Month: August 2017 (Page 2 of 2)

We had every intention of going to Lunt Harbor in Frenchboro, but boats aren’t allowed to anchor and there are only 5 moorings available for transients, all of which were occupied by the time we arrived. We regretfully spun in the pretty little harbor and assessed our options as we left. After some quick calculations taking into account the wind, we opted to head north ten miles to Southwest Harbor on Mount Desert Island.

Coming into MDI

Coda tapas dinner

We took a mooring through Hinckley Yacht Services and headed into town. The harbor is larger than we expected, but the dinghy ride to the town dock wasn’t any longer than that which we have when we’re in Block Island (10 minutes tops). It’s a 10 minute walk to Main Street, and we enjoyed the stroll through the local neighborhood. Houses are small, many are summer rentals, and all were full. People were really enjoying where they were – kids were out playing on lawns, people were sitting on wraparound porches talking, it all lent a really nice vibe. Town was the typical mix of tourist shops and restaurants. I did a quick search and we wound up wandering over to Coda for a great relaxed dinner tapas style out on their patio (I highly recommend their ricotta fritters, the housemade sausage platter, the smoked leeks, and the lobster grits with poached egg). Conveniently the restaurant was across the street from the library which offers free wifi so we stopped off and took care of some internet stuff. Then it was back to the boat, fending off the usual hoard of mosquitos and down below for a movie.

Sunset in Southwest Harbor

Sometime in the middle of the night the temperature dropped what felt like 20 degrees, as a massive bank of fog moved in. We woke up to visibility limited to one or two boats past us in each direction. It finally started to lift late morning so we went ashore to take showers and do laundry.

Old & New in Bar Harbor

Then we hopped the bus to explore MDI (Mt Desert Island). The island itself was designated as a national park 101 years ago and LL Bean coincidentally was founded just 4 years after the designation. LL Bean today provides a series of free buses called the Island Explorer to reduce the amount of vehicular traffic and provide access to the island in general. We took it south to Bass Harbor and Bernard (both rather anti-climactic as towns), and then up and across the island past Echo Lake, around Somesville, and into Bar Harbor. As touristy as Bar Harbor is, it is still a lovely little town and there’s quite a bit of history to explore. After lunch at the Thirsty Whale we walked out to West Street where many of the homes that were once owned by the fabulously wealthy (Rockefellers, Morgans, etc.) have been preserved in one form or another. Plaques have been placed nicely for a self-guided walking tour of the area, and it easily allows you to forget you’re just a few blocks away from lobster rolls and t-shirt stores.

We took the bus back across the island that night and settled in for another evening. I can only think of one negative thing about Maine evenings and that is the mosquitos. Once the sun goes down you can’t enjoy anything outside because of the swarms. Luckily we have screens for the boat, plus a TV/DVD player and 100 or so DVDs, books, projects, etc, so it’s easy to make the best of it.

Swans Island Coop Art

We had to hang out in Buck’s Harbor a little longer than anticipated since we needed a diver to exchange the zinc on the prop (neither Trip nor I had any interest in diving in Maine – we’ll pay for this). Once we left we headed down the Eggemoggin reach past the Brooklin Boat Yard and Little Deer Isle. The number of lobster pots toward the end of the reach was shocking – obviously a good place for a haul but tricky for boaters. Luckily we have a nearly full keel and a rudder that’s directly attached with a shoe so we run little risk of hooking a lobster pot. Added to that we were sailing and most of the risk comes when you’re motoring and the prop can wrap on the lines. As Lawrence has joked, these areas of lobster pots can look like an explosion in a Skittles factory and this was one of those situations. Luckily we were able to plow through and continue down into Jericho Bay.

Burnt Coat Harbor Lighthouse

closed for business – with those footings I can see why

Our destination was Burnt Coat Harbor on Swans Island. We were a bit shocked at the lack of boats until we realized that it was Sunday afternoon and many were already back in their homeports ready for the start of the week. We had a lovely sail into the harbor where we dropped the hook with only 3 other visiting boats. There’s not much on the island, but it’s pretty to look at. We hiked out to the lighthouse the following morning and prepped the boat to move on.

lobster pen – crates go up a conveyor belt, onto a truck, and it’s off to market

Buck’s Harbor is a charming little harbor that just screams quintessential Maine. We went on the recommendation of Lawrence and Viviane and of course were not disappointed. There’s room for anchoring if you don’t mind sharing space with visiting schooners, but we decided to splurge (read $37) on a mooring for the amenities. Buck’s Harbor Marina is a small family run marina that is worth the money. Wifi reaches out to the mooring field (falsehood in most other places), good cheap laundry, and showers. Outdoor dockside showers. Fabulous.

squeaky clean

Entrance to Buck’s Restaurant

After cleaning up a bit and looking respectable again, we walked up the road to the single restaurant in town to belatedly celebrate my birthday over dinner. Stuffed with pork chops and swordfish, we stumbled back down the hill and decided to stay another day. We figured the forecast was for rain anyway on Saturday, so we’d hang out another day waiting for the weather to clear and more importantly for the weekend boat traffic to head home and make room in anchorages for us.

Saturday morning was misting as promised, so we slept in and I made banana pecan pancakes with smoked maple syrup (recipe here).       We spent the day lounging on board, updating the blog (how often can you get wifi actually out to the boat in a mooring field????), and doing other projects.

House with tram to water

The rain eventually passed so we took a tour of the harbor by dinghy, inspecting closely some of the prettier boats.  There was one house that we passed perched high in the hills and were openly speculating how they got down to their dock when we suddenly saw a tram built into the hill that would haul gear and people up and down a pretty steep incline to the water and back – amazing.

Buck’s Harbor resident with teak galore

picking out dinner

After that we headed back to the dock to pick up dinner.  The marina has a stash of live lobster and the market up the road had potatoes, butter, lemon and corn so we opted for an al fresco lobster boil on board.  Soft shell lobsters are still in season and I got to pick my own!

lobstah

We woke up Sunday to fog that cleared pretty quickly revealing a schooner that had come in and dropped anchor not far from us – a fun new neighbor on the water.

Buck’s Harbor complete with schooner

the happy couple just after their anniversary!

Tanqueray at sunset

I have to confess we sailed right by Castine and never stopped, instead heading for Smith Cove. Once I had texted Viviane that we were back in Maine, she sent texts indicating where they were heading &  where we could meet up and we weren’t going to pass up the chance since she was heading home soon from vacation. Smith Cove is south of Castine – a well protected but quite large anchorage. Once we dropped anchor and got settled, we dinghied over and the cocktails commenced. We had lots of stories from our Midwest roadtrip and they had lots of recommendations of new Maine harbors to visit and homes they had looked at. The evening went much too fast. We headed back to the boat for dinner (complete with blueberry muffins for dessert) and a fabulous moon rise.

visiting Tanqueray by sailing dinghy

The next morning we all agreed to meet to hike the Holbrook State Park, which made up much of the land creating the harbor where we were anchored. If we hadn’t talked enough the night before we had a couple of hours of hiking along the coast to continue to visit. Ironically, even though we each had plans to head that day to other harbors, once we got back to our boats we decided to stay put another day. Trip took the dinghy out for a long sail, and I decided to try a new recipe for sourdough carmelized shallot focaccia. And since all four of us were still in the same place of course we had to have another cocktail hour……….

Cue the muzak (Girl from Impanema), we’ve put everyone on hold for a couple of weeks while we dashed off to the Midwest for a family wedding and some family visits.

We packed up the boat (Trip with tears in his eyes) in Rockland, rented a car and headed for home. Lennie barely gave us the time of day at the door, with a casual glance of ‘did you bring chicken?’, though he came around slowly for snuggles and cuddles later. Our house/petsitter had left the house in far better shape than we keep it – we almost didn’t recognize the place! Over the next day and half we ran errands, went through old mail, visited with friends and packed up again to hit the road.

Milwaukee Art Museum

Lady’s Room at the Safe House – alarm rings in the bar when you get too close!

Our first stop was Milwaukee for my cousin Meghan’s wedding. Milwaukee is a great city that has worked hard at revitalizing itself and it shows – I highly recommend it for a visit. We were staying right on the riverfront so had a chance to walk along the river and stop by Trip’s favorite local bar (The Safe House – filled to the gills with spy memorabilia and other fun things). We checked out the historic third ward and even made it to the lakefront to see the new Frank Lloyd Wright architecture blueprints exhibit at the local art museum – made famous by architect Calatrava – the top of the building looks like birds (or a manta ray) wings and it opens and closes on the hour, weather permitting.

Menu at the Safe House

Bride Meghan and Olivia

The wedding was lovely (how often is the groom’s friend an ordained priest who can make the ceremony personal????), the reception fantastic. I’d like to point out that the two that stole the show on the dance floor were my nephew Charlie and my cousin’s daughter Olivia – you simply can’t compete with two or three year olds.

A far smaller group got together Sunday morning for brunch, and then we headed off to Madison. To continue the Frank Lloyd Wright theme, we decided to head to Monona Terrace. There we met up with old friends Paul, Stef & Joe for lunch looking over the lake. Though I could have stayed to bullshit and gab all day, we all finally had to move on.
Trip and I then headed south to Janesville to spend a couple of days with my mom. We got a few projects done around the house, caught up with more friends and relatives, and even celebrated my birthday over breakfast with Trip, mom, Uncle Jim, Godmom Phyllis and her brother Sam.

Then it was off to Missouri for part two of the roadtrip! BTW, if anyone is driving south through Illinois they truly have some of the most spectacular windfarms to drive through. We even got to see the arms being trucked in for a new installation – the size is absolutely remarkable.

cuddling with Hazel

day drinking is hard work

The rest of the week was a mix of von Hoffmann, Macon & Voss families (and all their pups which sometimes outnumbered us mere mortals). We started at Brant & Wendy’s house, then headed down to the Voss farm where we were joined by Trip’s sister Paige and nephew Turner (Hailey if you ever read this you missed a good weekend!), Barb Voss, Gary Voss and his girlfriend Tammy. The boat was quickly hitched, the coolers loaded with beer and sandwiches, and chairs/towels packed into vehicles. Along with the dogs. Everything was offloaded to a gravel bar on the Gasconade River and the drinking, eating, and catching up commenced. When we had finally gone all pruney, we went back to the farm where Wendy made fabulous barbeque chicken for dinner and I had brought elk and venison burgers from a family friend hunter in Wisconsin. We finished the evening with a few hands of euchre and said good night.

The next day was pretty much lather, rinse and repeat, only the day ended a bit earlier when a typical summer Midwest storm rolled in. One of the dogs, Jackson, had the presence of mind to wander into the water and look at us all as if to say ‘don’t you think it’s time now?’ We made it just out of the water into the vehicles as the first drops of rain started.

After the Voss farm, we headed down to Sugar Tree – a place I had heard about since I met Trip and was only now getting to experience first hand. It’s a collection of cottages also on the Gasconade River where the von Hoffmann, Macon & Voss families all spent their childhood summers. I was finally getting a chance to see where it all happened.

We loaded up the boat with beer and food (does this sound familiar) and headed up river (does this sound familiar?) where we unloaded on a gravel bar to grill chicken & burgers for lunch. I’m still trying to get used to the concept of shoal runners for boating. I’m used to needing 7 feet of clear water for a minimum and being in 200 feet on a good day of Maine sailing. On the river we were screaming over just a few inches of water (rocks clearly visible) at any time – Trip’s cousin Billy is a certified genius at reading the river.

If that wasn’t enough once we got back we changed into swimsuits and headed back up river for a tube float trip. I’ve done float trips before, but this was the first one where we turned the boat loose with us. Paige tethered herself to it and we pulled it into the dock with us at the very end. After dinner we had a rousing game of boo-ray (beau-ray?) which I fully admit to winning the kitty – enough gas to fill our little rental tank for the drive home!

The next day was the first day in two weeks of non-stop rain. Instead of spending our time being disappointed about not being back on the water, we took advantage of the bad weather to catch up on poker and gin rummy, reading, and most importantly napping. You really can’t beat a good nap. Billy and Trip had a hankering to sit on the rocking chairs in the old von Hoffmann cottage (currently under renovation after the latest flood), so we topped off our cocktails, went down to the cottage, and listened to Miles Davis by candle light while the now lightning storm lit up the river periodically. Magic.

Turner and Lucie

And then it was time to drive east again. Much too short of a visit with everyone but great visit nonetheless. We made it back to Portland in a couple of days where James & Jenny fed us pizza, let us do laundry, and ease into sailboat talk again.
Since we were driving back, and had to go through Route 1 anyway, I decided that Trip needed to experience Reds Eats – home of the mountainous lobster roll. Even on a rainy midweek day the line extended from the order window around the corner and down the block. Their quality is good, but it’s the quantity you really can’t beat – a monster pile up of lobster that you have to eat with a fork before you can even attempt holding it as a sandwich.

Lobstah Rolls at Reds