Saturday, July 4

Happy Fourth of July!

Today was interesting in a number of ways. A little after 0700 Dave called to say he was on his way out. He had some supplies for us and wanted to get the mooring buoys in place. Water was calm this morning and the temperature was comfortable, around seventy degrees. Of course, the ever present fog was, well, present.

I went down to the cove to get things ready for Dave. Prepared the dingy, opened the boathouse, brought the tram down, etc. Dave and his son, Nate, arrived at 0830. We prepped the buoys and offloaded the supplies, including a donated air compressor that will come in handy. Then we walked to the house to look at the leaky water pressure pump. Seems the leak is coming from the top fitting. Dave tightened it and I’ll keep an eye on it. Dave’s wife, Linda, makes homemade English muffins and Dave brought some out for us. We’ll enjoy them later. Thanks! Linda.

Dave seemed pleased when he saw what we have done to the house, the shop and the engine house. We both appreciated his comments.

Back at the cove we loaded the dingy with the buoys and I took Nate and Dave back to their boat. While I stayed in the dingy, they began pulling the moorings. I’ll relate what was explained to me. On the bottom is a granite block. The granite has been drilled to accept an “eye”. Chain is attached to the eye and the rope “pendant” is attached to the chain. The mooring buoy is attached to the other end of the pendant. In the winter the mooring buoy is removed and a winter “marker” is attached to the pendant using some old polypropylene rope.

Our job today was to remove the winter buoys and attach the mooring buoys. Sometimes, after a winter of rolling around on the bottom, the pendant and/or chain gets wrapped up, caught in the rocks, or otherwise tangled. If this happens you have to really pull to free things up. This is where Dave’s boat comes in handy. You cannot pull it manually and you have to wrap the rope around a cleat and use the boat to free it up. We had to do this a couple of times. After we did this to three buoys I returned to shore with the old rope, the winter buoys and a ton of kelp. Kelp grows BIG up here. Many strands are over ten feet long and it is heavy, and slimy, and slippery. Dave and Nate returned to Bath to attend the Fourth of July festivities.

I rowed to shore and unloaded all the old buoys, rope and kelp and then dragged the dingy above the high tide line. Then I returned to the house, had some lunch with Brenda, and got out the mower.

Weather remained warm. The sun was shining, fog was lifting and I was a mowing fool. Just about the time I was finished we saw a storm forming off of Small Point. Lightening and rain clouds and thunder. There were quite a few boats around so we kept an ear to the VHF radio for any reports of problems. Didn’t hear any. It rained hard for ten minutes and cleared quickly. Sun came back out and warm again.

Two hours later the same thing happened again. Storm, lightening, the whole thing. Like I said, an interesting day.

And now it is only 1700 and clear again. We are wondering if we will see fireworks tonight.

Oh yes, a commercial I just saw on TV brings to mind a modern day conundrum. I told Brenda that next time ashore we have to look for two old bath tubs. We have the perfect place to locate these, overlooking the ocean with a spectacular view. Wonder what I’m talking about? Think of the Cialis commercials. Remember the couple with the man and woman each sitting in their own bath tub? The locations all have awesome views. We have the view, but not the tubs. And here is the conundrum. What does sitting in a bath tub…. separately, have to do with Cialis or anything connected to Cialis? Whether it be the instant version or the new “36 hour” wonder. I just don’t get it. And, by the way, I don’t get it either. Don’t have that problem and don’t need to see the commercials. Come on guys, stand up for America!

It is 2015 and the sun is just setting. It is beautiful here. High cirrus clouds after the storms. Fireworks should be fantastic.

Well, they were! Awesome display. Visibility fantastic. We could see from Portland to Monhegan. We went to the lighthouse catwalk and saw displays from at least sixteen different locations. Everywhere you looked on the shoreline they were setting off fireworks. I would be hard pressed to name all the locations, many I don’t even know. This is a Fourth of July that we will never forget. No one else made the trip out this year to see this spectacular event. We had the island all to ourselves.

Simply amazing. What a show!