Picked up a mooring at Portland Yacht Services this morning after a short early morning sail from The Goslings. Were expecting to stay for 2 days to knock some jobs off the boat to-do list. However, after a brief look at the weather forecast decided that we should continue southwards to the Isles of Shoals the same night because we might otherwise be stuck for longer than planned. So we did real whirlwind turnaround with laundry, major food shopping and a few other errands in town (incl. a look at lobsters for Nicky in the picture above), to slip our mooring at 7:30 pm for our first overnight leg this time around. Ended up motoring into a moderate headwind to reach the Isles of Shoals (off Portsmouth, NH) by daybreak the next morning.

We're back at The Goslings tonight (a gfew miles NE from Portland) after a great sail from Christmas Cove (so named because Captain John Smith spent Christmas 1614 there), starting in light winds this morning and ending up beating into 15-20 kn across Casco Bay under sunny skies. This pretty much concludes our little "Maine Shakedown Cruise" which we greatly enjoyed over the past 9 days. We had some great sailing (incl. a longish 55 nm day from Seal Bay to Christmas Cove where we averaged 6+ kn which - at least on Namani's scale - feels fast!), beautiful anchorages, an enjoyable two days in Castine (despite the rain) and nice reunions with friends along the way. Namani did very well and the new suit of sails makes a big difference. There are some smaller jobs to take care of but by and large it feels like the ratio of sailing time to boat work time is over the hump for now ;-)

We'll have to run some errands in Portland tomorrow (Monday) and then plan on finally starting our way south. About time as temperaturtes start to get pretty chilly at night ...

The video below was taken during our sail today, approaching Cape Small with Seguin in the background. Nicky taking a nap in the cockpit. You can tell by Nana's clothing and Nicky's sleeping back that it's getting chilly despite the sunshine...

... almost. We were one of three boats in Seal Bay, a beautiful anchorage on the NE end of Vinal Haven in Penobscot Bay (thanks for the tip, Mike!). Left Castine at 09:20 this morning and had a beautiful sail beam/broad-reaching in northerly winds.