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...
May 25/2021: Ahoy peeps! I should have mentioned this earlier. Tomorrow, Wednesday May 26, at 5:30 pm I’ll be giving a presentation on Maine Island cruising on behalf of the Maine Island Trail Association. The event is being co-sponsored by the Blue Water Sailing Club. Unfortunately, my co-presenter and good buddy Ben Ellison, per the...
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...
Sept. 24/2019: I haven’t kept you all up to date re my doings aboard Lunacy since the end of the Deth Cruz so I thought I’d share some glimpses of what’s been going on. A lot of it has been Maintenance and Modifications, which we’ll discuss later. Right now we’ll focus on more fun stuff....
This truly was touch and go. I’d had the boat hauled in early September to attend to a fairly discrete list of chores: 1) put on fresh bottom paint; 2) have some nice handrails sent by my friends at Boréal welded on to the stern arch; 3) make sure the engine’s running gear was OK...
Job one before embarking on this summer’s cruise was to clean up Lunacy’s bottom a bit. I waited until too late to ask if my home yard, Maine Yacht Center, could arrange to have a diver do it, so ended up having to do it myself. First I dove on the boat, on day one...
As I departed the casino-studded shores of Jersey early last Thursday morning, sailing alone this time, there seemed no shortage of wind. There was a nice northwesterly, 20 knots or so, so I tied in one reef as I hoisted the main just outside Absecon Inlet, as I thought it might soon grow stronger. In...
I had not one but three crew for the next leg of this year’s homecoming odyssey: my brother Peter, an engineer (see photo up top), and two engineer buddies of his, Steve and Greg. They didn’t know much about sailing, so to help them feel useful and appreciated I staged a mechanical emergency within moments...
I did take the family down to Hilton Head to visit Lunacy over the Christmas vacation, but we did not take the boat anywhere. It was far too cold for that. Instead we used the boat as a hotel suite (thank God for the Refleks diesel heater!) and toured the surrounding environs. Savannah, Beaufort, Charleston,...
For many years now my semi-regular aquatic flights from winter have involved offshore passages from New England to the West Indies by way of Bermuda. This year, however, what with new Lunacy already ensconced in Annapolis in the aftermath of her appearance in the boat show in October, I thought I would try an even...
