I Feel Sorry for Folks Cruising Maine.....

[Maine Sail]

I feel sorry for folks cruising Maine over the last two weeks. The fog has been pretty relentless and the rain too. Needless to say the clubs transient moorings are pretty full and have been for the last few weeks. Not a lot of "outta stateahs" or "flaht landahs" who are up here cruising are moving much..

This morning I went out at 4:30 am to button up a few things on a customers boat who is leaving this morning for Nova Scotia. My work skiff has prime "mooring real estate" being only about 70 yards off the dock. When I got there I grabbed the pram and I can normally make my way there, in the fog, boat, to boat. Unfortunately I got to the fist boat, only 60' or so off the dock and then could not see the next boat. I knew the wind direction, and my mooring direction, in relation to the wind, so I went with it. The next boat popped out of the thick fog only about 30' off my bow. My customers boat is a long way away, in the morning field, but luckily the mooring location is marked on the GPS in the work skiff. In the outer reaches of the mooring field I had trouble seeing the owners mooring ball from the cockpit on a 38 footer.. That is about 45'- 70' feet of visibility which, even for Maine, is rare..

When I got home at about 6:40 I could actually see the sun trying to poke through the fog and the fog was quite a bit thinner already. Our neighbors house, at 11:00 in this photo, is about 135' away and sits on the water. This is thin fog compared to what I found at 4:30am...

 

[dlochner]

Ack.... Thanks for the update. In half an hour we're leaving for Mount Desert Island. Expect to arrive there tomorrow afternoon. Fortunately, the Honda can just follow the white lines along the side of the road.

 

[Maine Sail]

Update.. 9:15am.. I can see Chebeague Island... Don’t like the “weathah”, just wait a minute,...

 

[Brian D]

I'll take some of that rain if you don't mind.

 

[markwesti]

We are spoiled out here in So Cal . Our fog only happens once in a while and not every year , last time I got caught in it I was with my buddy Roger the caveman on his Catalina 30 . We were bringing his boat home from Eddies a little DIY yard that is tucked away by LA shipping harbor . We knew fog was predicted but on departure we had unlimited visibility so we went for it , we only had about 8 miles to go to be home . We got past San Pedro turned left and all looked good , making our way through the shipping lanes we were thinking we dodged the fog bullet . A tanker paralleled and us and past us and then the fog came in fast and we lost sight of the tanker . The fog was thick to our port side but we had visibility forward , we knew the tanker had to turn right so we were watching for that . It was the eeriest thing all we could see was fog and then the tanker broke out , he was well ahead of us . Another fog bank was just off his bow and then he disappeared into it . The story has a few more pucker moments but all in all we made it home fine .

 

[gettinthere]

No fog hea in Flo-Re-Duh. Plenty of lightning to keep the electricians busy.

 

[Rich Stidger]

That is why God made radar......

 

[jviss]

It would be cool if there was a tiny, self-contained, handheld radar, just for the kind of thing MaineSail experienced. The new pulse radar technology should make this possible.

 

[Rich Stidger]

MaineSail- are you sure this whole story isn't just a thinly-veiled attempt to discourage southern sailors from flooding your gorgeous Maine coast and trying to keep the rift-raft to a minimum? And secretly keeping all the great cruising grounds for yourself? Sorry, not working. I will be cruising your waters and eating your lobsters in great quantity in another month. Nice try RC..... BTW, maybe our paths or wakes will cross?

 

[Rick D]

It would be cool if there was a tiny, self-contained, handheld radar, just for the kind of thing MaineSail experienced. The new pulse radar technology should make this possible.

Well, you know, there used to be. It was handheld and the return was analized by you with headphones. You had to practice obviously, but it worked. It was decades ago.

 

[uncledom]

Are they cruising in Maine or cursing in Maine?

 

[All U Get]

All the fog is hanging in Casco Bay.

 

[Captain Larry-DH]

Rhode Island Sound was no picnic today either. I sailed from Wickford to Block Island and would post a picture but it would just look like a solid gray square.

 

[sesmith]

Speaking of Wickford, did they refloat that sailboat that was sunken in the outer harbor there? What happened to it? We just got back last weekend from a 2 wk trip to your stomping grounds. Had a great time and great weather. We left Cuttyhunk Island in the fog one morning, but it didn't last very long. Penobscot Bay last year was another story, when it came to fog...

 

[Captain Larry-DH]

Speaking of Wickford, did they refloat that sailboat that was sunken in the outer harbor there? What happened to it? We just got back last weekend from a 2 wk trip to your stomping grounds. Had a great time and great weather. We left Cuttyhunk Island in the fog one morning, but it didn't last very long. Penobscot Bay last year was another story, when it came to fog...

Didn't see any wrecks near the entrance.

 

[All U Get]

Fog just rolled back in. What I can’t see is beyond two mooring balls. I can hear the Casablanca, which is the party boat from Portland, Me. They do a three hour tour with live entertainment on weekends and usually booked solid for the summer. Music is good.

.

 

[sailme88]

It came in thick thru the Hussey about 13:30. However, there was a good sea breeze with it... Sail on....

 

[RoyS]

MS, We were there and it was terrible. When we finally jumped to another port in dense fog we were almost T boned by a crazy guy in a tuna fishing rig. Fortunately, I was watching him on our radar and saw him suddenly turn towards us fast and heard his motor; blew our air horn and he throttled down and turned away only 30 feet or so away from us. I think he was alone and watching his fish finder and chasing tunas, real or imagined, IN THE FOG. My poor dog was frightened by the horn and dived below. I found him about twenty minutes later shaking in the cabin. Took quite a while to calm him down. We calmed down later at cocktail hour safe on a mooring. Be careful out there.

 

[Maine Sail]

MS, We were there and it was terrible. When we finally jumped to another port in dense fog we were almost T boned by a crazy guy in a tuna fishing rig. Fortunately, I was watching him on our radar and saw him suddenly turn towards us fast and heard his motor; blew our air horn and he throttled down and turned away only 30 feet or so away from us. I think he was alone and watching his fish finder and chasing tunas, real or imagined, IN THE FOG. My poor dog was frightened by the horn and dived below. I found him about twenty minutes later shaking in the cabin. Took quite a while to calm him down. We calmed down later at cocktail hour safe on a mooring. Be careful out there.

We run radar, an automated fog horn, running lights, AIS, VHF 16 & 13 and have a radar reflector up. Still does not prevent all close calls or prevent the idiots from doing 30 knots in pea soup....

 

[jssailem]

We run radar, an automated fog horn, running lights, AIS, VHF 16 and have a radar reflector up. Still does not prevent all close calls or prevent the idiots from doing 30 knots in pea soup....

Been there. Did all of that a year and a half ago. Still got hit. Now all is repaired. As Forest Gump states... "$HXX Happens".
Be alert and consider all of your options. And have a trusted friend to sail with (@LeslieTroyer )