toneeees
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- Joined
- Mar 15, 2011
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Heavy fog, waves and thousands of lobster buoys made today's 100 mile boat ride from Bar Harbor to Camden, Maine anything but relaxing. Here we briefly see a large 2 or 3 masted schooner as it passed to our stern. I did see it on the radar from several miles away.
Navigating in heavy fog, rain and moderately rough seas (often typical weather in Maine) really is not a problem as long as you have radar and a good GPS with detailed charts. But...add to that mix literally thousands of lobster buoys all around you floating on or almost on the surface, due to strong currents pulling them just under water sometimes, and you have an almost impossible situation for pleasure boaters. They were everywhere! They certainly were all around the shoreline for sure. So I tried going 5-10 miles off shore in 200 to over 300 feet of water and they were there too. So I figured I would at least get into the marked shipping lanes going in and out of the major harbors...forget that. The shipping lanes are the deeper spots and that's where some nice lobsters are, so that's where the pots were placed too...all over the place! It is as if the State of Maine has decided that lobster fishing anywhere and everywhere they want to put their pots is more important than recreational boating...both power and sailboats. You just can't go 20-30 mph on foggy days, which fog can stick around for many days at a time. Ask me if it was fun boating for 7 hours today.
Finally 2 babies jumped or fell into the water off the dock. Mother duck jumped in after them, followed by the other two in a panic. All is well that ended well!
Navigating in heavy fog, rain and moderately rough seas (often typical weather in Maine) really is not a problem as long as you have radar and a good GPS with detailed charts. But...add to that mix literally thousands of lobster buoys all around you floating on or almost on the surface, due to strong currents pulling them just under water sometimes, and you have an almost impossible situation for pleasure boaters. They were everywhere! They certainly were all around the shoreline for sure. So I tried going 5-10 miles off shore in 200 to over 300 feet of water and they were there too. So I figured I would at least get into the marked shipping lanes going in and out of the major harbors...forget that. The shipping lanes are the deeper spots and that's where some nice lobsters are, so that's where the pots were placed too...all over the place! It is as if the State of Maine has decided that lobster fishing anywhere and everywhere they want to put their pots is more important than recreational boating...both power and sailboats. You just can't go 20-30 mph on foggy days, which fog can stick around for many days at a time. Ask me if it was fun boating for 7 hours today.
Finally 2 babies jumped or fell into the water off the dock. Mother duck jumped in after them, followed by the other two in a panic. All is well that ended well!