Sailing Vacations
A Maine Windjammer

Good Morning! This week is or was a major turning point for us. Weeks or I should say months, have been spent sanding and painting, sanding and varnishing. You get gritty, you get covered in paint. The crew wonders if there is an end. We just keep reittering the words, be patient, it will be over, we will be sailing soon…..just keep painting! The weather this past week seemed unreal. Temps were in the 60’s! The snow has finally melted and the ice on the lakes have gone. People were out golfing and fishing on the lakes. We took off the cover and launched three boats….signs of winter times are finally gone! By taking off the cover and going for a ride in the yawl boat was the refreshing breeze for our wings to keep us flying thru this busy time of fit out. From taking off the cover and launching boats on Tuesday, we went right into yard prep. The waterline was prepped and painted and the Mary Day was turned around ready for the early departure to the yard. Early Friday morning we slipp...

Good morning everyone. Just 31 degrees here at 0530 this morning. We had fun playing this weekend and getting a few projects done. The garden has given up its last fruits of the season. We still have some warm days in front of us but the last of the peppers are in and I am thinking we should till soon. As a young adult I spent time with my grandfather working in his garden. I will never forget driving the tractor around, planting peas, cutting out potato eyes,and finally sitting on the edge of Swayze's field across the street and watching the turkeys (they were just making a come back in NH then) come out at dusk. I suppose that is where I get my love for the woods and all things rural. When I grow up I want to be a farmer. Now this might seem to be a long ways from our windjammer sailing family life but the two are quite connected. Both farmers and sailors live and die by the weather and that closeness to the elements is something that makes me feel so alive. As I watch...

Good morning everyone. Another beautiful day here in Maine. The wind was quite light for most of the day. We had a chance to get ashore in Stonington. The Granite Museum was closed for the season but Jan and Evelyn Kok were in their store, The Sign of the Purple Fish, making music and custom hand crafted bookmarks and greeting cards. More delightful people you will be hard pressed to find. While weighing anchor a flock of Canada geese flew overhead honking away. My heart leaps when I hear geese. Aldo Leopold, in A Sand County Almanac, wrote lyrically about "goose music". I have never been the same since I read his words. Sawyer was asking about the days getting shorter and the meaning of the equinox. It is unbelievable to me that the seasons turn as they do. There is plenty of science to explain all the changes but how does one explain the emotional changes of seasons to an 8 year old. We have many guests aboard from southern states that keep telling m...

Good morning evryone. Well this has been a truly whirlwind week. We enjoyed two 3-day cruises back to back, a couple of teasers if you will. And once again the decks were full of great folks. We thoroughly enjoyed everyone and only wished for more time with them. A quick turn around to board again on Wednesday went more smoothly than I can ever remember. The 3-day cruises are a chance for folks who have a little hesitation to try windjamming on for size. And by the reservations we received as people were climbing off I would say the fit was a good one. The sailing weather was quiet this week, unlike a year ago when a micro burst hit us square in the anchorage. Some of our returning guests had been aboard for that one and remembered it well. The upcoming week is our sail training cruise that we offer in conjunction with the Wooden Boat School. Jen and the kids will be off visiting Grandma. I will do my best to get back into my blogging routine as the cell signal and time allo...

Good Morning everyone. A quiet Sunday morning here in Appleton after a wonderful week on the bay. For all the “iffy” nature of the forecast Monday we had some great weather and good sailing. The frontal passage Thursday morning helped clear away the fog which was just lovely in the early morning. To see the waves of cold and warm air hanging so low to the water was just amazing. Jen was able to catch close up look at a seal swimming quite close to the schooner. The breeze finally came onshore late in the day and we enjoyed some good tacking upwind in Jericho Bay finally anchoring near Stonington. The kids went on their first solo journey rowing ashore to Hells Half Acre, a small, uninhabited rock with a small forest in search of this week’s “island treasure”. Passengers wondered how we could let them go so far alone. Our response was give them five minutes on the island and they’ll realize their alone, they’ll be back in a jif, and sure enough they were, with treasure in tow! Saw...

Good morning everyone. We sit quietly at anchor here at Great Cove in Brooklin. There is not a breathe of air stirring and the fog that crept in overnight is dripping from the rig onto the awning. Evidently a trough just west of New England is spinning a series of frontal systems across the region creating a very interesting weather week. A look at the sailing schedule will tell you that this is a non-smoking week. So no smoking on board but that did not deter me from enjoying a cigar at the lobster bake ashore last night. The great thing about a good cigar is that one has to sit still to enjoy it. Now I am not advocating smoking by any stretch but every once in a while I do enjoy the chance to sit quietly on the beach with a good cigar and watch the sun burn into the western sky. I guess you could substitute a cup of tea for the cigar but the effect for me is not the same. So this week we are smoke free aboard the schooner. Other than that this is the first non-theme week of ...

Good morning everyone. What a beautiful day on the Maine coast we had yesterday. We sailed the live long day from Pulpit Harbor through the Merchant Row and down Jericho Bay to Swans Island to anchor here in Mackerel Cove. The Delts experienced some great weather and great sailing. The crew ran them through 5 watch stations: bow watch, marlinspike skills, navigation skills, and helm/galley as well as their leadership station. It is amazing to me to see these guys from all over the country come together so quickly to make this boat move. Each evening we present the Delts with a “schooner Olympics” event that challenges their teamwork as well as reinforces skills they have learned during the day. Last night we held the knot tying competition with the groups evenly divided across the board. Test yourself to see how quickly you can tie a square knot, bowline, figure eight or clove hitch. These guys moved like lightning and coached each other supportively as they sometimes struggled to...

Good morning everyone. We have a very unique adventure in the making this week. Some of you have noticed that this week does not actually appear on our schedule. We have aboard 26 young men along with 2 staff representing the college fraternity Delta Tau Delta, a fraternity that backs up its motto, “Leading lives of excellence.” These 26 young men competed for the chance to be a part of this leadership academy. The staff of the schooner will don their professors’ hats and teach these young men the soup to nuts of sailing a schooner and being an effective crewmember. I told these fellas as we gathered on the lawn in the park Sunday evening; this week is more about self-discovery and teamwork than it is about sailing. At least that is my goal. Sailing the schooner will be the vehicle but they will be the engines. It will be up to them to chose to grab this week by the horns and shake it for all that they are worth. The Delts spent yesterday at a challenge course nearby before we...

Good morning everyone. After an overcast and chilly early week we end with brilliant sunshine and warmer temperatures and great wind. We sailed off the hook yesterday after exploring Holbrook Island Preserve. We saw several new species of sparrows in the fields and a kingfisher along the shore. The total species count for the week was 47 including puffins and razor bills. While counting species and putting names to creatures we have never seen before is important the week is also about the excitement each of us finds in the natural world. We come closer to ourselves by watching nature and feeling the joy in sighting our first chipping sparrow or bald eagle. The seals never cease to amaze me. As we passed under the bridge the other day a pod of porpoise rolled close to the boat so that we could see the whites of their bellies. The crew aloft in the crosstrees could see them clear as a bell from their vantage point. Everyone stood breathless for just a few moments before gleeful...

Good morning everyone. We had a delightful and lively sail yesterday around Blue Hill Bay. We were tearing along on 4 lower sails, no topsails, at 8+ knots all day quite comfortably. And then with the turn of the tide the wind just died…completely flat. So we lowered the yawl boat and pushed the last hour in to anchor here in Brooklin at the home of the Wooden Boat School. We saw numerous bald eagles yesterday as well as seals and the unspoiled islands of Blue Hill Bay. This is one of my favorite stops. This week in particular, as we examine how we impact nature and how nature impacts us, it seems appropriate to come to a place where wood and water come together in the form of hand crafted boat. The environment sculpts the people that sculpt the boats which sculpt the culture which sculpts the environment and round and round we go. The students here come from all over, just like our windjammer guests, looking for a little reprieve from the modern hurry up world. Many of you kno...

Good morning everyone. We are nestled in to the protected cove of Pretty Marsh this morning. The wind has been NE for the past few days of this our first Maine Audubon cruise. We left Camden Monday on a light Nly that carried us, with the tide, out around Vinalhaven to Seal Island. Seal Island is one of several islands where puffin colonies have been re-established. And puffins we saw. There were the usual individuals and pairs flying by and paddling along the shoreline. We also witnessed a raft of puffins 30 strong by one guest’s count on the north shore diving in the surf along the edge. The swell was not big. As a matter of fact the wind died completely so we just drifted slowly with the yawl boat giving a gently nudge. Terns by the thousands were rising in waves above the rocky island. And razor bills were about as well. We pushed all the way back in to anchor in Moore’s Harbor in Isle Au Haut. I had been there years ago in open pulling boats but never in the schooner. We...