Category: Living Aboard

The Wreck of the Willy T2

Last week, I promised you something fun. Here it is. 

The William Thornton Floating Bar & Restaurant has been an attraction in the BVIs since 1989, reachable only by boat. It is anchored in The Bight of Norman Island and serves lunch and dinner daily. It’s reputed to be quite the party spot at night, where many a cruiser and charterer jumps into the water from the top deck and drinks (sometimes simultaneously) until they peter out. The original “Willy T,” as it is affectionately known, was a wooden schooner named for the Jost Van Dyke-born architect, William Thornton, who designed the original U.S. Capitol. Sadly, it sank on its mooring sometime in 1996 when it sprung a leak in the night. An attempt was made to move it to become a reef, but the currents tore it apart. Its steel-hulled replacement, the Willy T2, was a decommissioned tanker that the owners fitted out for their needs. Alas, Willy T 2 was destroyed by hurricane Irma in 2017. The owners purchased a replacement in 2018 and had it renovated to look much like the Willie T2, and after a brief stint anchored in Great Harbor at Peter Island next door to Norman, it returned to its home in The Bight. Yes, we had lunch there with my folks one day, but that’s not the fun part. Keep reading.

What does one do with the wreck of a floating restaurant that is languishing on the shores of Norman Island? If you’re the non-profit organization Beyond the Reef, you dress it up with some pirates, sink it, and install dive moorings so people can tie up their boats and enjoy a dive on this piece of art. (Dave says that now makes it a Wet Willy 😁.) Beyond the Reef successfully sank the Willy T2 in August of 2019 between two reef heads in Key Bay on the south side of Peter Island. All they ask is a $5 donation/person (honor system), which they donate to a local children’s swim program. You can learn more about Beyond the Reef and its other underwater artistic installations here. 

We anchored in the lovely Key Bay anchorage area, donned our dive gear, and towed our hookah out by dinghy to one of the dive moorings. In the water we went, about 55’-60’ down, the extent of our hoses. Due to our hose limitations, we could only enjoy the exterior of the vessel and the surrounding seabed, but enjoy it we did. It was a hoot! If you have the time, check out Beyond the Reef’s photos of the Willy T 2 build and sinking so you can compare those to the pictures I took for the slide show below. Which is where I am leaving you today.

Enjoy the slides of the Wreck of the Willy TB2. Until next time, stay safe, and take care of each other!

Catch 22

Wow, it’s been just over 3 weeks since I’ve posted! You could infer that it’s because I’ve been busy enjoying myself, and I have been. The truth, however, is that I haven’t been “feeling the blog.” I promise a blog focused on the fun we’ve been having, but right now I need to vent.

Our insurance company, Geico/BoatUS, is dropping Caribbean coverage. I get it; it’s becoming a more risky market during hurricane season, which is 6 months of the year. They came into that market late and it’s not really their gig. What I don’t like is how they essentially left us in the lurch. 

Our policy cycle is April 13 of one year through April 12 of the next year. We get our renewal notice via email during the first week of March, and each year since we started in 2019, the policy with the rider has automatically renewed. I suppose we should have seen the writing on the wall since they’ve been dropping boats over the past year, especially sailboats, which they seem to consider more problematic. Maybe it’s that big stick they have sticking up out of their middles (that would be the mast). At any rate, we got our renewal notice on Thursday, March 7. Only this time, it stated that they would be dropping Caribbean coverage. We could use the boat in mainland US and Canadian waters, and could call and request a “visitation extension” for the Bahamas and Caribbean for up to 120 days, but not for the period of June 1-November 30 (the entirety of hurricane season, for their purposes). For that, we had to call. Okay, Dave called. He told them we were in the BVI and asked for the visitation extension and told them we would seek an alternate plan for hurricane season. The following day, Dave had an email response. Not only would they not grant the visitation extension, they also told us that we weren’t even covered for the final month of our policy because we had left US waters without permission. Say what?!

I’ll cover that last point first. According to the NH Amendments page of our current policy, which is good through April 12 of this year, they can’t just cut us off like that, except for nonpayment. It took a couple of phone calls and emails to get them to admit that, but they finally did. So we are covered through that date. That gave us just over a month to find a new policy. 

Now for the part about not granting us the visitation extension. First, I should tell you that we started this policy in 2019 or 2020 and even purchased the rider that allows us to be in the Bahamas or Caribbean at any time of the year, without prior notification and with no restrictions other than excluding a few locations we’ve never visited. Each year since we started the policy it has renewed in its entirety, rider included, without our having to do anything except make sure they had the correct payment information for our automatic renewal payment. Now back to their refusal to grant the visitation extension.

They said they wouldn’t grant said extension because we’d left mainland US waters without notifying them ahead of time. Hmmm…..that little gem isn’t in our current policy document, not on any of the 20+ pages, which, I assure you, we reread thoroughly. More emails and phone calls. They were reading from the renewal policy, which wouldn’t go into effect until April 13. So….you won’t grant the visitation extension because we didn’t do something our current policy doesn’t require us to do? Starting to see the catch-22 here? They even gave examples of how “prior notice” might occur. We could have notified them prior to departing for the Caribbean, or when Caribbean coverage was added to the prior term and with a request to extend into the renewal. Hello, Geico/BoatUS, neither of those are part of our current policy and we’re not mind readers. Perhaps you should have told us about this after we renewed last year. On top of that, in a way we actually did notify them of our intent to remain in the Caribbean when, last spring, we asked for and were granted the relevant paperwork to store our boat in Puerto Rico for hurricane season. You know, an island in the Caribbean. 

Then there was this little tidbit at the end of the same email. They could grant an extension in the event of “extenuating circumstances beyond our control.” Really, Geico/BoatUS, you don’t see this? You CREATED an extenuating circumstance beyond our control. We know you won’t cover us past May 31, but at least give us until then so we have enough time to find a replacement policy! This is what happens when bean counters make decisions. 🙄

The griping part is over. We clearly are not going to get anywhere by appealing to Geico/BoatUS’s better nature. We will bring this to the attention of whichever entity monitors and regulates what insurance companies can and can’t do. Based on our interpretation of the NH Amendments to our policy, we think they’re in the wrong, but we’re not experts. 

Where does this leave us? We have asked our boating friends for referrals to the insurance companies they use and have sent out several requests for quotes. We’ve received some ballpark quotes, but before any quote can be finalized, we need to schedule a survey of our boat. The survey requires that our boat be hauled out of the water, so we have to coordinate a surveyor’s schedule with a boat yard’s schedule. We’re working on that. Hopefully we have it all taken care of before our current policy expires. 

Like I said at the beginning of this post, next time I’ll write about something fun that we’ve done. Maybe it will have something to do with the picture at the top of this post. 😉 Until then, please keep your fingers crossed for us, stay safe, and take care of each other!

Moving on to St. John

My folks arrive late on 2/13. We had rented a car for the day to reprovision for four people for a month, and to be able to pick up my folks at the airport so they didn’t have to get a taxi. We were all safely aboard Lady in St. Thomas Harbor by a little after 8pm. 

We kept it low key the next day so my folks could recuperate from their prior long day of travel. Our big adventure was taking them on the Safari Bus from one end of the island to the other and back, something Dave and I had done the week before. We got off in Red Hook for lunch at Duffy’s Love Shack, because it was so yummy last time. This visit, we were treated to their metal shark in motion. Dave & I thought it was just decoration on our last visit, but it’s actually animatronic. When somebody orders a drink called The Shark Tank, Love Shack (by the B-52s) starts playing loudly, the shark’s mouth starts munching, fog and bubbles are spewed out from the other end of the bar, and everyone starts singing. Well, the customers start singing. We asked our waiter how many times a day he has to listen to that song- about 10 times a day. I bet that wears thin.

The following day, Friday, we left St. Thomas for St. John, but first we popped up to Mingo Cay for a snorkel. There is one mooring ball there, right over the reef. We snorkeled and dove there last year with our buddy boats, Caretta & Wild Horses. It’s a great snorkel for my folks because they can do it right off Lady’s sugar scoops. After our snorkel we had lunch, then headed over to Caneel Bay where we picked up a National Park Service (NPS) mooring ball in Caneel Bay on the west side of St. John, just north of the town of Cruz Bay. We and our buddy boats had spent a few days there last year. We dinghied into town so my folks could check it out, and we stopped for a drink at High Tide’s happy hour, right on the water. The right side of the ferry dock, facing it from the water, is being renovated, but the dinghy dock was still open. However, we had to wade ashore in knee deep water because access through the ferry terminal was closed. We didn’t realize it at the time, but there’s also a dinghy dock on the left side with dry access to land through the terminal. We used that the next day, much drier and no sandy feet.

Saturday morning we headed back ashore to visit the NPS Visitor Center. First of all, their dinghy docks are all gone! Looks like they’re being rebuilt. We dropped my folks off at the Customs dock so they could walk around to the Visitor Center, then Dave & I went around to the dingy dock to tie up, on the dry access side this time. Then we ran into my folks coming back from the Visitor Center. Closed! Our pamphlet and the sign on their door said open daily 8am-4pm. Nope. Bummer! I called later and got their message that says their current hours are M-F from 8:15am-1:15pm. We stopped there briefly last year with our boat buddies just for some information and a park map, but we didn’t look at the exhibits. Oh well. We’re in the area through April; I’ll get there at some point this year. Instead, we walked over to the Catholic Church so my folks could find it the next morning, then returned to Lady for a dip in the water and a relaxing afternoon.

Sunday morning we dinghied my folks into town for Mass. Dave & I found a little coffee shop just up from the water. I enjoyed a latte and used their WiFi to tend to some boat club stuff. Dave went for a walk. When my folks got out of church, they met us there and bought us pastries to enjoy later. They enjoyed a coffee each while I trotted up the hill to the Dolphin Market for some produce, then we returned to Lady for lunch rather than eating ashore again. It gets pricey.

On Monday of this week, we left Caneel Bay for the north shore of St. John to explore the bays up there. During the winter months, the north shore is often impacted by northerly swell from cold fronts moving south and east from the U.S. If the swell is sufficiently large or short period, it can be uncomfortably rolly in those bays and landing a dinghy ashore can be treacherous. There can also be rip currents along the beaches. The first half of this week, however, was perfect for the north shore. We spent one night in Hawksnest Bay and two in Francis Bay, all of about 2.5 nm apart. In between the two are Trunk, Cinnamon and Maho Bays. We all snorkeled in Hawksnest. It was disappointing. These reefs are in a sad state. Maybe I’ll write about that another time. Dave & I dinghied to a couple of the beaches to check them out. Gibney Beach on the east side of Hawksnest is the legacy of an old island family. On the east end of this beach is the ruin of Oppenheimer’s house. Yes, the a-bomb Oppenheimer. Dave & I dinghied to Cinnamon Bay from Francis Bay to snorkel (again, disappointing) and then explore the sugar mill ruins across the road from Cinnamon Bay Campground.

About 2/3 of St. John is National Park, including the coastal waters around it. There is no anchoring in park waters; you must use the mooring balls provided. Fortunately, between all the NPS bays, there are about 200 of them. They cost $26/night, but since Dave is old enough for the lifetime senior pass, which we purchased last year, we get them for $13/night. Sweet deal! They are well maintained, and that must be quite a task for the NPS, because not everyone uses them properly. Thus far we’ve been fortunate to find balls open in each bay we’ve chosen to stop at, despite this being peak charter/cruising season.

As I type, we are transiting the west side of St. John en route to Reef Bay on the south side. If we’re lucky, at least one of the two day-use moorings will be available so we can dinghy ashore to explore the sugar mill ruins there before moving on to one of the other nearby bays with overnight moorings. We plan to go up into Coral Bay on Friday so Dave and my Dad can help our friend Juan trouble shoot his engine. The ladies will do their own thing.

We’ll spend the next week and a half continuing to explore St. John before heading up to the BVI for a bit. More about that next week. Until then, stay safe and take care of each other!

St. Thomas & New Batteries

We’ve been in the USVI since January 21st and all but one of those days has been spent at St. Thomas, mostly in St. Thomas Harbor. The first week and a half was all about provisioning, getting our new batteries to Indigo Lady, and then Dave installing them. In that timeframe we left the harbor just once to cruise offshore to empty our holding tanks, then we went to a little anchorage on the west side of Hassel Island to make water. Making water in St. Thomas Harbor would be ill advised; harbor water tends to be icky. The next day it was right back to St. Thomas Harbor. 

For those who don’t know/remember why replacing our lithium-iron-phosphate batteries was important, here’s a quick synopsis. (If you know the story, skip to the next paragraph.) The original batteries were purchased with our entire solar-electric system when Dave did the original conversion in 2016-2017. By 2019 we started having issues with them and ended up replacing them, from the same company, in August of 2020 as a partial warranty. So yes, we paid for our batteries again, about half of the original cost. Within a year, the new batteries were giving us trouble! Despite the best efforts of a particularly helpful engineer at the company, and several upgrades later, at our expense, Dave was done with that company. Their batteries were never going to be capable of serving our needs. It was then that he started thinking about how to replace them. Go with another company or build them himself?

Back to the present. Dave ultimately determined that it was far more cost-effective to buy battery cells and build his own batteries than to buy premade batteries from another company. Purchased batteries cost about $28K, while the cells to get the same capacity as those cost about $7600, and that included the cells, shipping and all the parts to make the batteries come together. It took Dave four days to build the two battery banks, one in each hull. Even better, they work! We haven’t made any long trips on them yet, just a few 5-8 nm hops, but those were done entirely on battery & solar, and the batteries recovered beautifully. We were able to cruise at about 6 knots each time- woo hoo! 

Dave finished the batteries on January 30th. Other than one day and night spent at Christmas Cove at Great St. James Island, we continue to stay at St. Thomas. We’re not straying too far because my folks are coming on the 13th, assuming the impending snow doesn’t delay them. Cold fronts come through regularly this time of year and we don’t want to get trapped someplace, unable to get back here in time to meet them. We also had to ride out three days of big winds and rain last week, and St. Thomas Harbor is a good spot to do that. Still, we’ve managed to enjoy ourselves enough. We met a local, Ralph, who stopped to inquire about Lady when he was dinghying by. He gave us lots of helpful local information and helped us get the new batteries onboard. We’ve visited with him a few times. We met up with friends we met cruising in the Bahamas last year for errands (thanks Juan & Alison) and lunch. We learned how to use the Safari bus, and even rode its entire route one day out to Red Hook on the east end of St. Thomas and then out to the University of the Virgin Islands on the west end. We’ve been in Brewer’s Bay for a few days. Yesterday we dinghied to shore, locked dinghy to a tree, and walked up to the UVI bus stop to catch a Safari into town for the weekly farmers market, where we also met up with our new friend, Ralph. We hung out for a bit and bought some great produce. I am now in possession of a breadfruit that I have to figure out how to work into a recipe. I’m thinking it’s going to end up in a curry. Yum!   

It hasn’t been a show-stopping 3+ weeks, but it’s been enjoyable nonetheless. I enjoy getting to know an area and feeling comfortable in it. Did I mention that it’s comfortably warm?  Temps are generally in the low-mid 80s during the day, and not humid yet. We’ve even had to put on long sleeves a few times at night when the sun sets, the winds are up, and temps dip into the mid 70s. It’s awesome! 

Once my folks arrive, we will head to St. John as soon as we can to explore that island from land and water. In early March, we will all be heading to the BVIs. I’m going to try to post weekly from now on. Until then, stay safe and take care of each other!

Here’s what the harbor looked like during those big winds.

St. Kitt’s to USVI- following seas & dolphins!

We finally got our chance to leave St. Kitt’s, only not for St. Martin, as we’d originally planned. The conditions just weren’t conducive for that NNW course and wasn’t going to be for the foreseeable future, 1-2 more weeks. The conditions were good, however, for going straight to the USVI, so we took it.

It’s been a long time since we’ve made an overnight passage with following seas. I’d forgotten that winds 12-18 gusting to 23 with 4-6’ seas, even on a short period, are fine when they’re on your stern pushing you forward. For the past few years, conditions like that were a no-go because we were most likely going to be heading into them and getting slammed. It took my brain a while to embrace the reality. A phone call with Chris Parker (weather router we use) helped, because he confirmed the weather window and that it would hold more than long enough for us to get to St. Thomas, 141 nm away. We hauled anchor in Basseterre, St. Kitt’s at 5am on Saturday morning, 1/20 and arrived at the mouth of St. Thomas Harbor, USVI about 7am Sunday morning.

The passage was blissfully uneventful. Well, there were no bad events. There was one really wonderful event- a visit from a very large pod of dolphins just before sunset. There had to be at least 3 dozen of them playing in our bow waves, riding the surges that funneled between our bows from the stern, and jumping in the waves all around us. It was amazing! They stayed with us for about 15 minutes before the final stragglers peeled off. It was partly cloudy, but there was a brilliant half-moon and we could see a fair amount of stars. The light reflected off the clouds, lighting our horizon such that it was never pitch dark. I personally do not enjoy pitch dark night crossings, so I was quite happy being able to actually see all around us.

We were making 6 knots with our motors set at only about 4kW each. A fish hit one of Dave’s lines, so we had to slow down to reel it in. He cut back the power on the motors, but we were still moving too fast. We had to actually stop both motors to reel in the fish and we were still making 2 kts. That’s some push we were getting! We would repeat this one more time before Dave gave up on fishing, because both times it was just barracuda. When I came up for the 12-3am watch, I cut our speed down to 4.5 kts because we were going to arrive in the dark, which is not good for anchoring. Dave cut our speed even further when he came on at 3am, and by the time we were about 2-3 nm out from the harbor, the motors were set at about 1kW each because the sun still hadn’t risen. 

The sun rose just before 7am, but a cruise ship was also arriving. The pilot boat waved us off from the harbor entrance. We could have entered and anchored before the cruise ship got there, but whatever. Instead of waiting out the cruise ship, we altered course to the western entrance to the harbor and went in that way. We were anchored in 15’ of water just east of the Coast Guard dock by 8am. I ran up our Q-flag and submitted our entry via the CBP Roam app. Then I started tidying up the boat from all our passage gear and snacks while Dave tried to catch a nap. I awaited the call from Customs. The call never came, but an email did, about an hour after I submitted our entry (it was Sunday, after all). Welcome to the USVI; enjoy your stay! We were officially cleared in, so I replaced the Q-flag with the USVI courtesy flag and had breakfast. We just relaxed the rest of Sunday and slept pretty hard that night. 

As I write this on 1/24, we are still anchored in the same place. We’ve done some planning and reconnaissance for collecting our new lithium batteries and doing a big provisioning run. Hopefully tomorrow we will start acting on all that. Hopefully early next week our new batteries will be successfully installed and we can give them a good test run by heading to another anchorage. Please keep your fingers crossed for us.

Until next time, stay safe and take care of each other!

Back with Indigo Lady in St. Kitt’s

We arrived in St. Kitt’s on January 4th to find that Indigo Lady survived hurricane season very nicely at St. Kitt’s Marine Works. She had been moved just that day from her hurricane storage spot to the work portion of the boat yard, and a hard-working boat yard employee had just that day started on the list of work that needed to be done to her. We had expected the work to be done before Christmas, but that’s island time for you. So much for being launched on the 8th as we’d hoped.

We had incurred a small hole, above the water line, on the outside of her port sugar scoop last year in the Bahamas, but Kyle had also noticed water dripping from the starboard bow, where he discovered a crack. Thank goodness Kyle is observant! He repaired both nicely. He also painted on a new boot stripe (that marks the water line of the boat), buffed her entire hull and cabin exteriors, sanded her bottom paint to expose the copper (though not as much as Dave had hoped), and gave her a thorough external wash. Then we just had to wait for the travel lift to be repaired (again) so they could put her in the water. That finally happened on January 11th. That’s only three days later than we’d hoped, so not too bad. What was bad was the bill for the work Kyle did. We obviously misunderstood the fee structure for work in the boatyard and the bill ended up being triple what we’d expected- yikes! Lesson learned, get estimates and yard rates in writing!

Other than a slight launch delay and a bigger than expected bill, that part went okay. Also, when we first opened her up, Lady had no mold. Amen to that! Being a dusty, dry boat yard, she did have a layer of grit over everything that I couldn’t even consider cleaning until she was back in the water and away from the source of the grit. That was a bit frustrating for me because it meant I couldn’t do much unpacking and setting up. Holding pattern. The cabins themselves seemed to have little to no gritty covering, so I was able to clean our cabin and unpack and stow our clothing properly. Otherwise, I spent my time inventorying the food and other personal items left onboard so I could create this season’s provisioning list, and I tended to our “tech stuff,” like activating our IridiumGo (satellite phone) and conducting an SOS test, and upgrading our weather routing package. 

While I tended to that stuff, Dave tended to our frustrating battery systems. Our lithium batteries run the motors and charge our 12V battery system. They have been losing capacity since we installed them in 2020. In case you don’t know or recall, these batteries are replacements for the original set installed in 2017. We’re replacing them again this year, only Dave will be building the batteries himself this time from cells that are awaiting us in the USVI. For now, he had to get these to play nice, and they were resisting! It took five days of near constant monitoring, plus an independent battery charger to get all eight of the lithiums fully charged and balanced. 

The 12V system runs our “house load” – fridge, freezer, lights, communications, etc. They’re kind of important. They appeared to be flat and not charging, but since Dave’s good multimeter had died, he was diagnosing blindly. Thinking the batteries needed replacing, Dave went into town (with Kyle driving) and bought replacements and a new multimeter (though not as good as its predecessor). Replacing the batteries did not solve the issue, although the act of replacing them seemed to have some positive effect, leaving Dave guessing that the issue might have to do with a specific wire or connection. At any rate, they worked well enough, but occasionally there’s a glitch.

Moving on from system woes…

St. Kitt’s Marine Works is not within walking distance of any food source. After checking into the guest house (that abuts the boat yard) and checking on Lady after our arrival, we needed to sort out dinner plus the next day’s breakfast and lunch. So we ventured to take the bus. The “buses” down her are 15-passenger vans with license plates that start with H or HA. There are a few bus stops, but mostly one stands on the side of the road and flags one down when it comes. Doing this for the first time in the dark of night is challenging, but we had at least learned about the license plate to look for. We got a bus fairly quickly on the way to the Ram’s Supermarket in Buckley, but getting one to come back took about 30 minutes and the kindness of a local man who flagged one for us successfully. Riding these buses, by the way, is like riding the Knight Bus in the third Harry Potter Movie. Yowza! Still, the fare up to Basseterre (the capital) is only $3 EC (Eastern Caribbean Dollar) or a smidge over $1 US each way per person, so it’s more economical than taxis. We feel like old pros taking the bus now. 

Between the two of us, we made several trips into town over the week that we waited for Lady to be launched. Mostly it was running errands for things we needed, like the batteries, and a couple week’s worth of food (after that first night’s excursion to the market). One day, Dave and I went into Basseterre for lunch and a walk about (and a little reconnaissance before provisioning). That was a lovely afternoon.

We launched too late on the 11th to leave the boat yard’s little harbor, so we stayed tied up there for the night. The water in there was squirrely! Our six lines and four fenders creaked and groaned all night! There was not much sleeping. Next morning we set out around 9am to head the 8 nm south to the Basseterre anchorage. We went ashore for lunch, a few more groceries, and a SIM card for more data. It sure was nice to be at anchor again. There was a gentle roll to rock our tired minds and bodies to sleep that night. Even the music ashore couldn’t keep us awake.

The morning of Saturday, the 13th, we headed another 5 nm south to Ballast Bay, right next to White House Bay where we had anchored for several days at the end of last season before having Lady hauled out. The water is calm here despite the wind, and it’s peaceful. It’s a nice respite from all the frustration of the start of the trip. There are still gremlins in our systems that occasionally poke at us, but everything is working well enough, and when it doesn’t we know the work arounds. We are waiting for a good weather window to cross to St. Martin. Until then, we will bop around this little section of St. Kitt’s.

Until next time, stay safe and take care of each other!

Our New England cruising season is a wrap!

I’m posting a week later than planned. Once I’m on land I get right back into my land life and lose the desire to blog about cruising. (Note: The picture at the top of this post is of Whaleback Light with Wood Island Life Saving Station behind.)

We did, in fact, start our return trip to our home mooring on Sunday 8/27. It was a gorgeous day, both atmospherically and on the seas. It was sunny and warm with a light breeze and almost glassy seas and a gentle, long-period swell. We’d planned to stop at Damariscove for the night if it wasn’t too crowded. It was too crowded. We decided to see if any of the four mooring balls at Seguin Island, 7nm further south and within site, were open. (No anchoring allowed at Sequin.) With the binoculars, we could see there were two open balls, but it was such a calm, gorgeous day to be cruising, that we decided to just keep going. We eventually dropped anchor in Harpswell Harbor in time for afternoon drinks. It was about a 50nm day.

Monday morning we hauled anchor after an early breakfast and had another lovely cruise to Saco, ME and picked up one of the town moorings up the river. It was almost lunch time, so we splashed dinghy and headed up river to the public town boat launch/dock, tied up, and walked to Run of the Mill for lunch. Yummy! We walked about town a bit afterward and stopped for ice cream at The Saco Scoop before returning to Dumbledore.

We were treated to a third consecutive lovely cruising day on Tuesday, leaving Saco at 8:00am and arriving at our home mooring by 1:30pm. We popped up to our friend Mike’s dock that afternoon for drinks and conversation, then returned to Dumbledore for a late lunch. We decided to stay aboard at our mooring (which is a floating dock in the middle of Back Channel) until Friday as consolation for having to end our cruise early. 

Wednesday was overcast and rained off and on until late afternoon. We spent the day reading and chasing leak paths. Dave recorded 11 different leak paths. Oh goody. Our boating club dinner & meeting were that night, so we dinghied to Mike’s house to hitch a ride to the restaurant. The meeting followed at his house, and we dinghied back to Dumbledore afterward. 

Thursday was bright, sunny, and windy. The seas were going to be up, so we decided to cruise up the Cocheco River to Dover. We invited my folks to come along. Dad couldn’t make it, but Mom joined us. We rode the tide up the Piscataqua River to the Cocheco. We had our engines set for 7 knots, but at one point the tide & current had us going almost 12 knots- wahoo! It was VERY windy, the hold-on-to-your-hat kind of windy! There is a marina near the part of the Cocheco River that enters the town of Dover that used to have a dock for day visitors. It’s still there, but it’s smaller than it used to be and there were already two day boats tied up. So we turned around and dropped the anchor out of the channel about 0.5 mile down river and ate lunch aboard before returning to our mooring. We got to ride the outgoing tide, although it wasn’t as fast-flowing as the trip up. It was also less windy on the return trip. When we got to our mooring, we returned Mom to the boat launch where Dad picked her up, and Dave & I returned to Dumbledore for our final night aboard. 

My dad came to collect us Friday morning (thanks again, Dad!) and brought us to our house where we picked up our car and returned to Kittery to unload a good portion of our stuff off Dumbledore. We would complete the rest of the unloading another day. We’ve been on land since September 1st. We’ve done some boat work since, and by “we” I mean mostly Dave. I’ll tell you about that another time. I need fodder for additional blogs.

Until next time, stay safe and take care of each other!

We made it as far as Rockland, ME!

With our alternator finally sorted and our electrical gremlins somewhat under control (though still not completely eradicated), we set off again on August 15th to cruise up the coast of Maine. To ensure the alternator was charging the batteries and not overworking itself, we made only a short hop to the Isles of Shoals that first night. It performed admirably and has continued to so throughout this trip. Yay!

Our first two nights at anchor were rolly. Gosport Harbor at the Isles of Shoals is only exposed to the NE and that was the direction of the fairly short-period swells that first night. Our second stop was at Cliff Island, about ½ mile NE of Jewell Island. There was plenty of room to anchor at Jewell, but we wanted to try a new spot. It was nice and calm until high tide around 6pm. At high tide, the exposed ledge that breaks the incoming swells is under water and not breaking anything. We rolled quite a bit for about 4 or 5 hours. Mid-tide falling to mid-tide rising is the sweet spot at this anchorage. Fortunately that encompassed enough of the night to get some sleep at least. 

The following day we set out for Greenleaf Cove in Muscongus Bay to visit with my cousins, Richard & Sharon in Bremen, ME. The day we travelled to Cliff had been overcast and cool. This travel day was overcast and misty when we woke up in the morning and it didn’t get any nicer. We donned our foul weather gear to keep our butts dry driving from the wet seats up on the fly bridge, and to keep warm. Eventually it started to rain lightly. The rain stopped just before we rounded Pemaquid Point, but then there was fog. Fortunately the fog still allowed for about ½+ nm visibility. The middle part of the ride was also bumpier than we’d expected, but not too bad. We made it to Greenleaf Cove in front of my cousin’s house around 3pm and settled onto one of their neighbor’s moorings. Then we dinghied ashore for some visiting and a yummy, warm soup that was perfect for that day’s weather. 

We spent four nights in Greenleaf Cove, sleeping onboard Dumbledore and visiting with my cousins during parts of the day/evening. Friday was another overcast, showery day that started with me reading and Dave doing some boat tasks before we popped ashore after lunch. We ended up going to an art show and then out to dinner with my cousins and had a really good time. Saturday, Dave & I borrowed my cousins’ car so we could go to Dave’s family reunion in Greene, ME. It was a cozy group of 10 and we enjoyed several hours of conversation and food before heading back to Bremen. We arrived back to find that my parents had arrived. We shared another dinner ashore, courtesy of Sharon. Then my folks stayed at their house while Dave & I returned to Dumbledore for bed. Just after noon on Sunday, everyone packed up lunch and piled onto Dumbledore for a trip 7nm south to Harbor Island for the afternoon. We anchored before 2pm and ate lunch. Then Richard, Sharon, Dave and I went ashore to walk the public trail that the very kind owners of the island maintain. It’s lovely that so many private owners of Maine islands allow public access. If you ever have occasion to visit such an island, please respect the rules and privacy of the owners. We returned to the house for another shared dinner, this one courtesy of my folks. Then they returned to Dumbledore with me and Dave for the night, because we were heading off the following day. 

Just after breakfast this past Monday, Dave and Richard drove to Rockland to park my folks’ car, then returned in Richard’s car. This allowed us to spend a couple of nights with my folks without having to retrace our steps back to Greenleaf Cove. We spent Monday night in Tenants Harbor, going for a short walk about town after lunch (and buying delicious muffins at the general store). The next day, Tuesday, we headed over to Warren Island State Park and spent a night on a mooring there. Warren Island is the only ME State Park designed specifically for boaters. The only way to access the island is by boat; there is no public transportation (ferry) there. We went for a walk ashore, but we had to rush it because we forgot our insect repellent and those mosquitoes were voracious! It is a lovely island that Dave & I hope to return to one day, better prepared for the insects. (The picture at the top of this post is looking from Warren Island to Dumbledore in the mooring field.)

Wednesday morning we set off for Rockland Harbor to drop off my folks so they could head back home to NH. We enjoyed a lovely lunch ashore together before they set off. Dave and I have been here since. Over two days we visited the Lighthouse Museum, the Sail, Power and Steam Museum, and the Coastal Maine Islands National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center. All were wonderful and we highly recommend all of them! We enjoyed another lunch ashore and a walk along the water on the Harbor Trail. 

This trip started with several overcast, and lightly showery days (although Saturday’s rain was brief and we did have sun). Then we had a nice run of three sunny, warm (but not hot) days. Yesterday we had hoped to set off for the west side of Vinalhaven to ride out some predicted bigger winds. It was drizzly when we got up, but we donned our foul weather gear after breakfast, headed over to Journey’s End Marina for fuel and water, then headed out of the harbor. That didn’t last long. Although the harbor was calm, the exposed part of Penobscot Bay was not, and it was full on raining. So, we turned around and re-anchored, spending the day inside and closed up, chasing the numerous leaks that reveal themselves when it rains all day. (I’ll gripe about that in another post.)

It’s now Saturday, and though the day started gray, overcast and cool, around 3pm the skies became about half cloudy, half clear and the sun is out. Wonderful, right? Well, it is, but we still are likely to start our 3-day trek back to home port tomorrow morning, earlier than planned. Why? Tropical Storm/Hurricane Franklin will be passing between the US East Coast and Bermuda impacting our area mid-week. Don’t panic! the hurricane is not going to hit us. But a hurricane out at sea sends out swells and sometimes higher waves, and those could impede our progress home if we wait too long. It’s still not certain what the effect of Franklin will be, but we can’t afford to wait until the last minute. If it turns out that Franklin doesn’t raise the seas much, we can always dub around our home waters before returning to our dock and land home. 

That’s my update. Given the timing of our return home and the holiday weekend, I will probably post again the weekend after Labor Day and let you know how the end of our trip panned out. Until then, stay safe and take care of each other!  

We are not in Penobscot Bay

Not only are we not in Penobscot Bay, we’re not even on Dumbledore. We are still land bound.

We took Dumbledore and his new alternator for a test run up to Little Bay (near Durham, NH) on Thursday and spent the night on a mooring up there. The alternator performed admirably. So why are we not out on Dumbledore? We were having electrical issues. These manifested in two ways. First, the old microwave that came with the boat had stopped heating things, at least not consistently. We figured it was old and wanted to replace it with a microwave/convection oven anyway, which we did. Dave installed it several days ago and used the microwave feature successfully. On our alternator test run trip on Thursday, the microwave did not heat his lunch, nor did it heat something I tried to warm later in the day. Yet that night the air fryer function cooked our sweet potato fries perfectly. Hmmm. Friday morning I tried to turn on the solenoid switch that turns the propane to the stove on & off. It worked fine the six days we were onboard in July, but Friday morning the switch wouldn’t even turn on (you turn it on, then push the gas button to turn on the flow). What the heck??

Long story short, Dave didn’t think it was a good idea to set off up the coast of Maine with wonky electricity, a sentiment with which I agree. He has never been pleased with the haphazard mishmash of wiring on Dumbledore anyway. He describes the wiring as abysmal; sometimes he calls it a “rat’s nest.” The picture above is only the wiring that’s not in the engine room. The wiring down there isn’t much better. Bottom line, for now he has ordered what he needs to create a monitored bus bar distribution system. It won’t solve all our electrical issues, but it will be an improvement that also provides data that will allow him to suss out additional problems, and it will be significantly safer. 

Looks like we won’t get our extended cruise up the coast of Maine this year, but we’ll eek out some time once this piece is taken care of, which he’ll tend to as soon as all the parts arrive this week.

I will keep you all posted. Until then, stay safe and take care of each other!

We interrupt this Maine cruise…

On Friday, July 21st, we set out on Dumbledore for a 6-week cruise up the Maine coast, heading for Penobscot Bay. We enjoyed a lovely couple of nights on a town mooring in the Saco River (picture at top of post), then a night at Jewell Island. We backtracked a bit and spent a night on a friend’s mooring at Cousins Island so we could visit our friends at Greene Marine, the boatyard that helped us convert Indigo Lady to solar electric, and who have become lasting friends. From there we were heading to Damariscove, but the seas were uncomfortable, so we bailed and went up the New Meadows River to one of our favorite Midcoast stops- The Basin. We hiked the Micah Trail that afternoon, which turned into a foraging expedition because we found a bunch of black trumpet mushrooms- score! Dave also found a handful of yellow-foot chanterelles, which he ate for breakfast the next day. He dried the black trumpets.

Thursday morning was a lovely, calm day. So, we set out to meet up with friends at Damariscove. One mile out of The Basin, our alternator stopped working. Uh oh! Can’t cool the engine if the alternator isn’t spinning that belt. Fortunately, the New Meadows River was calm, and it is wide and we were in a channel between the rows of lobster pots. I kept watch above while Dave did some troubleshooting. He was able to get the alternator running, but it needed repair or replacement right away. We were only 8 hours cruising from our home dock, so we decided to take the risk and head there. Worst case scenario, if the alternator stopped, we’d call for a tow. If we got lucky, we’d make it all the way home before sunset and not have to pay for a marina or rent a car while we sorted our alternator (it is a model that is difficult to find). 

We got lucky. We were docked by 6:30pm, and my cousin, Bob, was there at the dock (having been working on his boat) to help with the lines. We all had some drinks and dinner aboard Dumbledore. Bob went home and Dave & I stayed onboard for the night. After breakfast the next morning, Dave called the alternator repair guy whose voicemail indicated that he was at his daughter’s wedding that day and heading off for vacation the following week. Yikes! He’d be in the shop Friday. So Dave left a message, removed the alternator, and we crossed our fingers that the guy would get back to us Friday. Fearing we would be homebound for over a week, we packed up stuff we didn’t want to leave aboard and met my Dad at the boat launch so he could drive us home. (Thanks, Dad!)

We got lucky again. The alternator guy called back that very afternoon (daughter’s wedding was in the morning) and told Dave that if he could get the alternator to him, he’d fix it Friday. Dave left immediately. Friday morning, alternator guy called around 9:30am to say the alternator was done. Woo hoo! Again, Dave left immediately.

As I type this today, Saturday, Dave is out at Dumbledore installing the repaired alternator and doing a couple of other boat things. We decided not to give ourselves whiplash and head back out on our trip right away. We’re taking this weekend and at least Monday to tend to a few things locally, then we’ll restart our trip Tuesday or Wednesday. We’ll probably even still make it up to Penobscot Bay.

I will try to continue to post weekly for the duration of our cruise. Hopefully next time I’ll be writing to you from Penobscot Bay. Until then, stay safe and take care of each other!