Sebascodegan Island Circumnavigation Labor Day Wknd 2013

[prudenceb]

Sebascodegan Island Circumnavigation Labor Day Weekend 2013

It is a bit hard to write about this trip, following as it does Warren’s inspirational account of his San Juan Island journey, and on returning home watching TV coverage of Diana Nyad’s totally awe-inspiring 110 mile swim from Cuba to Key West – at age 64! I note that both Warren and she had the same message: Live Your Dream. But I need to remind myself once again that dreams can come in all sizes, that not everything we do can, or should be, 110 miles long, that we cannot set records every – or most likely any – day, and that even a more “ordinary” trip can have its moments of small magic. And such was the case for the not-far-from-home, not awe-inspiring trip to northern Casco Bay that Warren, Dave and I took this weekend. This was Warren’s fourth – or was it fifth? – trip to this area, but Dave’s and my first.

We launched from Bethel Point on Saturday morning at nine, planning for a counterclockwise circumnavigation of Sebascodegan Island that would take place over two days, with a first night to be spent at Merritt Island, and the second at Little Snow in Quahog Bay. I worried a bit about whether we’d be able to get spots on these popular islands given that we would not be the only ones wanting to mark the last hurrah of psychological summer.

It was overcast when we started – and had been raining when I left home at 5 am – but as the day progressed, it became warm and, for a time, sunny. We headed south to Cundy Point. It was – as has been the case for most of my trips this summer – calm

with seas predicted to be no more than 1-2 feet, and we would experience those, if at all, only when rounding the southern tip of Sebascodegan. But there really was nothing to speak of in the exciting water department, and we paddled along, listening to tales of Warren’s northwest adventure. And then up the New Meadows River. It was all very pleasant: a calm day, easy paddle, quiet chatting, friends. We looked at the expensive real estate lining the river; people were sitting on their docks; dogs rode in motor boats. Labor Day weekend indeed. We stopped at a privately owned MITA site to stretch our legs and investigate the camp area. It was quite lovely – until I realized that mosquitoes vastly outnumbered camping sites – and I happily got back into my boat and paddled over to watch three labs – one chocolate, two golden – chasing Frisbees thrown by their family from a dock into the water. Labrador retriever was definitely the Sebascodegan dog! We saw a ton of ‘em over the weekend – and no other breed at all!

Scratching at various bloody bites, I juggled my paddle as we continued north, arriving at Merritt Island sometime around noon. Warren had warned us of a rock – Rob’s Rock he called it – that we should be mindful of: on an earlier trip Rob had apparently run into it. However, although the chart showed a clear all-tide gap between Merritt and the peninsula north of it, we were confronted by a rocky barrier. Rob’s Rock stood up in the middle of it – and it would have been quite a feat to run a kayak into it, standing as it was completely above water in the midst of a jumble of other rocks that at mid-tide were all exposed.

We set up camp, happily noting a) the complete absence of other campers; and the complete absence of mosquitoes. And come to think of it, mosquitoes haven’t been an issue at all for any of the trips I’ve taken this season – strange considering all the eastern equine encephalitis/west nile virus warnings we’ve been getting at least in Massachusetts. Since the next day would cover most of the circumnav, we had the rest of the afternoon to just explore.

We set out once again on a rising tide, under increasingly overcast skies, at first planning to head up Middle Ground, to a boat launch that Warren wanted to check out. I was thinking about the trip report, as I often do when we’re coasting along. What would there be to say? The trip thus far had had a rather ho-hum feeling – enough so that I suggested to Dave and Warren that we should have an interesting and dramatic incident of some kind so that I would have something to write about. I volunteered that I would not be the victim…

But the wind from the south was picking up a bit, and we thought about how much current and wind we might have to fight on our return, and made the kind of nimble and welcome change in plans that one can make when the group is small and there is nowhere that one has to be – except back to our little island for cocktails, supper and sleep. Warren was intrigued when he looked at Back Cove on the chart - a large and shallow tide-dependent area.

We looked up between Williams Island and Foster Point, wondering if the tide was high enough yet to have covered the green area marked on our chart that would provide an entrance to the cove. It wasn’t. So we backtracked, heading up the east side of Williams and approached Back Cove, a large area of green on the chart, which by the time we arrived was under several inches of milky water. The minute that we turned west into the cove, the wind and its attendant sound disappeared. There were virtually no houses along the shoreline – or if there were, they were tucked away and not immediately visible. There was a meadow heading down to the water at the western edge, an unusual sight. Warren said he was praying that there was no huge house out of our view at one end of the meadow. Blessedly, there wasn’t. It was just a meadow without purpose along a cove in Maine.

We saw a heron standing on a rock in the middle of the passage that we had not been able to get through.

We moved a bit closer, our paddles hitting the muddy bottom with every stroke. I reached down and felt the mud – thick and grey/black and gluey. There were two widely separated clammers raking in the mud at the shore. It looked like very very hard work.

Other than the clammers, herons,

cormorants, seagulls and ducks, we were alone in this still and quiet spot. The first perception of our little trip as something special dawned on all of us.

Paddling the edge of a rather large cove that was no more than a foot deep, with everything silent, felt magical. The seaweed at the shore was a chalky gray from the fine silty mud that clouded the water.

There were strange fungi on the rocks.

Thinking how fortunate we were to have stumbled on this area when the tide allowed us to explore it felt like one of the little gifts that one gets now and again on the water. But for sure, do not venture into Back Cove when the tide is ebbing. It is not a place that you would want to get stuck! A loooooooooong walk in sucking mud to reach open water…

By the time we got back to Merritt, the rock causeway was still above water.

By the time we were having cocktails

there was a passage that you could paddle board through, if you happened to have a paddleboard.

By the time we were cleaning up after supper, even Rob’s Rock was underwater.

It was getting dark, so we turned on our headlamps and set out to explore the (still mosquito-free!) island, walking down the path on the east side until blowdowns stopped our progress. We weren’t able to make it to the Bowdoin camp area and returned in full darkness.

The weather forecast called for rain overnight with rain throughout the day on Sunday. At 9:20 pm I heard a few patters on my tent. Which then stopped. A few more sometime in the middle of the night (which could have been 11 pm or 3 am for all I know). So much for rain overnight. We got up to fog.

And launched at 8:30 in fog.

And paddled in fog on glassy water.

We practiced navigation – which actually wasn’t just practice, because…where the heck were we heading??

The fog began to lift.

And we were in a glorious, warm, clear, calm sunny day. NOAA gets it wrong again! (In their defense, Warren said the forecast that morning had changed from the one the evening before, but still…)

At a little after 9 am there was a riffle of wind on the water. But it didn’t last. Passing Bombazine Island (Bombazine??? What kind of name is that; it sounds as though it should be in Miami, not Maine…) and on around the top of the island. The area right before Gurnet Strait was very cozy – boats in the water, a row of mid-sized houses sharing a huge rolling lawn (who cuts that thing??) toward the water.

The tide was still around slack, and there was no current to speak of through the strait. Then down Long Reach, still flat and windless.

The rocks along the west side of the reach were amazing, creating a paddler’s Rorschach test in their mirror reflections.

(Go on and tell me what they look like to you; I’m a mental health professional and can analyze these things!) Up close, they were silver, and so fragilely layered that a tap with a tip of the paddle would knock a slice off.

We took a few short breaks, with lunch at Strawberry Creek Island. There were interesting holes in the rocks.

Then the water opened up as we paddled across Harpswell Sound. We waited for a boat to pass before we entered into the deep green water under the bridge connecting Orrs to Sebascodegan Island. And down the east side of Gun Point Cove, where there was another black lab, Luna, who liked to paddleboard.

And finally, we were at Gun Point, where there was nothing to do but pose the boys and declare: “I’ve got you at gunpoint!”

And then into the exposed ocean, where there were still only gentle swells and a perhaps a 5-10 kt breeze from the south, which pushed us up Quahog Bay, with a brief stop at a privately owned MITA island, where we were greeted by yet another black lab, Murphy,

and then back into our boats for the final push to Little Snow Island.

Little Snow Island – a little piece of heaven in a peaceful cove filled with yachts at their moorings. Unfortunately, someone had arrived before us and set up camp in the prime spot. Tent and chair but no people. It was a little after 3 pm. We got our tents set up. Dave sat on his nifty new folding camp chair gazing to the north. I sat on my Crazy Creek chair reading a novel. Warren listened to a book on his iPhone. And then we saw people. And a few more people, on the other arm of the island. I went to investigate: a fire burning, many people, chairs, coolers, party streamers. Over the next two hours, more people arrived – clearly all the yachties were coming to Little Snow in their little tender boats. I had a nice chat with one arriving couple. She with a beer in her hand, he at the tiller. Turned out we had chosen to camp on the island where for the second year in a row, the Labor Day weekend lobster bake and party for what seemed to be every yacht from Portland was happening. Oh joy! While they didn’t invite us for lobster (worse luck!), they did give me three beers (“Do you prefer Shipyard or Geary?”) and invited us to join them for live music after supper. Banjo and guitar. Aargh!

We sat on our part of the island heating up our rather pathetic meals (compared to lobster!) and chatted about deep subjects: the meaning of life, finding joy and passion, optimal paddle lengths and so on. Still no one had arrived to occupy the other tent. I went to check. It was completely empty. Several minutes later, in the dark, a man and boy arrived in a little motor boat. It was their tent. They had planned to camp with a small group of young boys, but the weather forecast (rain and thunderstorms) and the goings on next door (raucous party) made them change their mind. In tidy fashion, they took down their tent, folded up their chair, and motored off.

Dark. Time for bed. But no… the festivities were just beginning! We enjoyed the show:

Then tried to sleep. The party went on til after midnight. Bad banjo plunking. Bye bye Miss American Pie sung with a weedy voice and soft guitar. And then constant flashes of lightning, rumbles of thunder. No rain. The party rocked on. I calmed myself by counting the time between the flashes and the booms. And reassured myself that a slow ten meant that we were likely safe. But I wondered (and anyone can feel free to answer): where is the best place to camp on an island in a thunder storm? I was in an open area. They say you shouldn’t be in an open area. But they also say you shouldn’t be under a tree. So where on earth should one be to be most safe, when – as my non-paddling friends all suggested – the Holiday Inn is not an option? (This question is a serious one, and more so when I returned home to find that several campers in NH had been struck by lightning that same night.)

I don’t know if the party broke up before the rains came, or whether the rains broke up the party. In any event, the rest of the night was one of those intense water, light and sound shows that only Mother Nature can produce. Snug and dry in my tent, counting off the seconds between lightning and thunder, I passed the night.

We had planned to be on the water no earlier than 8 am, but a little before 7 as I lay in my tent listening to the light rain and a bit of rumbling thunder, Warren came by to say that one of his iPhone apps had showed Doppler radar cells of intense weather with lightning heading our way from Massachusetts, and we’d best be on our way to beat them. He had already started packing:

And in what felt like a record 25 minutes flat, I too was all packed up and sitting in my boat ready to go. The final short stretch, with a north wind at our backs down the bay and to Bethel Point, was very pleasant. There was a bit of fog. There was a bit of misty rain. The wind died. There had been a bit of rumbling in the distance before I got up, but nothing scary now.

We were off the water by 9. On the drive home, the floodgates over the Maine Turnpike opened. I could barely see out my windshield, even with the wipers on as fast as they would go. People were driving at 25 mph with their flashers on, avoiding the many people who just pulled to the side to wait it out. Lightning flashed. Thank you Warren and Dave for your smart phones and your smart apps that got us moving and kept us safe!

A magical bay only a foot deep, fog obscuring the line between water and sky, silver cliffs making a Rorschach test on the water, snowy egrets as well as cormorants, a bald eagle at the very end consuming his breakfast on a rock some distance from us, fireworks both man and heaven-made, bad music and good beer, good company and conversation, paddle-boarding black labs… The ho-hum trip morphed into one of fine times and magical moments. And scary ones as well. (What to do to be safe on land in a thunderstorm?) And the moments that were annoying (Bye bye Miss American Pie at 11 pm on a MITA island…puh-lease!) were by the time we were driving home merely amusing.

And I almost forgot to mention the inspiration that Dave and Warren had while we lunched the second day: Starting a business with an ice cream boat that would go from MITA island to MITA island with a jingling bell and a freezer full of treats. It would be sure to be a winner. Ice cream sandwich, please!

pru

[...]

Pru,

What a wonderful trip report! And yes, these trips do allow us to "Live Our Dreams". Dreams filled with being on the water, enjoying Mother Nature and sharing our joy with good friends. Isn't that what paddling is all about?

It has been five times that I have paddled the Sebascodegan waters and they continue to be magical for me. I am surprised that more paddlers do not explore them. By the way, they are also magical in the Mar/Apr and Nov/Dec months. A return visit in December?

Warren

[PeterB]

Pru!

Thats not a strange fungi, thats rock tripe, a classic edible lichen.

You boil it up into a big mush, I guess. It may not be very good but, on everybody's list of stay-alive-in-the-woods foods.

[prudenceb]

Thanks, Peter - nothing like potentially life-saving feedback to a trip report!

So my next question - repeated from the report - is where the heck is the best place to pitch a tent on an island in a thunderstorm??

pru

[Katherine]

In the basement of the Hyatt

Definitely not under a dead tree...