March 5 - March 22:  Visiting Maine

March 21st - spring in Maine.  6 inches.

     Maine in March is a crap shoot.  It could be cold, warm, sunny, snowing, or raining depending on the hour of the day.  This is the time of year there is a noticeable change in the heat of the sun, and the days get longer by a few minutes every day.  The time changes early in March too - spring ahead (pun intended) - and the twilight seems to last a long time and the sun peeks its head between five and six am.  Crocuses bloom and daffodils push out their shoots even through the snow.  You can smell spring - it’s a clean, earthy smell.  The sap is running and the birds are flocking.  Most of the time we were home the ground was clear, but yesterday we woke to a snowstorm that steadily dropped six inches.

The snow doesn't deter the birds.

     The first thing Dan and I did when we got here was raid our house for winter clothes.  We’d brought the warmest clothes we had on the boat, but needed jeans, sweaters, and extra long-sleeve shirts to get us through our twenty day stay.  The next thing we did was go shopping for a few other things we hadn’t brought but  needed.  Before we knew it, our room in his parents’ house was strewn with extra things we had not arrived with.  As we prepared to return to the Bahamas, we sorted all our accumulated stuff into three piles - things going back into storage, things for carrying on the bus and planes, and things to go into the luggage we’d gotten at Good Will to check in for our return trip.  How is it we can travel from the boat so lightly and return to the boat with two large suitcases purchased especially for that trip?  We hope to give those suitcases away in the Bahamas because we do not have room for them on the Willie Dawes.  

     It’s been a wonderful visit.  Dan’s father has been ailing for a long time and we were happy to be here for the beginning of the recovery period.  His parents have been fabulous hosts, giving up their privacy and the use of their car to accommodate us.  It's been great spending time with them - I think we both gained five pounds, which was actually the goal for his father.  (He gained too.) We're going to miss all the desserts, especially the ice cream.  

Preparing ice cream with hot chocolate sauce. 

     We’ve been able to see and spend time with everyone we wanted to - good friends and family alike - and both Dan and I spent a little bit of time at our places of previous employment.   We’ve been able to take care of mundane but necessary things like filing our income taxes, upgrading our electronics, getting our hair cut, and making necessary phone calls to various establishments - all the things that aren’t so easy in the Bahamas.   Plus we’ve been able to take showers anytime we wanted!!!  We attended our church and sang with our choir, went for walks around Camden and the harbor, and spent a lot of quality time just talking and laughing with the ones closest to us.  We got our cat fix by attending the needs of Percy, who prefers to use the couch alone, thank you very much.  (Our Tommie is still on the boat in George Town and is doing just fine, according to Rose on Local Knowledge.)  

Percy on the couch.

     As much as we enjoyed seeing Maine as winter melts into spring, we are both looking forward to being back in the sunshine and warmth of the Bahamas.  The upcoming months are the best months to cruise these islands, we’ve recently read, because the winds and seas are far more favorable, and most of the transient cruisers will have left either to go back North or to continue farther South.  Hopefully Tommie will be happy to have us back aboard.    Tomorrow we get up bright and early to catch the bus to Boston for the plane which goes first to Canada and then back to the Bahamas.