Today it’s hot and by 0900 standing in the sun you can feel your skin start to burn. We go over to say goodbye to Judith and Joe to find Joe has had to move the boat from the slip and alongside as someone else has booked it and Judith is still out shopping! She turns up soon after and they leave, heading further east and then Canada.
Photo: Judith and Joe heading out on Brown Eyed Girl
Everyone has been telling us that Somes Sound is a must. As it is only around the corner we decide to take a look and while Mike busies himself at the chart table I do something I rarely do and hate doing – steering Jeannius through a busy mooring field. Luckily I don’t hit anything but when a couple of yachts sail towards us I very quickly shout for Mike to take over. Well, they change direction very quickly and I’m a wuss.
Photo: Me at the helm
We motor into Somes Sound and although it’s pretty, I am considerably underwhelmed. It may be Maine’s only fiord but it’s hardly dramatic. We get half way down and decide that the rest will probably be more of the same so we turn around and start the journey back.
Photo: Maine’s version of the Jolly Roger type sailing boats
As we turn out from Mount Desert Island and head south west, the wind is in the right direction to sail so we get both main and genoa out and for half an hour have a lovely sail, the first time without engine noise for days. We don’t have to dodge the lobster pots in the same way either as without propellers going, they shouldn’t get snarled up, ‘shouldn’t being the important word here.
Suddenly we lose speed, and I mean suddenly. Looking behind us Mike spots a lobster pot float following us. Shit. We have a hitchhiker! We roll away the genoa and face the wind to bring us to an almost dead stop. Luckily it has caught either on the keel or just on the propellers, which, as they are not moving, means that the line has not wrapped itself around them. Phew. Mike manages to poke it away with the boat hook, and off it goes, lobster pot and float still intact. We sail off again although within about 10 minutes the wind all but disappears so we put one engine on.
We trundle on for a little while then have another sudden loss of speed. I don’t believe it, another bloody pot, and this time it’s the kind that is two pots strung together, its joining line deep down in the water so that you can’t see it. Joe had warned us about these but they were said to be much further east – so far all the ones around these parts are the single pot straight down arrangement.
Mike gently puts the engine in reverse to see if it will shift it, but no, it stays firmly attached. We are now down to one engine. Great.
The rest of the journey to Hell’s Half Acre is uneventful and we put the anchor down in the other side of the anchorage to where we were the other night – hopefully in the sandy area rather than the clay.
Muttering, Mike changes into his swimming gear, dons snorkel, mask and fins, and with a knife tied to his wrist, gets into the cold water. It takes him a while. First up is a load of very tangled line, then a lobster pot float, then a very cold Mike who immediately gets into a nice hot shower.
Photo: Some of the stuff that was wrapped around the propeller
The propeller seems to be undamaged but the line has removed the anode behind it (the bit that acts as the sacrificial rusting thing for the propeller – it rusts rather than the propeller itself). This is not a problem for us immediately but we will need to get a new one put on soon. There’s always something with boats.
We are treated to a beautiful sunset, not the same as out at sea, but beautiful all the same, and dine on scallops. We have another early night – there’s a lot of miles and millions of lobster pots to dodge tomorrow.
Photo: Sunset from Hell’s Half Acre
Position: 44 deg 10 min N, 68 deg 32 min W
Distance so far: 1724 miles
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