Jan. 8/2022: Here’s a blast from the past. Behold the long outer face dock at Fish Island Marina in St. Augustine, round about sunset earlier this week. The last time I was here was in late April 1992, when I was crewing on the late great schooner Constellation. We had sailed down from Charleston, South...
Nov. 25/2021: I had planned to sail Lunacy south to the W’Indies this fall and base her down there for the winter. Turns out I wasn’t the only one thinking like this. It seems the pent-up demand from last winter, when people, like myself, took their boats nowhere due to the pandemic, would be pent up...
Oct. 4/2021: One thing I needed to take care of on Lunacy this past month was replacing the propeller zinc, the one anode on the boat that degrades fastest. I first tried doing this in the water, diving on the prop while Lunacy lay on her mooring in Portland, in what I call the lagoon...
Sept. 2/2021: The majority of my summer cruising in Maine this year, aside from some brief solo forays into Casco Bay, has been conducted in Penobscot Bay. All things considered, it is pretty much my favorite place on the coast. Given the prevailing conditions this season–light winds, fair doses of fog, and the odd hurricane...
June 28/2021: For the first time since we acquired her in 2017 Lunacy spent the past winter on the hard in storage rather than floating about somewhere warm. This was primarily a function of the pandemic, which made a Caribbean venture problematic, but also it was about time to catch breath and focus on making...
Oct. 23/2020: Those there are my two girl cousins–Cali, left, and Laura, right–in the foreground there, who came last week to help me (in the background there) get the mainsail off Lunacy so she can be hauled out and stored for the winter. It was my first time taking the main off this boat, and...
Sept. 22/2020: I ventured forth again alone on Lunacy last week, starting on Tuesday, on a special mission. Sailing away from Portland that afternoon I couldn’t help but note the hazy sky to the west, which was, so my radio informed me, due to smoke blown clear across the continent from the rampant wildfires in...
Sept. 9/2020: After bringing Lunacy back north back in late May I did during June and July run several short two- or three-day solo jaunts out of Portland, just around Casco Bay. These were certainly enjoyable, but not at all remarkable, so I have not bothered to memorialize them here on the blog. I’ve spent...
June 1/2020: I am sure you all remember Adam “Cuddles” Cort, my colleague from SAIL (above), who helped sail Lunacy north from Bermuda to New England last year. Fortunately for me, Adam had agreed to join the boat in the Cape May for part two of this year’s northbound trek from Georgia. Fortunately for him,...
May 19/2020: How to extract my boat from its winter quarters in Georgia without getting infected or quarantined somewhere? This is one question that was percolating through my mind as I monitored the unfolding of the global Covid-19 pandemic while sheltering at home this spring. Problem one, it seemed, was simply getting to the boat...
