Hatchet Cove - my homeport

The memorial cross at Georges Harbor 

five miles south of my mooring at Hatchet Cove, Friendship,

Maine

When we first came to Friendship thirty years ago, this was Brian Reed's wharf. It's the Carter family's now.

The Reeds and the Carters had fishing camps on Benner Island about five miles south.

Betsy Wyeth then bought two islands - Allen and Benner -   of the four that make up Georges Harbor where English explorer George Waymouth first landed on the coast of Maine in 1605.  In 1905 the State of Maine  erected a granite cross on Allen and claimed it as the founding of Maine.  

The Carters swung a deal with Betsy Wyeth who had a big wharf built on Allen Island and a house for her family on the south side of Benner.  The Carters still have traps stored there.  They are buyers as well as fishermen now.   Below are shots of Carter's wharf at Hatchet  Cove, Friendship now.

BrAvery's haul today - about 1,000 lbs.

@$7lb - before fuel, boat, crew, truck

It isn't easy

Salt 

dinghy dock

Bait - redfish heads from iceland

Diesel oil

Some bait is local - menhaden (pogies or bunker)

netted in the Cove or the St. George River

Product of Iceland

Clara - boatyard dog

A monhegan skiff

"Do not expect a warning shot"

Harvester wharf (fka Brian's wharf) 

Hatchet Cove, Friendship, ME

                                                                Storage shed

                                                                                The wharf

                                                                            Refrigerated bait shed

                                                                                

 

Cape Breton - Road Photos 2024 | tugster: a waterblog

Road Photos 2024 F | tugster: a waterblog

    

Maine Mist - August 9, 2024

 Back River, Friendship, Maine

The Back River

The town wharf - Friendship, Maine

Bloodhound - a Fife Cutter replica - in Thomaston for service

The original Bloodhound

Bloodhound - the replica, on the St. George, Thomaston, ME

Shamrock and Columbia - 1899 - America's Cup

My boat GeorgiaBel is nothing special: a 22 foot Eastern center console with a 90 HP Yamaha.

But it's maintained and stored across the Thomaston, Maine harbor from Lyman Morse where legends regularly call for service, and are launched fresh from the LM workshop. So it was when I saw an old 70 foot sailboat of unfamiliar design head off the floating dock and down the St. George River.

I got lucky - as I was about to cross the St. George I saw the cutter right across the narrow 75 yard channel from Jeff's Marine where my powerboat is stored and maintained. I stopped, of course. and ran to the dock.

Bloodhound's design - to me it looks like an old English Channel cutter - is a replica of an 1857 design  by Scotland's William Fife,* the great yacht builder of the late 1800's.

William Fife III [1857- 1944] was a great Scottish sailboat designer and builder inducted twenty years ago in the America's Cup Hall of Fame at the  Herreshoff Marine Museum.  His Shamrocks - designed for the great AC challenger the merchant Thomas Lipton - never quite beat the Nat Herreshoff designs but are remembered as the Lipton Era.

If you are interested in chartering Bloodhound - contact them HERE.

Stones Point to Friendship, through "the Gut".

 

Diane Matyas - Portfolio of Works: SUBMERGED: Marine Life of New York Harbor

Diane Matyas - Portfolio of Works: SUBMERGED: Marine Life of New York Harbor

Bunker (Menhaden)

Fog - the kind Mom called pea soup

 

Friendship Sloops - Gladiator (1902) and Noel (2004)

 

Friendship sloops - Rockland, Maine

I was ten years old when my father took me sailing on his friend Lou Perretti's gaff-rigged cutter.  Known as a Friendship sloop, its stability appealed to me.  And its beautiful woodwork.  The kind of boat known as a Friendship Sloop was first documented by historian Howard Chappelle.  It is a style of boat first referred to as a Muscongus Bay sloop, but renamed by its Friendship-based builder Wilbur Morse.

My second experience was in 1994 when we first came to Maine and sailed with Andy Zuber on the 1902-built 32 foot sloop Gladiator.  The boat was long owned and maintained by Bill Zuber who passed last month. His son Andy - who owns it now - was taking day sailors out from Friendship.   My daughter Taisy - like her Dad - welcomed its stability.

The stable, gaff-rigged cutters were lobster fishing boats but as engines replaced sail Morse and others built them as pleasure boats.   The Friendship Sloop Society keeps the heritage alive.  There are two Friendships in the town's harbor.  Last week in the annual "homecoming" races - now held in Rockland harbor - the two sloops based in Friendship did well.  Gladiator took 4th and the NEA-recognized master builder  Ralph Stanley-built 36 foot Noel took fifth last week.

Here they are:

                                                                            Gladiator

NOEL