After our time in Gloucester, we headed up to the first ports of Maine. Our first stop was the "border" city of Kittery, Maine which shares a large harbor with Portsmouth New Hampshire. We had quite a challenge picking up the mooring ball which we assigned by the Kittery Marina because the pick up "ball" would not budge at all. The current entering the river and harbor was strong so that added to our challenge. Finally Linda realized to her chagrin that the mooring "ball" which she had been attempting to pick up was actually a ball marking a lobster pot set right in the middle of the mooring field. Thankfully we were able then to secure ourselves to the actual correct mooring can...and even though we worried about it all night as the current changed, we didn't catch the lobster pot line or marker on rudders or propellers.
It was quite a dinghy ride but we were well-rewarded when we visited Portsmouth New Hampshire and enjoyed a wonderful harborside dinner.
Our next stop was the famous little town of Kennebunkport Maine - family home of course to the US President George H.W. Bush. We had a lovely marina spot and marina staff even drove out to the location of the Bush family home. There was a flag flying which indicated that GHW was in residence. Our visit was however after the sad death of Barbara Bush, a classy and very down-to-early First Lady. We also toured the lovely little village of Kennebunkport before returning to our boat in the marina to watch the strong current flowing out reduce the water level drastically. We studied the tide for our next morning departure and knew we had a short window to leave in order to ride a high tide out the harbor mouth. The next morning, we awoke to thick fog and normally we would have stayed put safely in the marina, but due to the tidal forecast, we carefully set out and thankfully were safely outside the harbor in no time. Unfortunately the fog never lifted and the incidence of lobster pot mooring balls increased as we motored carefully past Portland ME and on to the protected harbor of South Freeport. It was an exhausting 8 hour day, keeping a sharp lookout in the fog for lobster makers to avoid. Thankfully we have great headsets to communicate with each other, so Linda stood on the bow pointing all the lobster pots to avoid while Dave hand-steered and used the radar and AIS to avoid other vessels as well. Sometimes people ask if crossing the Atlantic was difficult and frightening. We are sure that coastal cruising with fog and lobster pots and many other small and large vessels coming and going is MUCH MORE DIFFICULT than crossing oceans!