital located right next door to the marina. Face cards from Spaulding were having a fundraising event on the catamaran. Before the event began, we had the opportunity for a short tour of the boat. Amazing. It is a beautiful boat, with assistive technology to enable persons with various impairments to sail. It was a pleasure to meet Deborah, the boat's owner, David a co-sailor and artist and his girlfriend, Lily, as well as the captain and crew. Fair winds and following seas folks!
On to dinner at Warren Tavern in downtown Charlestown. It's the oldest building in Charlestown, built just after the British burned the city during the Battle of Bunker Hill. Good food and nice people.
Once past the turbulence, the passage in the canal and river was a treat with boats and architecture to watch. A local that passed us on the way hailed AQUAVIT noting our Florida port of call and provided some very useful advice about shallow spots and navigation aids.
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| Entering the narrow channel through the bascule bridge |
The current at the northern exit of the Annisquam River into Ipswich Bay was as swift and turbulent as the south end, through long rock jetties lined with people. Then into Ipswich Bay the clear conditions turned into fog again, patchy at first and then thick enough to reduce visibility to 200-300 yards. It was stressful to slalom through fields of lobster pot floats. We slowed to 14 knots and kept a sharp eye for floats while scanning the radar and GPS plotter. We turned on our automated fog horn. Then, large buoys appeared, almost magically through the fog to confirm we were on course to our destination at Kennebunkport. Through the fog Lee got a glimpse of something rolling in our wake. Was it a whale? We saw storm petrels - perhaps Wilson's and/or Leach's.
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| Each Hinkley Picnic Motor Yacht seems to be supplied with a white lab. |
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| Kennebunk River |
Approaching Kennebunkport in the thick fog, we could not make out any shoreline. Only when we arrived between their entrance jetties could we make out the dim shadows of the rocks. But following the course on our GPS we navigated into the Kennebunk River and were able to see the close shore and boats on their moorings. Chicks Marina is a popular high-end spot touted for their excellent facilities and service. Well, we would rate them well, but the buzz is earned more by their clientele of Hinkley Yachts - 8 at least while we were there.
A helpful staff and better rest room and shower facilities were a welcome improvement from our last stop. But, not pumping out our holding tank in Boston to save time turned out to be a mistake. No marina, not even the highly touted Chicks, had a pump out facility, so our nights were interrupted by trips up the dock to the head (in the drizzly rain no less.) It's disappointing that such a trendy and popular tourist town as Kennebunkport did not have sewage facilities. A dock hand even recommended going offshore to discharge waste! Into the waters where lobsters are harvested and whales live!
On our first night, Kennebunkport was damp and rainy. But, the next morning the weather started to break and by the time Chris, who works at the Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve, and her husband Ward, former Refuge manager of Rachael Carson National Wildlife Refuge picked us up for a wonderful tour and lunch, it was a beautiful day. They were nice enough to stop at Mother's Beach to indulge our beach sand collecting habit. Water temp was 61 degrees and some hardy folks were in the water! At the next beach over, Gooch's Beach, the water temp was colder -- 58 degrees!
We toured the scenic towns of Kennebunk and Kennebunkport, filled with historic homes and cute shops. We stopped to view the Bush family compound on Walkers Point and ended up at the refuge for a nice nature walk through the forested bluff overlooking tidal marshes of the Mausam River, Maryland River and Branch Brook. It was nice to see interpretive signs and kiosks we made for the refuge still looking good after at least a dozen years.
Back at the marina we met a cordial man who was casually polite and asked a staff person to be taken down the docks to a friend's boat. When he left the ladies working in the marina office were all atwitter over getting a picture with him. Turns out he is an actor named Patrick Dempsey who starred in Grey's Anatomy and is a summer resident of the town. We were and still are a bit clueless about our brush with celebrity. |
| What a difference a day makes - leaving Kennebunkport |
The fog returned again in the evening and we hoped for better conditions for our short 30-mile trip from Kennebunkport to South Portland. Using the Greis technique of "putting it there" we did indeed have clear and calm conditions for the journey. With large rolling swells, timed at intervals that made it a rolling sea rather than a rough one, we made good time at 22 knots through the lobster floats. Still, some of the floats were hard to see as the swells submerged them. And, in a brief look away from the seas to check the instruments, we managed to hit one that emerged in our wake in two pieces.
Coming into Portland was easy if a bit crowded with boat traffic of all sorts and passing iconic lighthouses along the way. For awhile we followed a large private yacht to clear the way for us, and then turned into South Port Marine, a marina with full service yard. Our first order was to get our holding tank pumped so we would not have the long moonlight walks to the marina lavatories over a rickety high bridge. After a few tries we were able to get the self-service pump-a-head to barely work and we made arrangements with a clean water non-profit group that operates a pumpout boat for dockside service.
Our niece Lindsay, a traveling operating room RN, is presently at a stint at a hospital in Nashua, New Hampshire, along with her boyfriend Matt, a talented musician. So we rented a car to travel from Portland down to Portsmouth to spend a pleasant afternoon wandering the downtown with them and catching up. We last saw them on AQUAVIT for a day of scalloping with long-time friends Herb and SueAnn at Crystal River when Lindsay had a traveling nurse gig there last year.
In Portsmouth, we enjoyed a street busker, with an unusual instrument, Nyckelharpa, he had restored, performing for tips. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyckelharpa)Returning to the marina, there was enough light for Marvin to don a mask and snorkel to jump in the cold water to check out our propellors. The inspection was done in record time (too fast even for a picture.) Finding the running gear undamaged from our encounter with the lobster float, we are pleased we don't need any propellor work.
After dockside conversations and telling lies with the interesting local folks on their boats at the marina, we retired to a sunset and a near full moon rise. The weather is practically balmy for Maine. It doesn't get much better than this!
Our next couple of days will be exploring Portland and then returning home for two weeks to meet appointments,and have a new roof put on our house. We're sure looking forward to seeing our three cats and finding out what they have been up to in our absence.
07.16.2019
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