Mast of the Margaret Todd
12 June 2021
I didn't notice the boat the first time I took a picture with the boat in it. Only later, when I was blogging, did I realize how many photos the ship was in. It was amusing and mysterious, and I let it stay that way. There was no point in ruining the mystique.
Only when I discovered Bar Harbor Cam, before our 2018 visit, did I bother to figure out what this mysterious, photobombing, red-sailed boat was.
She is the Margaret Todd.
At work, I have two computer monitors. When I'm in my office and only using one screen, the second one is usually open to Bar Harbor Cam's view of the harbor dock, where the schooner comes and goes three times each day during tourist season. Winter starts when she leaves Bar Harbor. Summer begins when she's back again. Sometimes her off-season masts are visible in Bar Harbor Cam's feed of Southwest Harbor.
Jack and I don't do much in the way of touristy things. When we visit London, we never ride the open-top tour busses. So the idea of taking any of the tourist boat rides -- lighthouse tours, whale watches, the four-masted schooner -- wasn't on our radar at all.
Not at first, anyway.
Long-time readers will know how many photos I have of the Margaret Todd, resting at the dock, returning home as she passes by our hotel, from a distance as I crunch around on the sand bar, zoomed in from the top of Cadillac Mountain.
So when we got home from our trip in 2019, we thought we might get on that boat someday.
Then the pandemic hit. In September 2020, during a lull in virus waves, when Maine had fewer cases than New Jersey, masked at a restaurant outdoors, we watched afternoon passengers board. "No way," we said. "Too many people."
Nine months later, fully vaccinated, we were back. On the morning of our last full day in Bar Harbor, we boarded the Margaret Todd.
Socially distancing in line, we were across from a board with rows of binder clips mounted on it.
We walked down the white ramp that connects the pier to the floating dock where Margaret's sisters, the Delight and the Bailey Louise Todd, also live.
I was nervous. I hadn't been on a sailboat since I was 19. I never really saw the point of sailing. It was kind of boring. All I wanted to do was swim. My father and a friend shared a 30-foot sailboat. It was his way of escaping the world and engaging in mechanical geekery at the same time. My sister and I used to go on overnight trips with him. Those flipped between fun and boring. When my mother was with us, she spent the entire time yelling at us, and the boat became a 30-foot prison. When I was old enough to avoid the whole scene, I did.
I've been on plenty of ferries since then, and a handful of water taxis in Venice. Still, I worried that I might get motion sickness.
I needn't have worried. It was a relatively calm day, and the boat was so big that I didn't feel it rocking at all.
I spent my time taking pictures and just taking it all in.
Our hotel, the Bar Harbor Inn, is huge.
I peeked "down below," at the cabin, on our way to our seats near the front of the deck.
This was our view forward from where we were sitting. We estimated that there were 60 passengers, all spread out, with room for as many more.
The tide was up. A lobster boat was anchored in the harbor.
This early in the season, it's mostly birds using the floating docks.
We pushed off, motoring out of the harbor. I could smell diesel exhaust.
The captain was good about explaining what we were seeing. The mountain on the left is Champlain. Dorr is in the center, with Cadillac behind it.
When we got out of the harbor, the crew asked for volunteers to help hoist the sails. They did the rear ones first. Sorry, "aft." The captain used nautical terms for each of them. All I remember is "mizzen," which is one of the middle ones.
I volunteered for the forwardmost sail. One crewwoman and two of us volunteers raised it, trying not to grab each other's hands instead of the rope (sorry, "sheet") as we pulled on her count of "one-two-one-two." It got tougher the higher the sail got. The top and bottom of each sail is fastened to a thick piece of wood which wraps around the mast and makes a disconcerting grinding noise as it swings with the wind.
We got close to Bald Porcupine Island.
Some of the breakwater poked above the tide.
I enjoyed seeing the island from the other side.
Next up was Long Porcupine Island.
From here, I could see how maybe Burnt Porcupine Island got its name.
This little island was off the tip of Burnt Porcupine Island.
Sometimes everyone got quiet.
For a few seconds, I understood what had drawn my father to the water. But only for a few seconds. There's way too much work involved in sailing a boat, not to mention maintaining it and housing it. Too much money, too much time, too much stress. I can roll out of bed into my bike clothes and ride from my front door to wherever. From the top of a hill or the middle of a field or in the woods somewhere, alone or with my Slugs, I can achieve the same peace and still be home for lunch.
Sea sputum!
Some people on the other side of the boat got to see a seal.
On our side, off in the distance, between Burnt Porcupine and Sheep Porcupine, a group of kayakers made their way back towards town.
We rounded the back of Sheep Porcupine Island, where a bell buoy clanked away to warn boats of shallow water when visibility is poor.
I'd forgotten all about bell buoys. Clank clank clank clank.
From our hotel balcony, I've taken loads of pictures of the tip of Sheep Porcupine Island. It's one of my favorite pictures to take. I was hoping we'd get to see it close up. From the other side, it looks a lot like it does from the hotel, which surprised me. I'd expected the trees to be farther from each other up close.
Is this getting boring?
I don't think it's getting boring.
As we got closer to the harbor, the captain pointed out the mountains. On Cadillac's slope, a windshield caught the sun for a second on its way down the summit road.
I could just barely make out the cell tower at the summit (center right).
I bet that's the section of road that gives me the heebie-jeebies on the way down.
During a quiet time, I took a minute to use the bathroom (sorry, the "head"). I'd expected there to be more to the cabin than there was.
The instructions, including "please do not dispose of anything in the head that wasn't previously consumed (plus a small amount of toilet paper)" were amusing.
We were in the northern part of the harbor now, behind Bar Island.
Bald Rock has ledges underwater that play havoc with boats getting too near.
The water was green.
This is the side of Bar Island we can't see from town or from the sand bar. Like the dark side of the moon.
As we sailed around the side of the island, the customary view appeared, with only the tip of the sand bar above water at high tide.
The crew dropped the sails and the captain motored back to the dock, pointing out that the Starfish Enterprise is now operating out of Mount Desert Island. The tour consists of a diver with a camera that projects back on deck. I could maybe enjoy this. The name, though. High nerdery there.
And then the trip was over.
It was 2 hours well spent, even if it did set us back $42 each. This trip has been about throwing money at everyone who works on Mount Desert Island. They need it more than we do right now.
Because, as they say, a boat is a big hole in the water into which one pours money.
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