A Tale of Two Chemists

All in a Day’s Work … Sat 13th – Sun 14^th June

This was the first weekend of our season up at Sebasco Harbor, although the summer season doesn’t start until next Sunday. At the outset we knew there were two 10.30am – 12 noon “Scenic tours” scheduled for the “Ruth”, but nothing in the books for “Cotinga”. We were a little concerned that our efforts to be open about timing might be interpreted as nothing scheduled by the front desk, and so we have been working with them to try and make sure people know we are open for business. As it turned out we didn’t have any bookings for Saturday afternoon but we did run our first sailing charter for the year this afternoon.

Our mornings typically start with coffee and breakfast and then we go ashore to take showers in the sports center. It sounds leisurely but somehow it ended up feeling very rushed on both days as Mike needed to be ready for about 9.30am to bring the “Ruth” in to the dock. Taking the "Ruth" off her mooring and bring her into the dock seemed to go reasonably well – although definitely room for improvement. One challenge at the minute is our outboard motor, which despite being very reliable in the past, is proving a little hard to start and to keep running at idling speeds. This means that Gloria either has to stay on "Cotinga" whilst I am off running tours on the Ruth, or stay on land, as she can’t reliably re-start the outboard to make trips to and from our mooring. We have fresh spark plugs ordered.

Anyway, the Saturday morning trip on the "Ruth" went fine and we were left with a free afternoon and drove in to Bath to re-provision. Whilst we were out a large vessel had come into the dock to take a wedding party (~100 people) out for a cruise. When we returned we had to wait to go down the gang-plank to the dock as all of the wedding party dis-embarked. Things were going remarkably slowly with staff only allowing two people up at a time. We wondered why this was, but waited patiently (another first for me!). When our time came, we realized that the ~30 ft gang-plank was listing slightly and that half of the supports at the top were broken. With the tide out and maybe a 12ft drop to the dock it was a little spooky walking down. We later found out that the ships Captain hit the dock a little hard and broke the upper supports! Not only that, but when the dock-master complained the ship’s Captain was very rude about her on the open radio! Having finally got our provisions back to the boat, I was feeling a little restless so decided to go up the mast to spray lubricant on the sail track, which had been a little sticky. Gloria hauled me up in the bosun’s chair all the way to the very top (59ft above the water). At this point I figured out there must be more swell in the anchorage than I realized. I'm doing a fair impression of a human metronome and starting to feel quite unwell. Once back on deck I didn’t feel much better. Gloria cooked a wonderful meatloaf for dinner, which I didn’t appreciate as much as normal and shortly thereafter I took two meclizine tablets, went to bed and passed out for the next 12 hours in a drug-induced slumber.

When we went to shore this morning the resort had a fork-lift truck at the top of the dock lifting up the broken gang-plank and all was welded back together 30 minutes later. The scheduled trip on the “Ruth” went fine and then this afternoon we had a first paying charter of the year. Gloria describes the afternoon …

Our client was Albert a young man from Beverley Hills. He was in Maine looking at properties with a view to purchasing a home. If I understood it correctly he works for a consulting firm in the retail promotion part of the fashion/clothing design industry. Whatever it was, it was a long way from either sailing or chemistry so I might have got that slightly wrong ... but whatever, he was a lovely man.

Thankfully the lull in the wind that occurred around noon was just a reflection of the north wind giving way to southwesterly breezes. Taking the boat into the dock went smoothly. Albert arrived and we set off. Our departure was somewhat more problematic as the wind was pushing us onto the dock. Ellin, who was managing the dock today, was a great help pushing the boat out. Then we were off. Once out of the harbor, the winds were good. We set off on a reach to the west, moving along very nicely. Albert was delighted to take a shift at the helm. We soon arrived at our standard turn around point the two hour cruise. The sailing was so perfect that we decided to make more of a loop-trip. We tacked around and headed slightly southeast to pass between Blacksnake Ledge and Ragged Island. Turning ENE we made our way back toward Sebasco. We haven’t yet had the courage to sail all the way into the harbor, but maybe some day soon we’ll try that. Our landing was once again assisted by Ellin and we dropped Albert at the dock about 4pm. We quickly exited and headed back to our mooring for a fine cup of tea and a peaceful evening.

We are delighted to have our first charter of the year successfully under our belts. We have a sunset cruise scheduled for 6 people on Tuesday and two trips scheduled for 6 people next Saturday. So things are starting to get busy. If we approach anything like our published schedule then we are going to be running around like “blue-arsed flies” … (no idea where that expression comes from – but it’s one mike grew up with!)