I think I left off as we were leaving our hurricane hole.  We headed off for Boothbay, about an 8 hour trip again into a heavy wind and big waves....so obviously no sailing.  We sort of wonder why we are in a sailboat...oh we'll!!  Our good old Yanmar desiel keeps trustily (is that a word?) working away.  It's great to be with John as he checks the engine hourly along with whatever else he's down below looking at.  I don't want him to find out on my boat I only check things like that once a month or so!!!

Boothbay is another gorgeous port with boats everywhere and huge houses lining the shores....and of course it has our enemy the lobster trap everywhere.  We found a marina with a restaurant so all was well.  We went in for dinner expecting to order a giant lobster dinner only to find out it was a Turkey buffet with all the old folks from town.....I keep pretending that I'm still 40 years old!

Off we went Sunday with plans to go 20 miles out to try and get beyond the lobster traps and do an overnight run to the Cape Cod canal.  Even when we were 25 miles from shore there was still the "enemy."  We came to the conclusion that when it got dark we would not be able to see any of the traps so we decided to change our course so we would be in a harbor by dark.  But as our luck seems to go all of a sudden the alternator and the tachometer quit.  So back we headed to Portsmouth, New Hampshire where they have boatyards for repairs.....but the problem was that the last two hours of our trip would be in the dark.  Our, or should I say John's solution was for him to stand at the front of the boat holding a search light while I steered through the traps.  He would shine the light on the traps so I could see them and if I was getting to close to one that I hadn't seen he would use an air horn to warn me.  Everything worked like a charm and we got into a marina with repair services.