Scituate Harbour, Mass

Serafina
Rob & Sarah Bell
Mon 16 Sep 2013 00:47

42:12.18N 70:43.10W

 

Sunday 15th September

 

Seems that everyone and his mate has a fishing boat here in Gloucester and they all went out early this morning!  So much for it being Sunday and no lobster boats, we are now back in the more affluent money belt.

 

We lifted the anchor just before 0800 hours and we took full advantage of the westerly breeze and so with the main sail and Flossie we were soon whizzing along at nearly 9 knots for a while. But for the most part the wind was only around 7 to 8 knots so we had to make do with a very pleasant 6 to 7 knots for the first 14 miles or so. We were expecting the wind to come round to the SW and head us, but in fact it pretty much just died altogether and so we ended up motoring the final few miles to Scituate Harbor.

 

The sky was almost an unbroken blue and the sun was genuinely warm for the first time in weeks it seems and so it was a great sail. Scituate was a buzz of activity and we called up EZ (Eee Zee) Rider who runs the moorings for the Harbormaster it seems and he told us that he would meet us at red buoy No.6 so we made our way in carefully as the charts show this place to be very shallow. In the event they put us on the buoy nearest the entrance which was fine, but clearly we were the main attraction for the day! All afternoon an endless procession of returning motor boats came slowly and deliberately around us, all cheerfully waving but obviously being very nosey.

 

We took the free launch service ashore in the early afternoon and spent a happy hour or so doing a mountain of laundry and had a quick look round the main part of the town. We plan to stay tomorrow and do a big shop in case the weather gives us a break to make a series of hops, followed by a two plus days and night offshore passage down to Norfolk, Virginia.

 

Lovely evening again although the cannon being fired at sundown did rather shake us a bit!

 

I forgot to mention a rather disquieting moment yesterday afternoon as we made our way to Gloucester from Richmond Island. There was a 40ft motor cruiser (Last Whale) heading on the same route as us (we could see them on the AIS), but they started an hour or so behind us, but as they were motoring and we were sailing in lightish winds, they slowly but surely caught us up. This was fine but as they got close, their course put them in line to run us down! They continued to  hunt us down until when they were some 30 yards behind us, I repeatedly tried to call them on the VHF but got no reply. We could not see anyone in the bridge house and  assumed that they must be on autopilot and not paying any attention. At this point we made a course change ourselves and then gave them some clear blasts with a fog horn at very close range. There was still no visible reaction, but as they came past us, perhaps only 20 feet away at this point, there were two people clearly visible in the bridge house, but neither acknowledged us at all.  Then half an hour later we heard them make a call on their VHF so it was clearly working OK. Very strange and a little unsettling!