September 25 | 16.5 Nautical Miles

When we arrived at the boat at about 1230, we found that the sunny skies from earlier in the morning were clouding over. The strong NW wind was nowhere to be found, but a fair southwesterly seemed to be piping up. We headed down to the boat and quickly were off the mooring and underway under main alone. Tim had the helm and steered us out of the anchorage, stating that we would head out around Basket Island. Fine by me, and I unfurled and trimmed the jib for the course.

Pipin' Up!

We enjoyed a nice sail past Basket Island and up toward Chebeague before tacking and making a course towards Portland. The wind seemed to be building, and soon was blowing a steady 18-20 knots. I noted that the wind was really starting to honk and we discussed the merits of reefing. Tim noted that he was far more relaxed about reefing on someone else's boat. As if to prove the point, he started sailing the boat a little fat and drove the rail into the water. I took the opportunity to snap a few pics before saying, "OK, let's take a reef!"

With the reef tucked, we were much more comfortable, and had a nice sail at 5.6 knots towards Portland. It soon became clear that we weren't going to lay Cow Island Ledge and so we tacked up toward Long Island before tacking back and resuming our course to Portland.

The sail towards the city was enjoyable, with the skies slowly clearing out. We sailed up past Little Halfway Rock and right into the anchorage off of East End Beach. We then tacked up toward Fort Gorges before easing off and enjoying a nice reach back toward Clapboard. Tim took us between Cow Island Ledge and Clapboard.

We gybed around and I took over the helm for the last couple of miles, driving us in through the ubiquitous wind hole behind Clapboard. We headed down the fairway under main alone and made a reasonably pretty pick up of the mooring under sail, arriving at about 1600.

Launch: Closed!

After putting the boat away, we enjoyed some pepperoni, cheese, and crackers to go with our well-earned rum and tonics, and enjoyed a nice hour of relaxing.

At about 1450 I went below to mix up another round of drinks when the launch driver came by asking if we wanted to head in or not. Turns out that this was the first day of the late-season launch schedule, with service ending at 1700! Good thing he came by. We quickly packed the boat away and rode in with our gear and very full rum and tonics and retired to the yacht club porch to enjoy our second drink.

A fine toast to a fine season, sadly over all too soon!