This whale surfaced in front of us several times. Each time we put the engines in neutral and drifted for a few minutes to give the whale room. You can see that this whale has been hit by a boat prop in the past. What happened next makes me wonder if any whale is safe along our coast. A large whale watching boat came flying up behind us at a high rate of speed, and continued to chase the whale until they were out of site. It was amazing to see this whale from our own boat, but I felt very sorry for the whale knowing that most encounters with humans must be very traumatic!
The other concern that occurred to me, after the whale left us...oh crappers...I hope my clean sheets didn’t get sprayed with stinky whale breath😁
Isles of Shoals was a very cool place to visit! It is made up of several small rock islands that people have connected through a series of breakwaters to create a cozy little harbor. We originally planned to anchor, but the small harbor was full of mooring balls, and was 50 feet deep. There was no way we could let out enough scope (amount of chain to have the correct angle) to make a good connection
with the bottom. We decided to attempt to pick up a mooring ball, which would be a first for us on this boat. The mooring ball experience was fabulous! The harbor, however, was not the quiet serene place we expected. The largest of the islands has several large buildings that are owned by a church, and are used for conferences and camp. Camp was in full swing and young people were everywhere...playing a baseball game, having row boat races around us, kayaking, and singing. It was an unexpected pleasure to see so many young people enjoying this unusual setting.
We believe we were anchored a few feet on the Maine side...we made it to Maine😊
The next morning we left for Jewell Island, just east of Portland Maine. Our day of cruising saw the calmest conditions I have every experienced. The ocean was a sheet of glass the entire day. We saw seals, whale spouts, and schools of harbor porpoise.
Unbelievably CALM!
As we neared the coastline the view was spectacular! The islands were so picturesque they fulfilled my vision of Maine...rugged terrain made up of steep rocky cliffs. We are DEFINITELY in Maine!! The anchorage was AMAZING, and we launched the kayak and paddle board as soon as the hook was set.
If you zoom in on the Garmin map (linked to our main blog site) you will see the google earth view of the anchorage. As you can see, this was a cozy nook.
I can’t believe we are anchored here!
And after exploring all of this beauty, we were still treated to an amazing sunset!
No comments:
Post a Comment