I am just one overnight sail away from my summer cruising grounds along the coast of Maine. However, the weather is clearly communicating to me that the time to go is not now. Not only is it grey, wet and cold (see picture), the winds are howling out of the northeast - a classic late season New England nor'easter. I will stay put here in Gloucester until it blows itself out.

However, this blog posting is not about the weather or about the details of my travels north from the Chesapeake.

It is about luck.

I have often been lucky in life. The very fact that for the last nine years I have been traveling on a boat that I love, to interesting and unique places, and routinely spending time with wonderful friends - old ones and new - proves the point.

While I have long agreed with the old saw that "I would rather be lucky than good!", I do wish that Lady Luck didn't so often have to reach in and rescue me from bad fortune or, worse yet, bad decisions. I don't want to overuse the notoriously fickle Lady's help.

And yet, I gladly and gratefully accept her help rather than suffer the consequences of the alternative.

Yesterday morning I anchored here in the inner harbor in Gloucester. I have been here before and know that the old harbor mud provides good anchor holding and that, while it is not a large anchorage, there is plenty of swinging room in the early season. There are not many other boats cruising about (see comment above re:grey, wet and cold).

I knew that the nor'easter would be arriving yesterday afternoon, causing the winds to clock a full 180 degrees and that they would hit with a bang. I anchored carefully, set the anchor hard and tested it with a full and extended reverse gear back-down. It set immediately and did not move at all.

A little later I went into town to do some errands and to go to a coffee shop here that I remembered fondly. By lunchtime, I had finished my coffee, bagel and internet activities and started back towards the dinghy dock with every intention of lunch and a quiet afternoon on board while waiting for the festivities to arrive. But there was the Cape Ann Brewing Company to pass by - and a tasty lunch, a couple of good beers and some French Open Tennis action sounded far more interesting than a cold, damp boat.

This was my mistake.

Halfway through the second beer, with Roger Federer surgically dismantling his opponent, the front arrived and, while I couldn't see the inner harbor or KR, the wind was obviously howling.

Now, I knew the hook was down well and I really tried to relax and enjoy a bit more tennis, failed completely in that effort and ended up quickly downing the rest of the beer and walk-running back to the dinghy dock - from which I could see KR riding nicely to her anchor. I felt quite the overprotective nautical parent. I rowed back to her through the building, very gusty winds, got back on board and, just as I was stowing the boat bag stuff from my errands, a gust hit and KR's bow fell off to leeward - as usual in such conditions. However, this time the bow did not round back up when the anchor chain came taut. The bow just continued to sag off to leeward.

I didn't just fall off the turnip truck. I know what dragging anchor feels like - and we were dragging. When I took the above picture this morning, I had to zoom in quite a bit to make the very large, steel boat-eating red-green buoy look close. As we were dragging yesterday, (assuming that taking time to take a picture would have been a good idea), I would not have had to zoom the camera at all. It was close and rapidly getting closer.

The details of the boat rescue aren't actually all that interesting. I started the engine, ran at least a dozen 34 foot dashes as I alternated between feverishly cranking in anchor chain and driving the boat forward to keep the buoy safely astern and - it worked. With a high heart rate and while getting completely soaked externally with rain and internally with adrenalin, the anchor soon was up and we were motoring calmly forward to an available mooring. When the anchor came out of the water the problem's root cause revealed itself. A long piece of large diameter rope was fouled on the anchor flutes. The rope had kept the flukes from resetting properly when the anchor spun around.

Now, I recognize that it was stupid of me not to go back aboard after my pleasant coffee shop time. I should have been there to be prepared for the front's arrival. On the other hand, it was wise of me not to sit at the Brewing Company casually sipping my beer while the harbor was obviously getting blown to bits. But - it was PURE LUCK that KR awaited my arrival back on board before going on drag-about.

Thank you m'Lady.

Unless, perhaps, that's what KR intended? Hmmm. (What Christine-like thing could Stephen King do with the story of a cruising boat with malevolent intelligence?)

I have not been good about blogging recently. That will continue, I am afraid. I have decided that this blog will be on hiatus this summer. I suspect that it will then restart - although cannot currently be sure about that.

The fact is that I like writing the blog (even if it has become something of just another To-Do-List chore right now) and that I have had some amazing connections with people in my travels who have read it, in some cases, for years. It is also true that as I get older and memories from my earlier cruises fade and details get lost or muddle together, I have found myself going back and reading old posts on more than one occasion. And, I really don't see myself embracing the necessarily nearly constant connectivity of Facebook and other social media.

The Position Report map will remain active, however. I will continue to post position reports whenever I move the boat. You can access the map by clicking on the "Where in the World is Kelly Rae?" link in the blog side bar.

So, for now - Best Wishes for a Great Summer to all!