Carver Cove - After Matthew

We said a sad farewell to Matthew and family. After five weeks on the boat, it sure will be different without Matthew around. He's big enough to be very helpful on the boat. He raised and lowered the dink motor to me in the dink, normally that's Nana's job. When we weighed anchor, he used the washdown pump to hose off the mud from the anchor chain and the anchor itself while I raised the anchor with the windlass. In the dink he always steered it to shore and docked it back at the boat. He learned this year how to set the fenders and the lines when we came into dock and when at a dock he washed the boat. He also turned the anchor light on and off when we anchored out. I'll be busier without him.

I also relearned how 10 year olds do things. When going down stairs, the last two steps are always taken with a jump. When picking up something in the cockpit that rolled to the other side, he would bend over the cockpit table like a human teeter-totter and fetch what he had dropped. When I asked him, "Why not just get up and go around the table to the other side to bend over and pick up what he dropped", he replied, "That's no fun!" When going down stairs the fun thing to do is to hit the resonate pitch just so, the whole boat would vibrate like the mythical soldiers crossing a bridge that caused it to collapse from their in-step march. He did refrain from doing that after the first few times - after encouragement from us. When descending into the cabin, the last stair was avoided in favor of a direct step to the settee cushions. Oh well.

On the other hand, he started to read serious books (Tom Sawyer) while with us for the first time. He and Nana had a reading time together every night at 9:00, he never missed that and later on he read on his own. He earned his boat jacket this year and now everyone in the family wants one (first you've got to spend a vacation alone with us on the boat).

So we sadly said our goodbyes in the morning and headed east. Tonight we're in Carve Cove on Vinalhaven. In the past there have been fishermen that set nets dependent upon the tides. I see the nets ready to be set but 7 boats came in after us and anchored much closer to shore, within the area where the nets are usually set. It will be interesting to see what the fishermen do about that, I would think they are not happy. We're anchored well outside of the net area. The lighthouse in the photo is the one on the west entrance to the Fox Island Thorofare. We sailed all the way from Rockland to Carver Cove with winds from 10 to 20 kts. We routinely hit 8 kts per the GPS with a triple reefed jib and a reefed main when it gusted to 20 kts. We had a full sun, just a great day except for the beginning with Matthew leaving. We're not sure where we're headed tomorrow, depends upon the wind direction - the first priority is to sail.