The latest forecast predicted a day of calm, then a day of reasonable strength winds out of the east, and then Tropical Storm style mayhem from TS Andrea. It looked like our best option would be to advance our schedule, skipping several of our originally planned stops in order to be in the best position for making use of the east winds.
Another Early start, another calm day
Knowing the first day would be with no wind, we didn’t even bother unzipping our mainsail cover. Off in the distance in the other direction over coffee, I had been watching a ketch with full sail to our east going very slowly indeed. They were still essentially in the same place when we pulled up anchor. Finally, we were able to enjoy the beauty of Eggemoggin Reach. The only other boat we saw in the whole of Eggemoggin Reach had been that ketch. We passed under the suspension bridge and along shores with beautiful houses, many of which had equally pretty boats swinging on moorings below.
We didn't see another boat underway in the whole of the length of Eggemoggin Reach
We turned south into Penobscot Bay and slowly weaved our way through the various islands along the way on one engine, enjoying the sunshine and hot (within the enclosure, anyway) weather.
More Maine sights on a calm sunny day
At Vinalhaven (pronounced: vinyl-haven), we had originally intended to anchor in beautiful and isolated Perry Creek. We had been foiled the last time from doing this by a couple of big cabin cruisers that had managed to position themselves so they were taking up the whole little anchorage. This time, it was a little earlier in the season. I was hoping we might be able to beat the crowds and get a spot.
Well, a lot of things had changed in the years since we were here last. Perry Creek is now wall to wall with moorings, leaving no space for anchoring and very little for even maneuvering. Just to be sure we couldn’t anchor, most of the inter-mooring space was filled with lobster pot buoys.
Oh well, on to plan B – again.
Knowing it was supposed to start blowing hard from the east-northeast, we found a spot in a nearby cove with protection from that side. There were suspiciously no other boats there, likely because the tidal zone was very wide and the cove was ringed by private property, leaving no shore access. It was only after we had the anchor set and were all settled in that Maryanne discovered that it was called Shipwreck Cove. Ah, great!
I suppose it would have been an easy place to wreck before the place was well charted. At high tide, it looks like a big deep cove. In fact, in the middle, it is over 40M (133’) deep. About a third of the way from there to the edge, there is a nice, wide shelf of sticky mud, in which we set our anchor, then it rapidly turns into a lot of rocks, which reveal themselves at low tide.
From where we were, we had nice views in all directions, particularly to the west through the Fox Island Thorofare, dividing the islands of Vinalhaven and North Haven. We watched a couple of big schooners get underway from their moorings there and head to sea. As the tide fell, Shipwreck Cove turned out to be the place where the seals take their naps on the drying rocks. They are so cute and they have this amazing ability to sleep in the most uncomfortable-looking places. Perhaps their blubber acts like a big, comfy pillow.
It was still pretty early in the afternoon. Maryanne was feeling a little industrious, so she decided to improvise a recipe for pineapple upside-down cake using our pressure cooker as the oven. She had little idea about the specific ingredient mix and no idea about cooking time. She was expecting it to be the first unpalatable version in a series of long experiments that may eventually result in an edible cake.
It didn’t happen. The cake came out PERFECTLY! It was delicious! She’s a genius! It didn’t last long, though, and she used our last eggs to make it. The next one will have to wait. She did write down exactly what to do for next time, though.
Lounging seals, and Kyle appreciating Maryanne's latest cooking experiments
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