OCT 21: Eastport, Maine

We docked in Eastport, Maine, at sunrise, or at least statistical sunrise (0650). With 10/10 cloud coverage, it was impossible to tell.

I checked at 0430 to see where we were on my chart app, and seeing we were still well offshore, I rolled over and went back to sleep.  At 0600, Pam looked out the window while I checked the chart. The chart said we were entering the channel. Pam reported thick fog. We went back to bed. We were up at 0630 to watch the final leg of the approach in shades of blue and gray.

This proves once again that it is never a good idea to stand next to a working line (i.e., one that has a lot of tension on it). Two line handlers decided it would be clever to wrap the messenger line around the bollard and then attach it to the back of a third guy's truck. This would make it easy to pull in the heavy docking line.

The truck started forward. The line got tighter and tighter. There was a sound similar to the crack of a whip. Thankfully, no one was hurt when it broke.

Remember what it was like to be sent to sit in the corner as a kid? This is the Eastport equivalent for the two stupid line handlers. They can only get off if a boat comes to pick them up.

An interesting fact about the pier we were tied up to was that it was one of the deepest on the East Coast. It is 85 feet to the bottom.

What a difference an hour makes. This was the view at 0750. 

With the distinct uptick in weather, over the shipwide system came an announcement that we would be leaving at 1700 rather than 2100 this evening because of an approaching storm. A check of the weather map showed...

There was definitely more red in the image than I would have liked. Its approach was not exactly a surprise.  I'd been watching it for several days, hoping it would find a more easterly route to follow.

With the forecast for the day showing deteriorating weather, we went ashore as soon as we anticipated things being open for business.

On the right side of the picture below, Eastport had its Little Mermaid thing going on.

Our first destination was the Tides Institute & Museum of Art. The sign on the door said it opened at 10:00, but it finally arrived at 10:15; there was still no sign of life. Pam asked a local storekeeper why. The woman indicated that in the Eastport way of life, the opening time was more of an intention than a commitment.

We decided to walk about 1 mile to the Stone Ground Mustard Museum, but we played it smart this time. When Pam asked in a shop where the mustard was sold, she was told the museum was closed while they built a new plant. We bought some mustard from her and crossed that destination off our list. 

We decided our wisest course of action was to wander around to see what we could see, so we did and had a good time doing it.

Our friends aboard MASCOT and PERFECT ARRANGEMENT saw it up close and personal several years ago. We asked about seeing the famous Old Sow Whirlpool. We were told that was only possible from a boat and at specific times in the tidal cycle.  

By the time we got back to the ship. This guy's had turned gray again.

The ship arrived near low tide. It was almost a flat walk down the gangway to the pier.

It finished its ebb late morning and started coming back in. As the tide came in, the climb up the gangway to the ship became steeper, eventually forcing them to install a ramp to the gangway. The full title range (i.e., from low tide to high tide) is over 18 feet.

The gangway was disassembled at 16:30. The lines were singled up at 1655. We were underway right on the revised schedule of 1700.

We went down the channel under heavy clouds and rain, reducing almost everything we could see ashore to dark shapes.

Shortly before sailing, I took another look at the midnight location, a predictive weather map to determine the midnight forecast location of the storm and associated information. It appeared that given the wind direction and a slight easterly shift in the eye of the storm, we might not get hammered too badly as we moved along the line that I circled.  (Is this what mystery authors call building the suspense?)

One thing that I gleaned from this forecast was that had the storm come through 24 hours later, it would have caught us transiting from St John to Halifax, making for a very lumpy ride.