Doug Kelch
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Doug Kelch
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Over view of the Maine 2005 cruise. This cruise ran for two weeks, from Monday August 29 through Friday September 9th. In order to set sail on Monday most of us left home on Saturday the 27th. We had 5 boats on the cruise, Thomas Howe and Kate Dinneen in a Pearson 26 "SeaSmoke", Tod Mills in a Montgomery 17 "Busca Bris", Rick Langer in a Montgomery 15 "Bluebird, Abbey Gura in a Montgomery 15 "no name" and myself in a Montgomery 15 "Seas the Day". We launched from Rockland Maine ( in the rain and fog), and anchored out or were on moorings for the entire period. We stopped at the following locations: Carver Cove, McGlathery Is, Frenchboro (Long Is), Southwest Harbor, Buckle Harbor, Benjamin River, Bucks Harbor, Pickering Island, Seal Bay (Vinalhaven Is) and Perry Creek. All in all a fabulous trip with all the traditional Maine ingredients - fog, rain, lots of sun, 10 ft tides, reliable afternoon sea breezes, great lobster, secluded anchorages, and lots of Islands to hike around. Absolutely fabulous. It is truly the Mecca of cruising grounds on the East coast. I hope you enjoy the armchair cruise.
Abbey, Rick and I were the first to arrive late Saturday and early Sunday. This is Abbey and Rick discussing where to go for the first lobster of the trip.
Tod Mills arrived late Sunday for the Monday departure. He brought the first of the rain with him and didn't hang around to enjoy it. He parked the boat and took off to buy his first lobster of the trip. I believe he got one to eat right there and a live one to go. Tod took the picture below on Monday Morning while walking around the launch area in the rain. This is the Outward bound building to the left of the Schooner. They are in the process of moving to a new location down the coast. The schooner is locally owned.
Picture by Tod Mills
Above picture by Doug Kelch We compared rain gear setups and listened to an awful forecast for the next 4 days. Lots of rain with a couple of days of strong winds from 20 - 35 kts. It was looking pretty grim.
Picture by Doug Kelch Tom and Kate arrived in Sea Smoke shortly after noon.
The picture above was taken by Kate Dinneen Finally after much hemming and hawing and launching of boats we are all in the water and read to go with 4 boats in the water and Busca Bris on the launching ramp. We had decided to sail across Penobscot Bay and go most of the way through Fox Island Throrofare and anchor in the protection of Carver Cove. This was about 12 nm and it was already 2:30 so 4 boats took off leaving Tod to catch up with us.
So off into the light fog we go with the GPS showing the way.
Picture by Kate Dinneen. Picture by Kate Dinneen. The weather improved as we crossed the bay and wind settle in from the South at about 8 - 10 kts and by the time we got to Fox Is Thorofare the sun came out and it was a delightful day in Maine. The next few pictures are scenery along the Throrofare. Picture by Doug Kelch This picture is looking off the stern of the boat into the brightening sky to the SE. The monument marks the entrance to Fox Is Throrofare.
Picture by Doug Kelch A Nice Hinkley 48(?) coming out of the Thorofare. The first of many Hinklies we were to see along the Maine coast
Picture by Tod Mills - Classic Maine scenery
Picture by Doug Kelch Rick Langer in Bluebird towing his newly built nutshell pram. He is moving along at about 4 kts with the help of a 1 kt current helping him along. This turned out to be a delightful sail all the way to Carver Cove. The winds were a little on the light side to start but but the sun came out for most of the trip and the wind picked up to 10 - 15. Thankfully the rain held off until we were anchored.
We arrived at Carver Cove and Rick Langer took this picture after the rain started to settle in again. Abbey is looking pretty content in spite of the rain.
Picture by Tod Mills Tod had arrived later than the rest of us and did not join the raft up. I split from the raft up after dark. Both Tod and I learned bit about anchoring in Maine close to dark. I motored farther into the cove to get away from the Montgomery chuckle (wavelets hitting the lapstrake) where the raft up was anchored. The water was 15 ft deep at low tide, so I checked the distance to shore and it looked fine. I put out about 90 ft of anchor line on my 15lb CQR. Snug as bug. In the middle of the night I could distinctly hear the wavelets breaking on the rocks and I hadn't heard it earlier. I dug out my most powerful light and sure enough I was only about 30 ft from the rocks. Low tide had occurred and was now coming in so the current had changed direction. Just got a little nervous as it was much closer than I had guessed earlier. In Tod's case he had anchored up current from the raft up. Due to the extra weight on the rafts anchor they had far more scope than Tod did and when the current changed direction they were much closer to Tod than he thought they would be. Neither one of us had move but those tides are tricky.
Picture by Rick Langer A toast to the first night out. Thomas Howe, Abbey Gura and Kate Dinneen enjoy the first anchorage, rain or no rain.
Picture by Tod Mills It rained most of the night at Carver Cove and continued to rain well into the morning. This is "Seas the Day" in her rain gear. I was about to follow Kate's lead and go for a row in the rain. Tom and Kate have a Walker Bay 8 for a dinghy that rows and tows pretty well. With the rough Maine coastline they are a very useful tough dinghy. Rick and I both have nicely done, glassed wooden boats. His is a Nutshell pram that he finished rough on the hull because of the expected tough duty. Mine is a 15' 6" Bolger light dory. (yes I know it is longer than my M15). All three rigid dinghies worked well for trip overall. Tod brought a large 8 or 10 foot inflatable for two. It must have been 6 ft wide because when he inflated it the first time there wasn't enough room for it in the cockpit.
Picture by Tod Mills - Carver Cove shore line. I had rowed over to the raft up when the rain stopped around noon and discussed plans for the day. The forecast for the next two days were for continue bad weather with substantially increase winds by Thursday. This was Tuesday and wherever we ended up for the night was likely to be a two night stop to let the winds blow through. Carver Cove did not seem to have any public shore access and it would be tough being stuck in the M15 without shore access for 3 days. This was actually the remnants of hurricane Katrina coming through although we did not know that at the time. The marine radio never mentioned the hurricane and we had all left home Katrina had not turned for coast yet. What a surprise when we finally heard about it! Well with no shore access here we decided to push on to McGlathery along Merchants Row. We surprised Tod with the decision and he was caught with his dinghy up. We told him where we were going and said he would meet us there.
Picture by Doug Kelch So off across East Penobscot Bay into the light fog with little wind.
The fog seemed to get thicker as we went across the Bay but that could be just due to the distance from shore. In any case we motored 90% of the way there. By the time we got to the narrow rocky areas the fog had lifted considerably so we were not worried threading through the rocks. Reality sure does look different than those two dimensional charts :-) . By the time we were anchored and the Fog had settled back in.
Picture by Doug Kelch Tod did not arrive at McGlathery Island that night. By the time he got his dinghy deflated and contained in a small enough space that he could fit in the cockpit and still steer it was too late. He went to Seal Bay ( near Winter Harbor) on the eastern side of Vinalhaven Is.
Picture by Tod Mills
Picture by Kate Dinneen We had a terrific time exploring the rocky shore line and the island trails. McGlathery Is is one of the top anchorages to visit on a Maine Cruise. It is owned by two different conservation agencies and is open to the public as long as you pack out what you bring in. The only draw back to anchoring here are the tremendous wakes from the lobster boats using the channel on the way to traps. Of course these only occur between 5 and 5:30 AM when they all depart at once. I swear they heard we were there and all decide to come and checkout the Montgomery boats at high speed. By the time Tod arrived on Wednesday the wind had picked up considerably and the yet the fog settled back in for the evening. The forecast was for winds between 30 and 40 kts during the night. Since the big Danforth had dragged during the previous day we broke up most of the raft. Seasmoke and Seas the Day stayed together and used both a 15lb Danforth and a 15 lb CQR for a storm configuration. The CQR was set with less scope than the Danforth under the assumption that the CQR would help take up the strain when the boats started to swing off to either side. I believe all of the other Montgomerys were on 6 or 11 lbs Bruce anchors. The predicted winds did in fact come and were very very very strong. I have never heard that tone come out wind in the rigging before. The steady winds were around 30 kts (best guess, probably high but...) and gusts were short but very extremely strong and somewhere between 30 and 60 deg angles to the steady wind. It was a wild night but not much rain. We had removed the rain tents, and jibs from the boats to reduce windage. The waves were running 2 - 3 ft high even though the fetch was only about 300 yards. The waves were steep enough that the 2 hp Honda was banging up and down on its bracket so I removed it and placed in on the cockpit floor on some cushions wrapped in trash bags. The next day it took two of us to pull that big Danforth out of the mud. It was really deep. The CQR came up clean as a whistle so I don't think it contributed much but gave us some peace of mind (possibly false).
Picture by Rick Langer This is the morning after the strong winds. The fog came back in as the wind died.
Picture by Tod Mills The sun soon burned off the fog and we had another great day exploring the islands.
Picture by Abbey Gura Tod Mills and Doug Kelch (doing the work) heading for shore in the Bolger Light Dory. This dory really rows well as single but almost a tipsy as a canoe. It does get more stable with more weight however. You just need to warn people before they get in.
Picture by Tod Mills Buttoning up the boats for the trip to Long Island. The cruise has been great so far in spite of the fog, rain and wind. The forecast for the next week is near perfection so it can only get better.
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