Dinghy drift social hour, in which pvc pipe has been creatively used to deliver both cocktails and hors d’oeuvres. New friends are easy to make in the liveaboard life. Photo courtesy Mike Camarata
There are some truly amazing people out there on the water. We at Points East feel blessed to have met such a wide group of diverse, helpful, funny, and, on occasion, catankerous folk that make up the New England marine community.
A sailing love yarn
Spring 2023 By Bob Kowalski A few years back I was in Granada sitting out the hurricane season. It’s sort of the center of where people that live on boats go that time of year, there’s a big community of like-minded people there. Granada is
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Remembering Merle Hallett
With Merle, who accomplished so much, it wasn’t about what he accomplished as much as how he went about it – with grace and dignity.
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Keeping a watchful eye: A Grandpa’s message to his little sailor
October/November 2022 By David Roper As you can see from the black and white photo here of your Poppy, I have been watching much longer than you, for more than sixty years, in fact. Sailors know it is important to always keep a watchful eye,
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Charlie’s Bench, a holy place
You can get quite a bit of information just sitting on the bench at Marston's Marina.
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Practical magic: At Points East, it takes a village
September 2022 By Bob Muggleston “Champagne taste, beer pocketbook.” This was a phrase my dad used many times in the 30 years I worked alongside him as a landscaper in southeast Connecticut, often as he was getting back into the truck after meeting with a
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Olivia Lord, R2AK warrior
September 2022 By Marilyn Pond Brigham Shortly after I was asked to review the “Race to Alaska” movie for Points East, I came upon a bit of serendipity. My yacht club’s weekly email included a brief note that not only were a couple of members
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Sailing through boot camp
The members of the Corinthian Yacht Club made a young Coast Guard recruit feel at home.
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It’s the people who make Points East a success
August 2022 By John Gold I wish I could say I had a role in the genesis of Points East. But that honor goes to Sandy Marsters and Bernie Wideman, who cooked up the idea across their desks at the former “Journal Tribune,” a daily
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The perfect proposal
The planning was intense, the execution flawless and the result? Magical.
Read MoreNautical perfection on the small side
With a background in woodworking, and roots that extend to one of Maine’s most recognized islands, this Maine craftsman builds models that delight the senses.
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Robert Chace, former president of Bohndell Sails, 74
Camden, Maine Robert Manton Chace Jr. passed away at home on April 27, after living with Huntington’s disease for 15 years. Bob was an adrenaline junkie, offshore sailor, avid cyclist and lifelong alpine skier. New York born and Vermont raised, Bob moved to Maine in
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At 25 years, Points East has beaten the odds
Editor’s Note: As we celebrate our 25th year of publishing, Points East is taking a look back at our first year in business. This month, we hear from Bernie Wideman, a cofounder of the magazine. According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics,
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Tetra twins
May 2022 By Christopher Birch My new friend, Dick Eldridge, just built a rowboat, and Points East magazine is to blame. I’ve made mention of a favorite red rowboat in the pages of this magazine on several occasions. Dick read my ramblings on the merits
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A fond farewell to a beloved family boat
May, 2022 By Peg Ryan Editor’s note: The letter below was written by boater Peg Ryan following the sale of the 1961 Pearson Triton she and her husband Jim purchased in 1977. At the time, Jim was recovering from a heart attack and they hoped
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What a trip: Time flies when you’re having this much fun
25 years ago Bernie Wideman and I were handing out the very first issues of Points East at the Maine Boatbuilder's Show in Portland. It's been quite a ride.
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The thank-you passage
My mother, Gail Stanwood, passed at 96 in October 2020. She kept meticulous cruising logs, then retyped the accounts with detailed narratives. She would savor this 2021 log entry for the sloop, Prelude.
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How Benny came to dinner
March/April 2022 and 1998 Editor’s note: This article ran in the very first Points East magazine in April 1998. As we celebrate our 25 years of publishing, we felt compelled to rerun this piece, as it reflects so much of what makes this magazine special.
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Following seas, tin skiffs & Getch
Dave Getchell was the consummate small-outboard/aluminum-boat guy. A skillful, safety-conscious skipper, Getch clearly knew small-craft handling and loved to share his wisdom with kindred spirits.
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A couple of aging vessels
Boat and owner share some characteristics. They're both getting older, but not ready to part yet.
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A visit with Dodge Morgan
September 2021 By Homer Shannon It was the morning of July 14, 1999. Three boats from the American Yacht Club in Newburyport, Mass.; Carpe Diem, Overtime and Cinderella, were anchored way up in Quahog Bay. Homer and Dee Shannon from Cinderella had just returned from
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His world is our oyster
One day I’m retired and idle: the next, I’m an oyster farmer. How did I go from eyeballs-deep in a couch to total immersion in raising Eastern oysters? Well, hang onto your hat!
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Adopting a kinder, gentler approach
August 2021 By Jack Farrell Five days after it happened, I’m still smarting over an unfortunate conversation on Channel 16 with a local lobster boat. The captain was apparently unhappy with my course, and made a rude, and let’s just say unprofessional comment about it.
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An American dream
From suit and tie to overalls: Man emigrates to America to make fortune in automobile industry, then, at age 40, leaves fast-track to build and restore classic boats. Sounds like a novel.
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A prince of a man and the captain of Boston Harbor
Larry Cannon, a prince of a man and the captain of Boston Harbor, is sorely missed.
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Gift from a stranger
July 2021 By Jack Farrell One day last week I was called up to the front porch of the Oceanic Hotel to greet some visitors. Everett Hall and his son-in-law from nearby Cedar Island were there to talk about their float docks. Since Star Island
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Dudley and sailing evermore
From an early age, the author was drawn to the mystical act of propelling a sailing vessel by harnessing the wind; and his wife, Dudley, also felt the magic. But it wasn’t all “tailwinds and flat seas.”
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Spreading my mom’s ashes: A promise kept
May, 2021 By Joel Gleason For Points East Toward the end of 2012, my mother’s health began to seriously decline. The timing of it was a bit of a surprise. We’d just witnessed her successful struggle to come back from knee surgery two years earlier,
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Saoirse was 40 feet of rusting vessel destined for the scrap heap. Now she’s home sweet home
One person’s candidate for the junk pile can be another’s gem. And thus it was that a beloved, but deteriorating, steel sailboat became a treasure for a couple in search of a new floating abode.
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The Down-Under Cup
March/April 2021 By Peter Winter Warning: Violent and gratuitous allegory ahead New Zealand sent several artillery batteries to help out during the Vietnam War. Some culturally insensitive brute at the Pentagon decided that since New Zealand looked pretty close to Australia on a map, they
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Virtual voyage? Anchors aweigh
Midwinter 2021 By David Roper There are good ships, and there are wood ships, The ships that sail the sea. But the best ships, are friendships, And may they always be. -Irish Proverb You could easily say that the pre-COVID-19 photo on the following page
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A day on the Harraseeket River
By James Rudolph “I used to clean this stuff off the bottom of boats. There’s not an inch of this that isn’t alive. There’s worms, eels, crabs. It would get in my beard and I could just feel it moving.On an overcast and unseasonably warm
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The mayor of the marina is gone
By Randy Randall Some people you meet in this life leave a lasting impression. I suppose the grizzled waterfront character is a stereotype, and people coming to the marina or boatyard are not surprised when they run into such a bard roaming the docks. These
Read MoreBoating beyond your prime
When my wife Marcia and I were boat hunting a few years back, we encountered a flotilla of men and women in their 70s and 80s who were hanging up their dock lines because of bum knees or bad balance or failing vision – not
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A new boat for Diana
I promised I’d buy a bigger boat, with a standing-headroom cabin, if she survived a summer cruising on my J/24. She not only endured, she thrived. The ball was in my court. Big time!
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The liveaboard life
By Mike Camarata For Points East I am a full-time liveaboard. I am also a snowbird. I have been called plenty of other names, but we’ll stick with those two for now. A liveaboard is a person who owns a boat and – wait for
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A fairy tale for grownups
By David Roper For Points East Once upon a time there was a man who felt that his life was a canvas painted in various shades of gray. His job lacked challenge, his friends were dull, and his girl didn’t cast her eyes down and
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My first big deal
There are two kinds of salesmen. There is the lonely, bespectacled, data-driven geek with the mathematical model that demonstrates the inevitable causal relationship between the promotional dollars invested and the widgets sold. Then there’s the Irishman. The Irishman can walk into a room of strangers
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Snapshot of a small Maine business
In total, Ray Trombley has spent 30 years making his living on the Maine coast. His career has taken him from digging clams to selling them wholesale at the establishment he owns – Casco Bay Shellfish in Brunswick, Maine.
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Sailing way into the past
“We’re getting to be antiques,” I whispered to Elsa, as I collapsed into the cockpit after dropping the old Herreshoff anchor 50 yards off a nearly abandoned fisherman’s wharf. It was the end of a brisk fall solo sail, a late cruise, as I was
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Caveat venditor – let the seller beware
Over the years, I’ve sold lots of stuff on the internet. Everything from Swedish cars to antique rototillers and, for the most part, the transactions have been fairly straightforward. Goodbye baby bike trailer – don’t let the door hit you on the way out –
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Captain Bumblebee to the rescue
By Ralph B. Pears My hapless cruising companion of many years, affectionately known as “Captain Bumblebee” because of his fondness for a yellow and black rugby shirt, was someone who was always prepared to lend a helping hand. You could always depend on him to
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Life’s a beach . . . or is it?
By David Roper In these times of COVID-19, statistics show that many people are virtually escaping to paradise via YouTube. If you Google “Sail to Paradise,” you’ll get 40,300,000 hits. As of today, there are 1,300,000,000 YouTube videos out there, movies from every imaginable category.
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My own sailing legacy
I married this man because, well, sailing was part of his fabric, and I was determined it would be part of mine, too. Little did I know then that I also had a magic boating key to pass on to my family.
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Privateer end game
By Capt. Michael L. Martel For Points East I peer through the chain-link fence, fingers grasping the rusty wire, feeling like I’m on the outside of a detention center. The gate is locked. Inside is a sad collection of old and derelict boats. Some of
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A shipyard burned, a treasure lost
A fire destroyed George W. Zachorne Jr. & Sons Boatbuilders, in Wickford, R.I., but more was ruined than structure, boats, tools and precious artifacts. A way of life was snuffed out, too.
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The Snow Goose
Guest Perspective By Randy Randall For Points East Snow Goose was a Marblehead cruiser designed by Eldridge-McGinnis and built in the late ’50s at Marblehead Boatyard on the Biddeford side of the Saco River in Maine. My dad owned the boat for over 20 years,
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A fortuitous meeting
Guest Perspective By Dave Tew For Points East In 1975 I was a senior in college, and trying to figure out what to do with my life. At the time, the Western Electric Corp. offered a program in which they evaluated and sponsored soon-to-be-graduating college
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Where there’s a will . . .
Wickford, Rhode Island, has always had more interesting characters than I can shake a stick at. Plenty of interesting stories abound there, as well. Not too long ago there was a distinguished older gentleman who was very active in community affairs, politics, and the yacht
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Cruising with Diana, Part II
On their first short cruises as a couple (see “Cruising with Diana, Part 1,” December 2019), it was two boat-lengths forward/one back for Mark and Diana as they set courses – often divergent – to perceived common grounds on which they might sail constructively, as
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Hurricane Dorian and the “dream wedding”
The last big weekend of the year promised a full house at the Oceanic Hotel. A two-day island wedding extravaganza was also on the schedule.
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Our first boat: Lessons Learned
After we sold Gannet, our 30-foot 1969 Pearson Coaster, last spring, we reflected fondly on the 24 years we owned her, during which she taught us how to cruise the coast of Maine.
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Finding Minnie
By Pam Humbert For Points East It’s been almost 30 years since my mom called to talk about their big move, and the fate of one of the family’s small sailboats. “There’s some interest from Barry down the road for the Minifish,” she said. Her
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A view from the top (of the bridge)
As experienced boaters know, there is much more to an outing than packing a picnic basket, picking out a destination, and heading out into the wide blue yonder. A good captain should have a lot on his or her mind: One must consider the weather,
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After the boys (and girls) of summer have gone
The title of this piece is obviously a riff on the signature line from Don Henley’s “The Boys of Summer,” a song that doesn’t get too much airplay anymore, but that all these years later (it was originally released in 1984) still affects me when
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My ‘mermaids’ are real
Throughout human history, tales have been spun about marine creatures with torsos of women and lower bodies of fish. Called “mermaids,” they traditionally are associated with shipwrecks and rescues at sea, and their positive image has been portrayed in books, paintings, music, and movies for
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Lessons learned from a lame duck
By Christopher Birch For Points East Not every marina has a duck house, but, lucky for me, mine does. I’m thinking now of a certain duck that once lived there. She had a bad starboard wing and a bad port leg. When she walked, she
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The marine hardware guy next door
One of the many compelling things about the WoodenBoat Show at Mystic Seaport, which this year took place June 28-30, is the number of interesting personalities you encounter while walking around there. The boats are beautiful, of course, but the men and women who build
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The freedom to be Warren River Boatworks
By Capt. Michael L. Martel For Points East Paul Dennis loves boats. He especially loves sailboats, and one type in particular, with which he’s had a long-standing affair. The humble and soft-spoken man has no qualms admitting it – he loves the often-unconvential-looking sailboats built
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Ladies, does this sound familiar?
Guest perspective/Capt. Laura Tecce Surely, many long-suffering spouses have heard this: “No one talk to me while I’m docking.” (But, if you can’t talk to him, how are you supposed to know what he’s doing or where he’s going?) Or how about this: “Throw the
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Heartfelt issues: Straining under load
Last summer I wrote a column about First-World problems and a bumblebee. Well, really it was about an engine that would struggle under load, making a sound not unlike a person choking to death. I dared not throttle up when that happened; hence, I ran
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Optimism, Catboat Bob, and Mrs. Crabby
By Jack Farrell Points East We’re five miles out of Portsmouth on an early summer freight run to Star Island. The fine bow of my Royall Lowell-designed Utopia slices through the two-foot chop with grace and power. Ten feet back at the helm, bits of
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Pixie dust and promises
I conjured memories of Dad, Uncle Al and the sailboats that followed in their wakes, and saw their unmistakable influences sprinkled like magical powder on my past, present and future. And I recalled my vows to them.
Read MoreCapt. Bumblebee and the stadium blanket
Guest perspective/Ralph Pears Over the course of 30 years, during which time I frequently sailed in company with the ill-fated Capt. Bumblebee, so-named by my children because of his fondness for a yellow and black rugby shirt, he was always ready to come to the
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Farewell, Capt. Lou
Although I’ve written many stories for Points East and other boating publications, the Capt. Lou series has generated, by far, the most interest. Readers have gone out of their way to contact me about them. If they knew Lou personally, or of him, they’d say,
Read MoreThe misadventures of Capt. Bumblebee
Guest perspective/Ralph Pears Whenever sailors get together and have a few drinks, their talk invariably turns to the adventures they’ve had aboard boats. Sometimes these stories involve dangerous conditions and overcoming difficult situations. Other times they focus on the reminiscences of beautiful journeys, or the
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The young guns of the Mayflower II
It’s always neat when what you assume about a given situation is wrong, but in a way that leaves you hopeful about the current state of things. Take last fall, for example, when I checked in on the progress being made on the Mayflower II,
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The advantage of being petite
Guest perspective/Marilyn Pond Brigham I’ve always considered myself fortunate to be small. That is, as a short person, I’ve always felt – contrary to the tongue-in-cheek sentiments of that famous song from the ’70s – like I’ve had many great reasons to live! Have there
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The day President Bush stopped at Marston’s Marina
With the recent passing of our 41st president, George Herbert Walker Bush, I’m reminded of the time he visited our little marina aboard one of his boats. This happened back in the ’90s, but my memory of the event is vivid even today.
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Black Flags, Blue Waters
An interview of the author of “Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America’s Most Notorious Pirates” by Eric Jay Dolin, Liveright Publishing Corp., W.W. Norton & Co., 416 pages, hardcover: $29.95.
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A (fishy) gem hidden in plain sight
Guest perspective/Capt. Mike Martel and Capt. Don Ringwood A few years ago, on our way home on a Sunday morning from an annual Christmas party in New Hampshire, my wife Denise and I decided to take the “scenic route” home to Rhode Island, down Route
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What ever happened to Roger? – Part II
Guest Perspective: Roger LongAs related in the first part of this story , I fell in love with cruising narrow waterways and a woman with a delicate stomach.
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What ever happened to Roger Long?
Guest perspective/Roger Long A few Points East readers from the single-digit years of this century may remember accounts of cruising in my 32-foot Endeavour, Strider. I once had the honor of being on the masthead of this magazine as a contributor, but slipped quietly from
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How I met E.B. White
Guest perspectve/Charles Sutton My roommate at Cornell University for two years, starting back in 1948, was Joel White (1930-1997), son of E. B. White, most famous for his books “Charlotte’s Web” and “Stuart Little,” humorous articles in “The New Yorker” magazine, and for his wife,
Read MoreTrue class in the J Class
Guest perspective/Greg Coppa Many years ago, I had the good fortune to receive a press pass to the America’s Cup Hall of Fame enshrinement ceremony, sponsored by the Herreshoff Marine Museum of Bristol, R.I. Inducted were a photographer (Morris Rosenfeld), a noted British yacht designer
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The secret life of a bridge tender
Guest perspective: Greg Jones I am a bridge tender. Some call bridge tenders America’s first line of defense, ever-vigilant monitors of the nation’s maritime lifeline. Some. Maybe. Maybe our mothers, who long ago despaired of us becoming doctors or lawyers. Others are, necessarily, less flattering.
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Thank you, cruising friends
Guest perspective/Russ Roth Two years ago we made a decision to repower our sailboat, Skiya (see Points East, August 2015). This spring I needed to be repowered. Last June, Marty and I left our mooring in Portsmouth Harbor on our yearly migration to our mooring
Read More‘It’s Thursday.’ ‘Me, too; let’s get a drink’
Guest perspective/Lauren E. Storck In the U.S. alone, there are 50 million of us with some hearing loss or deafness. That’s one in five people of all ages, on average. If you are so challenged, these three thoughts are important: 1. No shame is warranted
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Where is Tasmania?
Guest perspective/Randy Randall The marina business in winter is not much fun. The river’s frozen over, the snow-covered docks look like giant loaves of white bread, and the mooring balls are gripped fast in the ice. It’s all very depressing, and spring seems a long
Read MoreMeet Rockland’s new harbormaster
Hank Garfield “This is one of the busiest and most eclectic harbors in Maine,” the man himself declares. On a rare warm day in early May, Matt Ripley, the new Rockland harbormaster, stands outside his office looking out at a placid and mostly empty piece
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Live aboard? Why not?
The timing was right for the semi-retired couple and although there have been some challenges, they wouldn't have it any other way.
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No better friend than Capt. Lou
Greg Coppa Capt. Lou’s loyalty to friends in Wickford, R.I., and beyond, is renowned. Some time ago, his longtime and eccentric buddy, G.I. Joe, passed away. G.I. Joe – who was never called “Joe” but always “G.I. Joe” by the Captain – lived and died
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Riding the wave
Capt. Dave Marciano, with his 38-foot Hard Merchandise out of Gloucester, Mass., is a highliner on National Geographic Channel's "Wicked Tuna," but family, not fishing, is what makes it all work.
Read MoreBlanche DuBois (circa 1985)
Of all the 1,100-plus lakes in New Hampshire, including Lake Winnipesaukee (which is actually more like a mini inland-sea) none is more entrancing than Lake Sunapee. It is 11 miles long. And it recently boasted the world’s largest Star-class fleet of racing sailboats.
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Back on the land
After five years of roaming the seas, the Martin family has found a spot of land on which to live, at least for now.
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