Crossing the Gulf of Maine — 2003-08-17 20:50
We motored all the way to our anchoring site, not wanting to arrive any later and discover that there was no room. We’ll get in a little sailing in the morning, if all goes as planned.
We’re harbored in a little triangle formed by Dix, High, and Birch Islands. We arrived here at about 15:30, and at around 16:00 we went ashore. We went first to High Island, where we followed several paths back inland, found the quarry, oohed and aahed, and left swatting mosquitos. Returning to Rubber Ducky (the inflatable dinghy) where she was tied to the granite wharf, we decided to pay a visit to Birch Island.
While High Island is covered with alder and apple, Birch Island is covered in grasses, heaters, shrubs, large rounded rocks, and the occasional pine. We beached the Ducky and went ashore to explore. Together we ambled around the rocky beach, until Henry & I went inland, scrambling up the boulders littering the small islet. I delighted in the wafting scents of dried aromatic herbs, and the sight of waving grasses.
We returned to Pamina, where I rinsed the sand from the cockpit and managed to pour some significant quantity of seawater into the quarterberth through the open window. I mostly just doused my own bags, getting both this notebook and my computer (which we just loaded on-board today so I’d have it in Burlington) marginally wet. Funny — the computer was more easily dried than the binder-full of paper. It is fortunate that the marginality of the dowsing was quite literal — no page seems to have gotten wet enough to bleed ink or stick to another page.
Together we prepped dinner — steak for Pop, Alice, and Henry, and a bowl of veggies, fried rice, & edamame for me. We all had hors d’oeuvres, steamed asparagus, and sautéed mushrooms with onions. The last was of my own making — Alice was going to use butter, and when I suggested using Earth Balance she offered that I could make it myself any way that I liked. I agreed. Everyone liked it, and Alice said that the only difference she noticed was that the mushrooms and onions seemed slipperier than when she cooks them with butter.
Henry had a little red wine with his steak, and a lesson from all of us on the drinking and appreciation of wine. Dinner was accompanied by Mozart’s symphonies 40 & 41 from my computer (via a small portable RF transmitter), as well as another reading of my log. And a few glasses of excellent wine. Trust Alice to provide — she has amazing taste, and neither she nor Pop will drink trash.
Anyway, drinking three glasses of wine has made me sleepy, and I’m headed for bed. In the morning, we sail for Rockland.