We Are at the Beach!
19 July 2013 | Roque Island, Down East Maine
Donna
Yesterday Bill finally solved a problem with our Single Side Band radio that has been bothering him since we started cruising. It generally has so much noise (static) that it is so uncomfortable to listen to it, and makes him have to turn it off. It turns out that most of it was our solar panel interfering with the radio. Now the solar panel control has an on/off switch on it and that helps a lot. Now we will probably check in to the different cruising nets in the morning more often. We did check in to each of the nets in the past two days.
After we finished messing around with the SSB radio this morning we dried up the remains of the torrential downpour last night from the cockpit. It was not a lovely day but we are kind of on a schedule now and we wanted to make it to Roque Island before we had to go back to Penobscot Bay. We have to be there when two of our grandkids fly up to meet us. When we left Mistake Island we could see about a quarter mile around us but by the time we got to Roque Island it wasn’t even close to that far. The fog was so bad we knew there was a beach in front of us when we were anchoring, but we did not see it at all.
We dropped the anchor, made sure we were settled, and then we went down below for a hot lunch, hotter showers, and a nice warm nap. When we woke up the fog had cleared and the boat that was next to us in Mistake was anchored nearby. Better than that, we could see the beach, and it is beautiful. As always, the picture above does not do it justice, but you take what you get. We dinghyed to the beach where our neighbors were also walking. We walked together for a while. They had picked wild blueberries at Mistake and she has made a pie with them. If the weather cooperates tomorrow we are invited for pie on their boat. Bill will make sure the weather cooperates!
This is as far north as we plan to go in Maine. You know you are far north when the Coast Guard is transmitting in French! We were a little confused at first then we realized it was the Canadian Coast Guard! The wind looks like it will be good for us to sail back to Penobscot Bay on Sunday so for now that is our plan. After the grandkids leave, we will head back north to Nova Scotia.