Friday, August 25, 2017 – A day of new and old friends
Today started like 90% of our days, I am awake to see a picture perfect sunrise and Brian sleeps in. His sister’s, Lisa and Carol, had spent the night and would be going back to the mainland at 1:30. We knew by the weather forecast today was going to be busy but we had many surprises awaiting us!
Brian started making breakfast for all of us because he is always a better breakfast cook than I am, and the ladies sat out on the porch just chatting and looking at our view. Nice and easy, no rush like most mornings should be. As we sat around the table, I mentioned I wanted to go to the beach for low tide and sea glass hunt and his sisters hadn’t been to the cove area since they arrived yesterday, so off we went along with Pickles because without Phin she gets a little lonely and she is always up for a beach adventure. The tide was great and the surf was gentle which makes for perfect sea glass collecting, and we all had some success. Brian ended up walking the Cove and Cobblestone Trails with Lisa and Carol while I headed back to the cottage with Pickles to get everything ready for our guest today.
For the past week, there has been water in our water when we turn the faucets on and usually that is our first indication there is a leak somewhere in the basement. And we have been diligently making sure there are no problems, in fact, I check probably every hour or so. I started washing the breakfast dishes when I got back to the cottage and the air in the lines was the worse yet. The pressure pump was maintaining a lower PSI than normal but no leaks. Brian needed to do more investigation because I have some of my family arriving on Saturday and it would be nice to have hot water. When he got back up, he reset the pressure pump, verified there were no leaks, added more water into the cistern, and then we crossed our fingers all would remain status quo for 9 more days.
Here is a funny little story which will allow Carol, Brian’s sister to remember her trip to the island as very memorable. She went inside to get a drink of water and she quickly called my name and came back outside immediately, turns out there was a snake just sitting on the counter where we keep our water containers. I surely was not going inside to help even though it was just a garter snake, so baby brother Brian, put on gloves and wrangled the snake back outside. Now I am constantly on the lookout inside for my biggest fear! Life on the island.
I heard our first visitors coming up the porch steps so the day begins. But this was one of those moments when you see a face, you know exactly who they are even though it has been 30 years since I saw them. My first visitors were Bill and Tinker Saltonstall from Marion, MA where I grew up. But the significance of Tinker in my life was even more involved and she was a force that changed many young ladies lives in the late 70’s and early 80’s. She was made the Dean of Women at Tabor Academy during the school year of 1979. This may not seem like a big deal, but Tabor Academy was an all boy’s prep school which decided to go coed, but how to do it was a mystery to a heavily dense male faculty. I was one of 8 girls admitted to the 500-student body and Tinker was our overseer and our pitbull protecting us from a school population that was 95% male. She allowed us to trail blaze in an all-male environment and without her persistence and encouragement, many young ladies would never have had a dream high school career. She and her husband were sailing on their J30 sailboat in the Maine waters and they decided Seguin looked like a nice place to stop for lunch before heading around Small Point. It was a ride down memory lane for my morning and I am very grateful fate on Seguin gave me another direct connection to my past.
And right on time, the ferry arrived with 25 people for a few hours on the island. Everyone made it up the hill, had great scenery for family pictures, enjoyed their picnics and even had a chance to hike a few trails and eat some blackberries along the way. We had a few other private boats arrive at the same time and we just a great few hours with everyone. Brian at 1:30 started to help his sisters down the hill to get the ferry and I was getting ready for the next group because Ethan decided to run 2 groups out today, lunch will have to wait for a few more hours. As the next group arrives to the plateau, I start the tours and answering questions for everyone but again, there is a good routine going out on the island and we make sure everyone sees or does what they are most interested in and will always leave with a smile.
Yesterday, I received a message from one of my facebook friends saying she and her husband were sailing from Matinticus Island and wanted to have dinner on island and they would spend the night in the cove. Now Judy Long and I have many friends in common but we had never met before. Their ETA was going to be around 5:30 and they would join us for dinner and a sunset. So after a full day of visitors, I needed to create my portion of the dinner, light munchies and dessert. They were going to bring a beef stew and salad, and like all cruisers, you always travel with your own drinks, but the bonus is we have unlimited ice to share, not a common thing on a boat, ice is a hot commodity.
As the 3pm ferry people are leaving, I run into the kitchen to get cooking and Ethan calls to inform us a private boater coming ashore had fallen on the rocks hard and we had an injury. Now just last night talking to Brian’s sisters I mentioned we had been lucky with accidents and illnesses on island all summer and we were thrilled to never have to use the Defribrillator while on island, and I did knock on wood our luck would hold out for just a little longer, oh well, it was good to practice what we had trained for.
I grabbed the first aid kit, Brian walked down the catwalk and I took the Lighthouse trail so we would not miss the injured person and finally arrived down on the beach where the lady had slipped on the sandy, wet rocks. We were lucky to have had one of the visitors from the ferry who was a ER doctor come back to shore to help me out triage any issues. Our injured person had a few lacerations on her knee and fell on her shoulder which was bruising already and she was holding her wrist in the classic posture of something broken. His advice was if she blacked out she should go to the hospital to be checked out, but she refused. So, as I gloved up to clean and dress her wounds, I joked with her it would be so much easier if she were a dog because I am great with veterinary medical emergencies but I would do my best. Brian went back to the plateau to get ice packs for her multiple forming bruises and I got her settled in the shade.
The couple had stopped for a short visit on their way to Boothbay Harbor but the result is they decided to stay in the cove for the night in case anything changed with her injuries and we could call Bath EMS to help her ashore. We did let them know we would keep Ch 16 & 78 on to monitor into the evening if they needed anything else. When all this was going on, I finally looked out into the mooring field and saw 5 boats tied up, and here I told my friend sailing her for a visit, we rarely have a full field on a Friday afternoon, yikes, I hope there is a mooring available for Bentana when they get here.
A quick shower and back to the kitchen, I decided to make blackberry ice cream for our dessert and quickly looked on our food shelves and put together some great munchies, all gluten and soy free. Not bad for island living but this would be no different if we were on the boat, you make do with what you have and how great to have an unlimited supply of fresh green beans to dip in the hummus and dips we had in the fridge!
At 6pm, we got the message they were coming ashore so down the hill we go to greet our new friends! How much fun is blind date friendships! It turns out, they travelled south just to meet us before we head to Annapolis in September, after finishing up their visit on Sequin, they are heading back to Matinicus Island. A perfect evening spent with people with the same passion for life as we have, we shared sailing stories and adventures, also made some other connections based on other people we know and the bonus of the night was learning about a new to me concept, geocaching. They travel along the east coast and the islands looking for treasures left by others based on gps locations and clues. This looks like a new adventure for Brian and I, Steve even is the overseer of a cache in Staniel Cay in the Bahamas, one we may need to find this winter! The sunset didn’t disappoint, the dinner was fabulous and suddenly it was midnight! Brian walked them down to the beach with them while I did a quick clean up and fell sound asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. Wow, what a day!
Guests today – 42
Guests total – 2280
USCG – 6, I guess my helicopter landing is not going to happen.
