Post Irene

We are at Mark and Mimi's house waiting for the power to come on.  It went ot at 10:37 am and it is now 6:28 pm.  We have a $5 pool to guess when the power to go on. 

Holliston had a lot of rain and wind, some downed trees.  We do not know how High Spirits came out, but we believe she is okay,

Tomorrow we are going baxck to her and pump out the dinghy which is left floating behind.

Then going up to New London to check out the house and get some clothes for me to wear to the PBE fraternity reunion on Spet 16-18.

Hope to get qa morring for Boston Harbore for next weekend.

Joe

Prep for Irene

Today is Friday, August 26 and we like a lot of people here in Scituate Harbor are getting their boats ready for Hurrican Irene.

We had some trouble getting to the morring last night. Turns out instead of transmission cable problems, the fuel cable broke.  That is why we had no power in the midst of the 25 knot wind trying to pick up our mooring.

We found a guy to work on it, he is currently taking it apart, and hopefully we will have the cable ordered by early next week and put back together. He is replacing both the throttle cable as well as the transmission shifting cable.  Of course, it is T&M, time and materials.  Will be interesting to get the final bill.  At least it is not the transmission, which as Linda and Francis knows is a 4 digit expense.

Here is some pictures of our trip up the Cape Cod Canal, Craig Fletcher and Joy, plus working on High Spirits for the Hurricane.  We took off the jib sail, took down he dodger and bimini.  Plus going to tie down the main sail.

Joe

Joy & Friends - Part 2

Due to technical difficulties, I had to do this in two separate parts

Joy and Sharon

Sharon Grow-Wargo is a friend from MetroHealth Medical Center where Joy worked for 8+ years as a Lactation Consultant.  Joy worked there from 1989-1998.  After Joy went to the Cleveland Clinic, she continued to have breakfast with Sharon once a month or so.  They called it the MetroHealth Breakfast Club.

Last picture is Joy and Madonna, her fellow Lactation buddy.  We stopped a Madonna's house today on our drive back to the boat from Cleveland.

Joe

ps  We are moving to a safer spot in Mass. for Hurricane Irene, due here this weekend

Joy and Friends

We have been off High Spirits for the past week. Visiting Cleveland Ohio for some medical issues that both of us have. Nothing to worry about, have follow up appointments in November when we come to Cleveland after Thanksgiving.  Big Thanksgiving party and Barn Dance (Friday evening) at Joyce and Jon's place in Sunbury, Ohio

Today's photos are Joy and some of her friends that we connected with in Cleveland the past week.
Plus  a picture of Candy Keefe, Joy's high school friend.  Candace lives in Newport, RI

Joy and Candace in New Port, RI

Here is a picture of Joy and Shelly.  Shelly is a teacher in the Parma Schools system, and is a good friend going back to the 80s.

Laid up in Cleveland, Ohio

Well a lot of interesting things have happened in the past week. Sorry about the lack of postings but we got behind and then had some medical issues we had to deal with.

After Woods Hole, we travelled to Newport, RI area to visit with Candace Keefe and her family.  We actually are on a mooring in Jamestown, RI, across the bay from Newport.  Candace is an old high school friend of Joy.  Her husband, David Keefe, is a obgyn in NYC, so they live in NYC during the school year and in Newport during the summer and vacations, Candace and Dave have seven children, the last two are still in high school. The older ones are in college or medical school. 

When I get the camera ready, I can post some pictures of their house in Newport. Actually it is an old mansion, 22 bedrooms. We had a lovely stay overnight with Candace on Tuesday.

Then the medical issues started. Joy had been noticing some lower abdomen pain for 2 weeks and so we decided to rent a car and drive back to Cleveland so we could be checked over at the Cleveland Clinic.  Turns out she just has a muscle strain, most likely from water skiing with Nick and Sue Buehler two weeks ago at their lake home in Webster, MA.  So that is good.

We arrived in Cleveland, Wed night late, staying with Gayle and Don, my sister and husband.  I also went to my doctor and discovered I have a small hernia which will be rechecked in late November to decide what to do about it.

Had a nice pizza party with Connie and Mike and their son Jeff, his wife Kristen and their two boys, Evan and Issac, Over to Kristen's after dinner for desert and to celebrate Connie & Mike's 37th anniversary.

Joy started having trouble with her right knee and it was too painful to walk.  So today,Sat, Aug 20 we are waiting  to hear from the nurse and most likely staying to Monday/Tuesday to get her a MRI appointment to check for damage.

So that is the news from us this week. Will keep the blog posted on  medical updates.

Joe

WOODS HOLE

We spent Friday, August 12 in  Woods Hole, MA.  As you may know, Woods Hole is one of the centers of marine research in the world. There are at least 4 different organizations here in this one tiny town.  Actually Woods Hole is a section of Falmouth, which has 14 harbors in the Town of Falmouth.

We were able to get a mooring ball at the Woods Hole Yacht Club for only $40.  After tieing up we dinghied over the Club looking for Skip, the dockmaster. He was not there but we me Ted Everett who wrote us out a receipt. 

Started walking to town, Joy's right knee started giving her trouble.She thinks she hyper extended it the other day. So we walked back to the dinghy, motored to High Spirits, and got the knee brace that her mother used to wear.

Then we took the dinghy directly into town and tied up at the town dock and found a very nice and not too expensive restaurant.  Joy had here lobster bake with clams, lobster, mussels, and corn on the cob.
I had brie cheese with pears, and caprese salad.

We left Woods Hole at noon today to ride the tide down to Newport.  We had a nice talk with Skip, the dockmaster at Woods Hole Yacht Club.  He is a newcomer to Woods Hole, only fourth generation.  Some families go way back.

Arrived in Newport at 6:30 pm.  Found our mooring and cooking dinner.  Joy talked to Candace Keefe, her friend from high school who lives here.  We may be able see them tomorrow.

Joe

PS   Here are some pictures of the boats in Eel Pond, the inner harbor section of Woods Hole

An Unexpected Reunion on Nantucket

As Joe mentioned in the last blog, I just found out that my good high school friend, Daphne, and husband, Bob, were coming to Nantucket this week to stay with their daughter, Fae, and family, who vacation on Nantucket every summer.  On Monday we met Daphne and Bob at the ferry and had lunch, then Tuesday, we rented bikes and headed out to Surfside Beach, close to where they are staying.  We had a wonderful beach day, enjoying the sun, surf, and watching Daphne's grandsons rollick in the surf for hours, long after we retired to the beach chairs.  They were trying to see how many waves could knock them down.  In the evening we were invited to join them for lobster, corn, and salad back at the cottage that they rent.  The pictures say it all!

Today, Daphne and Bob joined us on the bus to Sconset, a small. original Nantucket village out on the eastern most end of the island.  There is bus service all for the last eight years over the island for $2 a ride, with a 50% discount for seniors.  Sconset has a small supermarket and 2 restaurants, and the highlight being small, cedar shingled cottages with the most beautiful gardens ever!  It was a delight to walk up and down the narrow lanes, marveling at each yard.  Of course, there is also a beach, as Nantucket is ringed with beaches everywhere.

When not visiting with Daphne and Bob, I had a chance to go on a historic house tour of three houses from the 1700's, 1800's, and 1900's, highlighting the families and industries that built this small island.  In the 1700's, the island was populated by Quakers, who wanted to get away from the strict Puritan community in Boston.  Farming had its challenges here on an island with no fresh water, so the islanders began to learn from the Indians about the use of whale oil.  During the 1800's, Nantucket had an international presence with ships all over the world and families running those businesses were very wealthy.  Some of the early settlers were names known to us now- Folger(coffee), Macy(the department store).  The 1900's brought many artisan's to the island, so that home illustrated the last group of people to make this island their home

We plan to leave on Friday and head back toward Martha's Vineyard and Jamestown, RI where we will have a little work done on the boat. 

Joy

Nasty Weather in Nantucket

It is raining like crazy here in Nantucket, Sunday August 7.  We motored and sailed over to Nantucket yesterday from Vineyard Haven, part of Martha's Vineyard. The trip over was a good sail, except at the end we had to motor into a headwind.  I also goofed up and we might have the mainsail stuck a little in the roller furler. I forgot to tell Joy when to stop cranking.  Whenever it stops raining we will try to pull out the main sail.

So last night we had dinner with a classmate from Exeter, Jay Riley and his wife Gretchen.  Pictures attached.  We went to a very nice restaurant.  Gretchen has been a summer resident of Nantucket since the 1980s with her parents.  We hope to go over to see their house in eastern Nantucket and will get there by riding bikes.  Also hope to go to the beach while we are here, except the weather forecast is for rain on and off most of the time.

So after church today, we went to the new Whaling Museum for the afternoon. Very informative programs done by the volunteer staff including a talk on whaling history, a talk on the Essex which was rammed by a whale and sunk, and a very nice movie about the culture of Nantucket.

Good things we had raincoats as we were still soaked by the time we got back to High Spirits on mooring O-7.

Found out today that Joy's high school friend, Daphne and her husband Bob, are coming to Nantucket tomorrow for a couple of days with their daughter and her family. Hope to see them on Tuesday.

We most likely will stay until Wednesday but possibly Thursday.  All depends on the weather.

People always ask if we have a TV. We tell them no, but we have a computer with a fairly large screen and we watch movies on Netflix or reruns on Hulu.com.  In fact the other day we watched two movies, or at least I did. The first one was Mercury Rising with Bruce Willis about an FBI agent and an autistic 9 year old boy.  The second one was the 1954 classics sci fiction movie, THEM.  Them is about killer ants that mutated from radiation from the 1945 A bomb test in New Mexico. It stars James Whitmore, Edmund Gween(Santa from Miracle on 34th Street), James Arness, and Fess Parker.  Why this movie?
Them was one of the movies we got to see at Camp Christopher, CYO summer camp, that I went to when I was 10 years old, 1958 or so.


Joe

Fun on Block Island

We have been here for the past two days, Wed & Thursday.  We found Chris DeCaro yesterday and had lunch with Chris and her sister-in-law, Terry. Terry and Chris came for Terry's annual family reunion on Block Island. After a nice lunch at Three Sisters, we headed over to the beach and had very relaxing afternoon.

This morning we stopped for some very tasty doughnuts, picture attached.  Joy said it was the best she has ever had.  They were good and Nantucket also has good doughnuts. 

Today was a day for bike riding down to Southeast Lighthouse and the Mohegan Bluffs. We had lunch downtown and then headed for the Lighthouse. Most of the way was up hill so we ended up walking the bikes part of the way.  After climbing down to the ocean, we found the "Mud People".  Around the corner of the beach is a spot where the water and clay form a mud puddle. People climb and coat themselves.  We have attached a picture of two the Mud People.

Interesting fact about the Lighthouse. It was moved 245 feet in 1993 due to cliff erosion.  They jacked up the lighthouse and attached house onto 38 beams.They then moved it on a series of rails.  Project cost several millions of dollars, would have been worth watching it move.

Having dinner on the boat tonight, same as last night. Trying to conserve our financial resources as move into a more expensive part of the county for boaters.  The mooring fees are in the $45-$65 per night range, versus the $20 per night down in the South. 

On the way back to the boat we saw an accident that was very lucky for the two people on a moped. Then did not make a proper turn and hit a truck right in front of us.  Joy signed a witness statement that the truck was clearly on its side of the road. The moped people were extremely lucky as they were not wearing helmets.  Found out from the bike rental people, that no helmet on a moped is a $85 fine.
I called 911 immediately, and the squads were there in about 5 minutes.  Looked like they will end up with some bruises but no major bone damage.

Tomorrow we are leaving for Martha's Vineyard at 7 am.  Just an overnight stop and then to Nantucket on Saturday for three nights. Then back to Martha's Vineyard for 3-4 days.

Joe

Fun with Nick and Sue

Just spent the last two days with Nick and Sue Buehler at their lake house(picture of it) on Webster Lake.  Unfortunately I do not know the spelling of the Lake's Indian name, Josh can pronounce it but I can not spell it.

Things we did:  play cards - Pitch and Hand & Foot.  Teams were Joy and Sue versus Nick and Joe.  The guys held their own in Pitch but got killed playing Hand and Foot. For you Hand and Foot players, the women had over 1,000 card points during one hand, plus about 8 books, they totalled over 4,000 points.

Other activities were going out to eat.  Very nice restaurants -  Dog Patch at our marina were we parked the boat for two days, and The Pita Spot - a Lebanese restaurant in Mystic, CT.

However the big highlight was Joy water skiing for the first time in 5 years.  Attached are pictures. She also went for a tube ride.  Tube ride was fun, water skiing was hard work. 

August 3-5 will find us on Block Island visiting with Chris DeCaro.

Joe