Category: New England-Thalia

We left our friends, the Skillins, in Kennebunk this week and started making our way further south. There was a general willingness amongst the crew to continue our march south at a rapid pace in hopes of warmer weather. On Tuesday, we motored for 45 miles to Rockport, on the tip of Cape Ann, near Gloucester. Rockport is a quaint small town with an enjoyable waterfront area called Bear Skin Neck. Back in the War of 1812, this spot was the site of Seafencibles, a reference to men that were posted in forts to protect the harbor. They were overrun by the British in a surprise attack and taken prisoner. Fortunately, we faired better, as we sampled the goods from the local ice cream shop! It seemed like this spot would be teeming with visitors in the height of summer; now that school has started, we get to enjoy these areas with a bit more elbow room on the streets. Here’s a picture of the waterfront area as we approached to anchor.

I got a lot of criticize from the family for taking many pictures of Thalia from the shoreline… why is it that some sailors, once off the ship and wandering ashore, focus instead on the ship from whence they come?!

Continue reading “Whale, Ho! Ep. 15”

Birthdays ~

Late August is always accompanied by cake and candles for both our youngest and I and this year was no different. Ok, a little different ~ see, I don’t have my good stoneware baking pans … or, more accurately, they don’t fit in the boat’s oven! So, we all got pretty good at cutting off the slightly burned cake bottom while maintaining the icing position above! One never knows when THAT skill will be needed again!

Here is our youngest in front of their cake in the cockpit of our boat!

Continue reading “Birthdays, Books and “Bbbbrrrrrs” in the Mornings! Ep. 14″

The last 7 days have been very action packed. In some ways too packed.

We left Burnt Island in Muscongus Bay and sailed into Rockland harbor, enjoying a nice gental breeze and our first attempt at flying the new assymetrical cruising spinnaker! We had fun watching the knotmeter continue to increase while Karen guided us up Penobscot Bay. Our arrival in Rockland was marked by a fleet of Windjammers returning from a day’s sail. It was quite a spectacle to see all of these old ships so skillfully handled in the harbor and to revel in the splendor of their beauty. Continue reading “Blown Biminis, but Bountiful Blueberries Ep. 5”

We are gradually getting more settled in to life aboard Thalia. The anxiety level is coming down, a general routine is setting in, and the atmosphere is more relaxed like we had intended the trip to be!

We spent several days this week visiting with our friends the Withee’s and their relatives in Boothbay Harbor. After a romping sail from Sebasco Harbor, and an early evening arrival, they were kind enough to let us barge in on their lobster dinner!

We also made an excursion out to Burnt Island for an enjoyable picnic…

Continue reading “Settling In Ep. 4”

Milestone #3 has been met, finally! We drop lines and depart Portland for our first day underway on our trip! This day came after many preceding days of highs and lows as we wrestled with boat preparation tasks. We departed with a few tasks still to do, but revel in what has been accomplished in a little over a week at the marina. Among other things, we finished putting all of the deck hardware on, including cabintop winches, dorade vents and guards, stanchions, lifelines, bow and stern pulpits, and the bimini. We were blessed with mostly clear and warm weather for this work. A few surprises arised, including the discovery that the new windows that I had installed were leaking after the first rain. Karen and I had spent a lot of sweaty hours under the boat canopy at home caulking and mounting all 367 bolts to secure these windows, so to find drips of water coming down around a dozen of the bolts put me in a very raw mood. We spent several days removing the old windows, scraping away old caulking and recaulking (and applying much more caulk then before!) as well as using epoxy to seal the bolt heads to the top of the windows. Needless to say, we left this window re-work to the end of the week so that we could head out as soon as the agony was over.

Continue reading “Milestone #3 is achieved — We Leave the Dock! Ep. 3”

Milestone #2 was met today by us moving out of our house! This was  preceded by many exhausting days of final packing. When did we acquire all  of this stuff? I long for my college days when I could move with one small  car load! Karen had done a great job of packing most of the house and  coordinating with the moving company for our sensitive furniture and  electronics. We were fortunate also that our renter, Margarita, wanted to  use most of our furniture, and that reduced the burden of the move out  tremendously.

This morning we finished up final packing and giving away food in the fridge,  hoping to get out of the house before Margarita showed up, but we ended  up overlapping for an hour. We were all a bit quite and reflective as her  belongings started filling the rooms that we had just emptied and the reality  of our move out started to appear. It will be 13 months before we sleep,  eat and shower in our home!

Continue reading “Milestone #2 is achieved — We Move From Land to Sea! Ep. 2”

Karen and I talked about three critical milestones for us to accomplish before we left on our trip. The first was getting Thalia ready for the haul to Portland. The second was getting moved out of the house. And, the third was actually leaving Portland on our boat. We accomplished the first milestone today! Thalia was hauled away from our yard! Today’s work started at 5am with both Karen and I rolling on a fresh coat of bottom paint on the hull. We needed to give it a couple hours to dry before Dayton Marine showed up mid-day for the two hour haul to Portland. They showed up as scheduled, along with an escort car that is required because of Thalia’s beam (width) of 14 feet. The escort car also has a pole mounted on the front of the car that checks for height issues along the way.

 

Continue reading “Milestone #1 is achieved — Thalia leaves our yard! Ep. 1”