August 7 – Sept. 2

We are headed to Norfolk VA to leave the boat for a bit and fly back to Colorado. We left Baddeck on Monday because we knew bad weather was making its way North and didn’t want to be stay another week in Lake d’Or. We got through the locks at St. Paul and ran into some big waves and water splashing over the deck shortly after. We were in the middle of a current coming out of the Straight of Canso and swells coming from the South. We weathered the rough ride and stayed in Tor Bay once again. We had a well-earned rest after a tough day of traveling.

We arrived in Halifax in front of the bad weather and stayed 5 days waiting for a weather window. We caught up with a yacht we saw in Southwest Harbor called the Ann S. Pierce. It is a converted fishing and training vessel now a luxury yacht. The Bowdoin docked in front of us is a sailing vessel from the Maine Maritime Academy in Castine that was on a training cruise. We also saw a US Coast Guard ship showing the flag and the sailors saluting the Canadian flag as they passed by. Very cool. On the way to out we saw the ARC Gloria coming into Halifax. It is a Columbian training ship coming for a visit.

Leaving on Monday we, once again, had a beautiful evening in Pourt Mouton.

The plan was to do an overnighter and go directly to Portland. I am not patient when I’m waiting to leave so we ended up getting ahead of schedule. This is usually not a big deal but we were heading back to the land of lobster traps which are really, really hard to see at night. I had timed it out that we would have daylight by the time we got into Maine waters. Fortunately, we only had to kill about 45 minutes until we had enough light to see them in all their glory. We had seen Portland enough times we only stayed one day and then lit out for Boston.

We did stay an extra day in Boston because I was looking forward to a meal in the North End. Unfortunately, the restaurant we chose was just OK.

Not letting moss grow under our feet we did another long day and went through the Cape Cod Canal and planned to anchor in Buzzards Bay. The wind and waves were blowing pretty good so we went around the corner into Woods Hole and had a nice quiet night.

Instead of retracing our steps through Long Island Sound, we decided to go someplace new. Montauk is a vacation destination on the northern tip of Long Island. We had fun looking through the shops and had a very nice dinner overlooking the ocean and inlet to Lake Montauk.

We did another overnighter to Cape May, NJ and spent the night. The marina was fairly shallow so I got us up early to catch the end of high tide and slowly went through the Cape May Canal in the dark. We headed up Delaware Bay fighting the current all the way. Luckily, there were no large ships coming through the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal so there was no stress getting to Chesapeake City, Maryland for the night. We stayed at the Schaefer’s Canal House and had a great meal and great night’s sleep after a very long day.

From Chesapeake City we traveled into Chesapeake Bay and anchored for a couple of days in the Magothy River. It was nice to relax a little before we went to a place I wanted to visit last year, St. Micheals, Maryland. St. Michaels is a nice vacation destination and managed to find a great place to eat once again. We do have our priorities.

After leaving St. Micheals we anchored in the Great Wicomico River just above Ingram Bay.

We couldn’t get into our slip in Norfolk right away so we stayed in Hampton VA for a couple of days. Hampton and nearby Langly Air Force Base was the birthplace of NASA so we visited the Virginia Air & Space Science Center.

Finally, we are in Norfolk, VA. It has been an incredible summer of fun and adventure, but it is time to be home to see family and friends. We will pick up and head to Florida next. Stay tuned.

August 3 – 6

We left Halifax and headed to our final destination; Bras d’Or Lake pronounced brə-DOR as in Labrador. We had an intermediate stop in Tor Bay. It is not only a beautiful area but a dream anchorage. Easy in, big anchorage, deep but not too deep, pretty well protected and nice folks who dropped by to chat.

To get into Bras d’Or Lake you need to go through St. Peters Lock. Like Great Bridge lock that we went through in Virginia, it is easy and low stress. They didn’t even bother to have us tie up and just floated in the middle to lock-through.

We anchored in a small bay to wait out less than optimal weather then steamed up to Baddeck, our northernmost point ever on Terrapin. Baddeck was the home of Alexander Graham Bell and has the Alexander Graham Bell National Historic Site. I actually learned quite a bit and found the museum pretty interesting. I recommend you drop in if you’re in the neighborhood. Our meal at The Freight Shed was pretty darn good and wanted a second one there but bad weather was moving in so we hightailed it back South.

Like all vacations, the journey home is a little sad but also gives you some comfort to get back “home”. With Terrapin, she doesn’t have a home but frequent resting places that gives you that familiarity. While less adventuresome, the homeward bound leg of our journey will no doubt have some adventures.

July 26 – August 2

We are excited to finally arrive in Halifax. It was exciting to see some whales as we approached Halifax and a government helicopter thought so as well.

We are staying at the Halifax Waterfront Marina which has floating docks along the wharves downtown. It is like camping in the middle of downtown Denver with crowds of people constantly wandering by. A little different from the small towns and emote anchorages we have gotten used to. We are on the Museum Wharf in front of the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. On one side is the old steamship CSS Acadia and on the other side is the WWII corvette HMCS Sackville. We got in a little exercise and hiked to the top of the hill to visit the Halifax Citadel.

We rented a car and did some sightseeing in Nova Scotia. We drove along the shore of the Bay of Funday and visited the West shore at different locations of the Cliffs of Fundy Geopark. We next went to the East shore to the Burnt Coat Head Park which has the highest tides in the world.

After that we visited Lunenburg and Peggy’s Cove.

July 25 – 26

A long day after leaving Southwest Harbor we arrived in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. We saw a large number of very large sharks during the crossing. I mean really large. We actually came within 20 feet and I definitely saw a Great White just below the surface but couldn’t get a picture in time. This is the best I could do from another sighting.

There have been sightings of Great Whites in the Bay of Fundy so I’m pretty sure I wasn’t seeing things. It is a little unnerving to know they might be out there but then actually seeing them is something else. The infamous tidal currents were not felt but observed as our heading was offset as much as 10° to counter the current in the middle of the bay. We stayed at the marina in Yarmouth and raised the courtesy flag after clearing Customs. Yarmouth is definitely a blue-collar working town be we had a great meal at a waterfront restaurant. Sandy had lobster poutine that was to die for. Of course, the fog came back in that night which is something we are getting used to traveling in.

The next morning after we cleared Yarmouth Sound the fog lifted and had a beautiful day. We took the shortcut through Schooner Passage because the tide was with us and could get a little boost in our speed. However, that comes with a cost. As we were going through the narrows the current caught us and pushed the boat outside the channel marker. Luckily, it was still deep water but was not a pleasant experience. We did set a new Terrapin world speed record of over 12 knots! After turning at Cape Sable we made our way up the East coast to a beachfront anchorage near Port Mouton. It is a beautiful setting and an easy place to drop the hook for the night.

July 22 – 23

Our goal is Nova Scotia but to get there we need to do some preperation. The first was to get fuel so we went back to Rockland but to the Journey’s End Marina instead of the Safe Harbor where we stayed last time. According to a friendly captain in Portland, it had the cheapest fuel around. The marina was not as nice as Safe Harbor but we did have a nice view of the Coast Guard station.

After Rockland it was off to somewhere new, Southwest Harbor which is in Acadia National Park. This is our staging stop before going across the Bay of Fundy to Nova Scotia. We had been to Acadia NP on our road trip when we left Terrapin in Portland. It is still an amazing area.

July 16 – 19

One of the stops we had been looking forward to is meeting our dear friends Burt, Amy and Connie, in Boothbay Harbor for a few days of fun and eating. The party started on a high note with a lobster dinner with all of the trimmings.

I went on my first ever fishing charter and it was spectacular. We must have caught a couple of dozen large Stripers all greater than 32″ in length with Burt’s monster measuring 42″. There is a slot system, you can only keep a Striper if it is between 28-32″ in length. Burt caught the largest but I brought home the bacon, or the one fish that was small enough to keep. I am told that our experience was one of the best days the skipper had seen so I guess I am spoiled now.

July 13 – 15

We are working our way to Boothbay and stopped for a night in our now familiar anchorage at Ebenecook Harbor on the Sheepscot River. It is such a convenient single day stop and large, easy anchorage to stay. The next day we continued up the Sheepscot River to Wiscasset. It is a nice little town that, unfortunately, has US1 running through the middle of town. Dodging traffic got a little old however the history and architecture are really interesting. There is a unique sunken garden built in the foundation of an old hotel that had burned down. I had never seen something like that before. While we were hanging out on Terrapin, I had a guy run up to our boat (yes, he can walk on water) and started up a conversation. It turned out he had seen us in Florida and took a picture of Terrapin going under the Haulover Bridge from his Trawler.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t a great memory. You’ll notice some whitewater in the middle of the bridge where the current was crazy strong. It took three attempts to get through because the current kept pushing me into the bridge abutments on either side. On top of that, this is at the end of Mosquito Lagoon that has quite a few shallow spots and usually have a couple of “keel cleaners” going through. It was a very stressful day. What are the chances I would happen upon someone in Wiscasset Maine that took a picture of me on that day in Florida!

July 4-11

Once more we are back to Portland but at a different marina. The Fore Points Marina caters to the bigger crowd and Terrapin looked like a rowboat by comparison. For the celebrity yacht spotters, we did see Podium go up the harbor but even this marina is not in its league. While Sandy flew back to Colorado I worked on boaty stuff.

July 1-3

Sandy had tickets to fly back to Colorado so we started heading back to Portland on July 1st. With all of the fog at McGlathery Island we were worried we would be fogged in for take unnecessary risks getting back to Portland. We pulled up stakes, umm anchor, and overnighted at Ebenecook Harbor where we had stayed previously. As a footnote, we found a passage out of the McGlathery anchorage that was almost clear, by comparison. It was a most excellent start to the day. Our destination for a couple of days was an anchorage by Snow Island in Quahog Bay. After choosing left instead of right at the fork and wandering through a tight mooring field, we came to a beautiful bay with a calm, peaceful anchorage. Once again, the scenery was absolutely beautiful.

June 29-30

We’re off to do some more gunkholing, this time in the Merchant Island chain at McGlathery Island. It is a picturesque anchorage next to the uninhabited island which is managed by a conservation agency. Getting into the anchorage was a test of patience. We are a stone’s throw away from Stonington which is the lobster capital of Main and boasts of a fleet of 300 lobster boats. The area is thick with lobster traps and we had to idle into the anchorage weaving through the buoys. Once we were in the cove where set the anchor, thankfully there were practically no traps. Whew. Unfortunately, being close to Stonington we get hit with wakes from the lobster boats at all hours starting around 4:00 a.m. We were anxious to get the Hare down and some exploring but a thick fog moved in. Finally, around 2:30 the fog lifted and we were able to get some pictures including ones of a couple of Bald Eagles that were looking over us.