Further Adventures Of SV Nutmeg

 7/31- Rockland ME   Goodbye July you’ve been fun. We haven’t gone far in this month in miles but we got back to our summer home base. We started out in Portland and ended up in Rockland and traveled far without going too far.     Today was provisioning day as I borrowed a car and went to Walmart and Hannafords. I loaded up with groceries for our week long trip. It was a cloudy day with rain spurting off and on so it was a good time to head to the store.     We went out to dinner tonight with the woman who gave us our mooring for the rest of the season. Her husband was someone we met in the boat yard and we became quite good friends. Unfortunately he passed away this past spring. She saw I was looking for a mooring and graciously offered the one they had. We had a good if somewhat emotional time recalling good times with her.    As I look around the bay here I see a lot of empty moorings for the end of July. I feel like there are almost as ma...

 7/30- Rockland ME    We decided to venture over to the Lobster Fest today. It opened at noon so we spent the morning doing the never ending boat chores. We brought our laundry in to exchange it for some cleaner clothes and then strolled down into the mayhem.     I found it weird that there were people lined up to pay $40 for a lobster dinner at noon on a Wednesday. The place was packed pretty instantly as we walked around through the different vendors. We didn’t find anything particularly interesting and as the number of people increased so did our desire to leave.     The bay was like glass most of the day so any thoughts of sailing went out the window. So we settled down to putzing around the boat looking for projects to do. Not finding any we settled for taking a nap. Maybe we’ll find something tomorrow. 

 7/29- Rockland ME   The day dawned pretty spectacularly. We actually slept in a bit today not rising until 6:30. We did a bunch of chores and then found it was 8:30am. Where does the time go?      The wind looked like it was strengthening a tad so we thought we’d go sailing. One of the bonuses about being at the edge of the mooring field is there are no other boats behind you. We sailed off our mooring and headed out to the breakwater where the wind collapsed. We sat there flogging about for about a half hour when finally the wind came up. We had a nice beam reach for about 40 minutes until the wind stopped again. Once the wind found its direction in life we turned around and had a nice close reach all the way back into the harbor.     On our way out I looked around and there was a Cape Dory 31 on one side of us and a CD 33 on the other. Of course it was the lightest wind but we all moved quite well.      We need to get back into t...

 7/28- Rockland ME    We got Alayne back onboard today. Her aunt and uncle drove her back from the family reunion and we had lunch at Claws. ( just for you Joe) Other than that not much happened today.      People always ask what do you do all day on the boat. Well the truth of the matter is sometimes not much. Living on a boat is like sailing, short periods of intense activity followed by long periods of sheer boredom. When getting the boat ready for a season I try to get everything in working order so that big repairs don’t happen on the water. Of course those can occasionally be unavoidable and thus leads to times of high activity. Usually though it’s just the routine chores that need to be done. So normally there is plenty of time for reading and napping and walking when we get the chance.     We now have about a 20 minute dinghy ride to get to shore which leaves plenty of time for reflection. It does make going ashore a more special occa...

 7/27- Rockland ME   Today was mostly a carbon copy of yesterday. I got up early and went over to work with the lobster fest folks. I did a lot of odd little jobs today as I think they were having trouble thinking of stuff for me to do. It’s an interesting group of people as they are obviously mostly locals. Many of them have volunteered at this festival for years, some as many as 30 years. They all know each other and it’s like a big family reunion.     Now that I’ve had an inside look it is tough to realize that festivals like this have seen their glory days. Tradition is probably the biggest thing keeping it going. They say it used to be that nobody in the state would schedule anything for this weekend but now there are many other activities to choose from. Portland has a big outdoor concert this weekend and another town has scheduled their county fair.      Still it will be plenty crowded which means we won’t be anywhere near here. Our annual ...

 7/26- Rockland ME    Today I was out the door early heading into town. I was volunteering to help set up for the lobster festival happening next week. My first job was helping put sides on one of the tents. It is ironic that this is the art tent which holds the craft and art exhibits. I met the “Mad Potter of Portland “. The guy in charge of setting up this tent was a potter/ sculptor who is making a big Neptune statue to put out front. It was interesting talking to him and his family.     The afternoon was spent setting up the food tent. There are different areas for the different foods like lobster, clam chowder, or breakfast. It was interesting seeing all the equipment that is necessary to pull off this festival. And not to mention the organization that is needed to get it to be successful.     I was fed quite well today though it was mostly by waffles. The food truck that came put everything on waffles. In the morning it was sausage and ...

 7/25- Rockland ME   I sent Alayne away again as she heads over to her yearly family reunion. I then ran a bunch of errands in town before heading back out to the boat to escape the heat. It was amazing how walking up from the water was like walking into a wall of humidity. The same coming back as it must have been 10 degrees cooler out here.     I have some preliminary numbers I’d like to share as we have closed the circle on our adventure. We will still be living on the boat for another month and a half so these are numbers for the trip up from Maryland.     We launched May 12th and moved onto the boat that day. We have spent 72 total days on the boat and we have traveled on 34 of those days. We have traveled 950 nautical miles (6000ft) with our longest day being 113 nm along the New Jersey shore. We also did days of 58 and 43nm for an average of 27 nm in a day. To do that we spent $380 on diesel fuel with prices all over the place. I think the ...

 7/24- Rockland ME    Well today was pretty much a lay day. We got into town and walked to the farmers market. They also had the Maine Stonecutters Symposium right there. There were a bunch of artists working on chunks of granite. It was interesting in that these people were working with electric grinders and polishers using diamond blades. I just had to think back to like Michaeangelo where he was using a hammer and chisel. I have often wondered how often there was this oops and a nose or a finger got knocked off.  I guess then it would have been a second.      Being as far out as we are we have decided that we should only go to shore no more than once a day. So we made the most of this trip in and headed back to the boat. It’s kind of bouncy out here with all the various boat wakes hitting you from different directions.      We have been catching up with the regular cast of characters that hang out at the marina. It’s good to see that ...

 7/23- Rockland ME   Well we have come full circle and are back where we started two years ago. We motored the whole way up from Tenants Harbor as the wind was too light. Of course the minute we got here it picked up nicely. Oh well!    We searched around for our mooring for a while until it finally revealed itself to us. We are borrowing a mooring from a friend for this season. It is much further out than we were before. This has both advantages and disadvantages. It takes longer to get to the dock and in bad weather it might be impossible. Being further away means less road noise and quicker to sailing. Anyway we are here for the season and we’ll see how we like it.     This is the land of lobster pots as the further north we got the thicker the pots became. It was practically impossible to use the autopilot because you would be constantly making adjustments. The lobster Fest is next weekend so maybe we’ll get to check out some of the fruits of their...

 7/22- Long Cove, Tenants Harbor ME    The morning started with no wind so we just sat in Boothbay until around 10am. The wind looked like it was ready to give us a push but sadly it was all just a tease. We motored out of the bay and ran up a jib for about a minute until we realized it was not going to happen. We motored for about an hour until Pemiquid Point.     I ran the sails up and we actually did move so we shut down Mr Perkins and sat back. We sailed for about two hours at 2.5 to 3 knots. It was a nice day so this was fine. About the time we got to Eastern Egg Rock the wind petered out so we sent a call out for Mr Perkins again. We didn’t see any puffins but I did see two of the biggest porpoises I’ve ever seen.     We left the motor on to get through to Marshall Point where the wind stepped up its game. From there we broad reached out to Two Bush and then a nice long tack all the way into Long Cove. We tied up to Nutmeg’s old storm m...

 7/21- Boothbay Harbor ME    Amazingly a northwest wind took ahold of us right from the get go. We pulled up the anchor and motored out into the bay and away we went. The sailing was certainly robust today.     After leaving Quahog Bay the wind was having trouble making up its mind as to whether it would blow directly behind us or on our beam. I had the jib out but it kept getting blanketed by the main so I finally took it in. We were doing close to 7 knots on the reefed main alone. It was also a lot more comfortable not having to deal with the jib.     Once we rounded Cape Small the wind was decidedly on our beam so I ran out the stay sail to help out. We had a great run sailing past the Kennebec and Sheepscot rivers. The waves were not not large but we managed to cover the boat with salt. Waves crashed repeatedly over the bow sending spray all over the boat and us.     We sailed right into Linekin Bay and were going to anchor...

7/20- Snow’s Island, Quahog Bay, Harpswell ME    We finally got out of Falmouth with a little bit of our money left. It was a nice place but it sure was expensive. We motor sailed across the bay and wound through a bunch of different islands. The thing about Casco Bay is you can’t get anywhere in a straight line.     First we had a broad reach then we went down wind only to have to turn upwind to get around the corner. Then more down wind until we turned to head almost straight into the wind. Here the tide was rushing out and the swells were rolling in making for some mighty big waves very close together. I had to use the motor to assist here. I’m pretty sure at one point we launched off a wave and my 10 ton boat actually went airborne. It sure came down with a big crash.      We turned downwind and rode the swells all the way into Quahog Bay. We anchored in a lovely spot just south of the island. It didn’t take long for the rains to catch up to u...

 7/19- Falmouth ME   I rode the bus over to the airport this morning and collected Alayne. Now that she is back on board hopefully we can head out of here. This was a pretty nice place to be all things considered but the $70 a day was starting to get old. I could probably have bought a mooring for the season for what I paid for 2 1/2 weeks.     The rest of the day was taken up by naps for Alayne. We did meet up with a friend from the area and went out for dinner.      I did see a couple of meteors last night. These were long burning ones. It reminds me of the time I saw one so close to me that I could see the flames coming off of it. We were on a hillside and looking out saw a bright light coming closer. Before we knew it it passed directly over head. It was so close all of us instinctively ducked. I read in the paper the next day that it had landed in a field about 20 miles away. This was the first of three meteors I have seen hit the earth....

 7/18- Falmouth ME    It is that time of year folks for your favorite heavenly light show, the Perseid meteor showers. It looks like tonight will be a nice clear night (at least here) so I should be able to see some fireworks.      Today was another in a string of do nothing days. I spent some time reading and napping but other than a walk in the preserve this morning I really did nothing. Hopefully we only have one more day here before we start moving on.      This was a good place to be as it has good access to the city and the airport. While with 50 transient moorings here they have a fair number of boats coming and going. The trouble is there is really no place where people can congregate so meeting other transient boaters is harder. I have met several and I’m hoping we can possibly meet up later in the summer.     It’s time to shut down this screen and let my eyes adjust to see some meteors. 

 7/17- Falmouth ME    Last night was interesting. Lots of folks headed out in their boats after work to try and cool down a bit. Well just about the time it got dark the fog rolled in fairly heavily. The mooring field was filled with boats crawling along with floodlights trying to find their moorings. It made for an interesting sight. The fog of course rolled right on out about an hour later.     Not much going on today, just doing some boat chores. I did meet a couple coming up from Maryland. The fun thing was they were on a boat named Safari and the other day I met a couple on a boat called Africa. I thought it was neat when the launch driver asked him where to go and he says Africa.     One more time maybe    I had excused myself to go down below and get another donut and when I got back up top, poof, she was gone. There was no sight of her anywhere. How someone could disappear that fast was kind of amazing though my guess is tha...

 7/16- Falmouth ME   As long as I had to bring the car back today I decided I would walk around Portland a bit. Of course it was incredibly hot so this may not have been the brightest move. I did walk along the water front in the Old Town and it was nice but again there were plenty of shops and stores selling stuff I neither wanted nor could afford. I finally hopped the air conditioned bus  back.     The rest of the day was spent avoiding the sun. I did catch a launch ride where we rode all over the mooring field. I always tell the launch drivers to drop me off last. Some forget and I get to go all over again.     Where were we…   “Well you never mind too much about me” I mumbled. I could tell by the fact she was looking around that she probably wouldn’t be around here too long. So I nudged the conversation back to her.      “ Well if you’re looking to get sailboat ride one of the best ways is hooking up with a schooner so...

 7/15- Falmouth ME    It dawned on me just about the time the dawn hit me that I had a car today. I figured I paid $100 to have this car I should probably use it. So I asked the launch driver if there were any cool places to go. She instantly rattled off 4 or 5 places that fit the criteria I had given her. Now all I had to do was decide which one.     The option that I went with was a 40 minute drive away which wasn’t so bad in an air conditioned car. It was a nice drive down some windy back roads. I am decidedly more suited to this kind of driving as compared to the high speed driving of yesterday.     I eventually ended up in the town of Harpswell where this trail started. It was a nice 2.5 loop that ran along the edge of a 200’ cliff with the ocean below. I would guess that is why they called it the Cliff trail. It was a nice shaded walk through towering spruce trees with several nice overlooks. Then I had the nice 40 minute air conditione...

 7/14- Falmouth ME   I stripped the main sail off of the boat last night in preparation for bringing it to the sailmaker. On the launch ride in this morning I met a group of fellow cruisers. While we were waiting for each other to use the marina bathrooms we realized we were both calling an Uber to go to the car rental place. So I ended up sharing a ride which was very pleasant.      After not driving for 3 months hopping in a car and going 65mph was intimidating. The amount of traffic didn’t help much either especially on Route 1.      I had a nice chat with the sailmaker as she measured the sail and we discussed all the things that would happen.  I stopped off at Knights marine to make some arrangements for our return to Rockland. That along with provisioning took up the rest of the day. The launch driver widened her eyes when she saw the load I had. She was a trooper though and we got it all on board.      Again no installme...

 7/13- Falmouth ME   After figuring out the bus system yesterday I thought I would venture in again and see a baseball game. The Portland Seadogs are a double A ball affiliate of the Boston Redsox. Numerous Redsox players have played here on their way to the big leagues.      It turned out to be a beautiful day and I somehow managed to get a really good seat. They won the game against the Hartford Yard Goats 5 to 1. It turns out this is one of the few games they have won in this early season. And yes who names their team the Yard Goats? What is with that and what is a yard goat?    Portland may have redeemed itself a bit in my eyes as I walked through some nicer sections today. If you know us you know we are habitually early for everything. So of course I had plenty of time to walk around Portland. There were some very nice areas that were much cleaner than yesterday. The place was swarming with tourists though. A couple of stores I walked into were so...

 7/12- Falmouth ME   Today I went on an adventure. I discovered yesterday that you can take a bus into downtown Portland. So today I walked the 1 1/2 miles to Walmart where I got on the bus. The bus took me into Portland for a dollar. There I walked a bit and went to the farmers market and walked around downtown.    I do have to say I am not particularly impressed with Portland. Everything seems very dirty and there is trash everywhere. I had to wade through trash just to sit at the bus stop in the downtown. When I searched on things to do in town almost everywhere I looked it all came back to bars and restaurants. There are plenty of those.      Here we go again…     I had retired to the cockpit as the sun was waging a more or less winning battle with the fog. The girl was coming back down the dock after showering and presumably getting some coffee in her. If it hadn’t been for the striped purple hair I might not have recognized her. Now tha...

 7/11- Falmouth ME   We were fogged in this morning. Not that it mattered much to me as I wasn’t going anywhere. I don’t really have a whole lot to do right now so I have been diving into cabinets and drawers. I have been finding stuff I forgot we had. That is one of the troubles with leaving your boat for a year. In one drawer for example I found a half dozen Apple charging cords. Why we need more than two is beyond me but I guess we just keep accumulating them.     Meanwhile back at the ranch …     I swing the door open and sure enough there on the settee was a pile of gray with a striped purple top.     “Hey miss, miss “ I said softly.      “Coffee” was the only sound that came out of the pile of gray.      “Sorry, there’s no coffee on this boat”.  This elicited a long groan.       “I’ll make you some breakfast and give you the code for a shower but I’m gonna need some answers to ...

 7/10- Falmouth ME     It was raining this morning when I stumbled out of bed.  I don’t want to tell you what I had for breakfast and I’m sure you don’t need to know. By lunch time it had cleared a little and it wasn’t raining so I hopped the launch in and went for a long walk.     It seems almost every night of the week there is a different one design class racing. I’m not sure who was tonight but last night they had a big group of J-24’s out racing. Before that there were a lot of Echoltz( not sure how to spell that one). Anyway it’s usually not one or two boats racing but more like 10 or 12 and a lot of these boats have brand new sails. I could never figure out why people will spend incredible amounts of money to win a trophy.     Where were we …   You may be wondering why I would allow a perfect stranger to sleep in my boat. Well maritime law says that as a mariner you are obligated to help any mariner in distress. While this wo...

 7/9- Falmouth ME    I had a fairly productive morning as I changed the secondary fuel filter. Mr Perkins is now all caught up with his routine maintenance. I then prepped and sanded the bowsprit in preparation for applying some Cetol.     This afternoon I explored Falmouth some more taking a long walk. I found a bunch of trails through the woods in the back of a small park.     Ok so where was I —    The woman peeled off her hat. It was a Minnesota Twins hat so I just wished her luck with that. This revealed her brownish hair with purple streaks through it. Of course she was dripping water all over the settee so I wished she would get on with it.     “I just want to go sailing” she said. “I want to buy a boat and sail off into the sunset “    “Now!” I queried. “In the dark and in the rain?? Why are you knocking on my door ?”    “I really have no place else to go. “ “Well you have no place to stay ...

 7/8- Falmouth ME    I dragged out this morning in order to give the launch driver a chance to wake up. I dragged all my anchor chain and line up on deck and cleaned out the anchor locker. There was quite a bit of some Maryland mud in there.      Then, before it rained, I walked up the grocery store. This was mostly for the exercise as I didn’t really need anything. I got back just in time for the thunderstorm to come overhead.      Once upon a time in galaxy far away it was a dark and stormy night when I heard a knock on the side of the hull. Who would be out in this weather I wondered but then again I was not too anxious to find out either. Sorry to say the knocking continued harder and harder so I pulled back the hatch cover and there was someone outside being drenched in the rain. They were pretty unrecognizable as they were just a sopping wet dark gray blob.      “What” I exclaimed. A woman’s face appeared from under her h...

 7/7- Falmouth ME    Today the plan was to give Mr Perkins some love. I changed oil as we were well past the 100 hour point and checked the valve adjustment. I put a new impeller in as the old one had a cracked vane. It had been in there over a year so it was time. And last but not least my worst favorite job is changing the primary fuel filter. To change this means you have to bleed the air out of the fuel lines. The motor only starts right up after this procedure about once every fourth time. I struggled bleeding it again and again and finally the motor started. Hooray!!     Today’s surprise was a call from an old friend from my days of living on Cape Cod. He had seen a post on Facebook and he lived nearby. He came out and we chatted on the boat before heading into Portland for dinner at a sushi bar. There we met an another friend from college and had a nice get together.     It’s late so there is no fictional interlude tonight. That is unless y...

 7/6- Falmouth ME    I was up early this morning to walk to the grocery store before it got too hot. I guess I beat all the staff in as there was no one around when I dragged my wagon up the hill. A while ago we bought a fold up wagon and this is the first time I really have used it. I was glad to have it.     The walk was pleasant as I had to share the road with all the joggers, walkers, and bikers. There are some amazing stone walls around here. They are very well built being flat and level.      Yesterday I alluded to something I wanted to try. It has been getting harder to put 100-200 words down to describe me doing just about nothing. I’m pretty sure you readers don’t want me to start describing what I had for breakfast. So what I want to try is to delve into a little fiction. I will still report on what if anything happened in the day but considering the same thing keeps happening I would like to make it more readable. Anyway stay tuned...

 7/5- Falmouth ME    Another not too terribly exciting day. I did get out for a walk this morning and then did a bunch of boat chores. I am looking at my list of projects and hope to get started on them soon.     I did get a visit today from a couple of friends, Peggy and Denny. They graciously took me out for some lunch before heading off to their own boat.      Other than that the day was filled with watching the endless line of boats pulling up to the gas dock to refuel. It was another day with some fine wind which happened to turn around to the south. This meant I get to look out on the northern side of the mooring field for a change.    That’s all for now and I’m hoping this doesn’t get too boring in which case I am coming up with a plan. Stand by!!

 7/4- Falmouth ME    We got Alayne off to CA this morning and then I went exploring Falmouth a bit. This is not the low rent district. There are many big fancy homes with well manicured yards residing here. The town market here is not for the faint of heart either.     It was a beautiful day with a very nice 10-15 knot breeze. It would have been a wonderful day to go sailing. It was good to see many empty mooring balls as folks headed out to take advantage of this day.     Being the 4th of July there is of course the required fireworks display. As I watched from the cockpit I could see the fireworks from several towns all across the bay. Portland’s display was the biggest and most impressive. Of course now you can watch the parade of green and white lights heading down the bay as all the boaters in the harbor head home. The launches here will run until 11pm tonight and the water is churning already.  I have turned on some lights to hopef...

 7/3- Falmouth ME    We got up early this morning and headed out to explore a little around Falmouth. We were trying to beat some of the heat so we sort of woke the place up. There was a nature preserve just down the road a bit and we hiked there to get another proper walk in the woods. It was not terribly exciting but nonetheless it was exercise.     A thunderstorm rolled through in the early afternoon with some pretty impressive thunder claps. Some guy in a 50 foot boat was trying to beat the storm onto his mooring. His poor wife missed the mooring lines three times before hooking them and then dropped the boat hook. It then started to rain pretty good and she apparently had had enough and went inside. The guy tried three more times to catch the lines before just driving away. He came back later and finally got tied on.     In other marina news a 40 foot cabin cruiser sank at his mooring last night. Apparently a shaft seal burst and it slow...

 7/2- Falmouth, ME   Well today we did a whole lot of nothing. We tackled some boat chores in the morning but after that nada. It was one of these not super hot but humid days where you just feel heavier. It was hard to get fired up to do anything.     One interesting thing about this place is that there is a ton of boat traffic. Our mooring is on the front row next to the main fairway and only a couple of hundred yards from the fuel dock. There are boats of all kinds buzzing by here all day long. The next several days should really be interesting with the long holiday weekend.     The launches are constantly tooling by us as with  over a thousand boats here storing dinghies would be almost impossible. The launches rides are fun and you get to meet all kinds of people. We just get on them and tell the driver to do his rounds so we can have a boat ride.     Another interesting thing is looking out over the mooring field at night...

 7/1- Handy’s Boatyard, Falmouth ME   When I got up this morning I could not see the island which was 200 yards away. By the way for those of you who were wondering about how I slept last night, I mostly slept fine. Of course I shut all the hatches and pulled the pillows over my head so the breaking waves were mostly muffled.      Back to this morning the fog was very thick so we hung out a bit while waiting for Handy’s to tell us they had a mooring for us. Once we got the ok we headed out. You could see about an 1/8th of a mile. Fortunately there were not a lot of lobster pots in this stretch. It was however exposed to the ocean waves to which we were sideways. It made for an awfully rolly ride. Once we turned the corner it cleared right up and the sun came out.     Sailing in the fog is certainly interesting. I just love the way things appear out of the fog as if they were being assembled molecule by molecule. It was cool to see the tops of the ...