We arrived in New Bedford, Mass. after a long, lumpy run down Cape Cod Bay into Buzzard's Bay.  New Bedford is a huge commercial fishing port, but it also played a significant part in the history of the whaling industry - ending in the early 1920's.  The Whaling Museum there is incredible - very comprehensive and very well done.

I thought the giant squid at the front entrance was a pretty neat touch... Jim and Jason don't look sufficiently intimidated, though.

Just as we saw lots of dories in use in Nova Scotia and down through Gloucester, we now see people rowing whale boats here and down through Mystic.  I think it's neat that people get exercise by celebrating their local history.

Our next stop was Newport, RI - though we only stayed one night because the weather would be deteriorating.  We wanted to give Newport another chance, but once again we found it to be a bit pretentious and overpriced.  It's a high-end serious sailing town, though wooden boat building is still taught in the area.

This is the kind of elegant traditional sailboat that makes my knees turn to jelly...

...and as we left early in the morning we passed by Cunard's elegant Queen Elizabeth on her way into Newport.

We had an easy cruise into Connecticut waters to one of my favorite places - Mystic Seaport.  We tied up at the Seaport dock and spent a few days enjoying the many exhibits and demonstrations.  It really takes a lot of time to see it all, and we had a blast.  We particularly loved the live music - sea shanties and traditional tunes.

The Seaport is very active - with a large youth sailing program as well as boats that you can take out and row or sail.  We went for a spin in a Crosby catboat - similar to what Jim wants to build for us to use in the Keys sometime.

Sadly, Jason had to head home Saturday, but we all had a great time together.

It's so special to be docked right in the Seaport - and it's a wonderful treat since I have great memories of Mystic Seaport from my childhood, and Jim and I have great memories from our visits as "big kids".

We were glad to have a little time to enjoy Rockland - walking the pretty streets and exploring some of the art galleries and interesting shops.  We also toured the Farnsworth Art Gallery - famous for its Andrew Wyeth collection.

We rented a car and spent an afternoon and evening exploring some of the other towns farther up Penobscot Bay: Camden, Searsport, and Belfast.  We had great weather to stroll around the towns and to see the waterfront.

Camden was particularly nice...

...with working boat yards, big schooners (one was taking a wedding party out), lobster boats, and plenty of pleasure boats.  If you look out to the harbor edge you can see the thick fog bank.

Our next stop was Searsport - a more commercial port.  It's home to the Penobscot Maritime Museum which is actually a number of homes and buildings that are original to the founding of the town.  We got there a bit late to tour it properly, but it was very interesting and is on our list of things to see again sometime.

We wrapped up the evening with a stop in Belfast - a very pretty little town.  It was low tide, and like many of the other towns the waterfront is a mix of working and pleasure boats.

There is never enough time to see all we would like to, and Penobscot Bay has tons of places that we'd love to visit - plenty to do the next time we come up here!  It was time to leave and continue south so we would get to Gloucester to meet our friend.

We came into the dock in Rockland for one night to catch up on laundry and fill water tanks - here's a photo of ADVENTURES on the dock with the American Cruise Line's INDEPENDENCE (about 225' long) the evening before we left. We look pretty small with our black stern to the camera.

And here's a photo taken from the same place the next morning just before we departed, in the fog...

We had about 200' of visibility for the first three hours, then about 1/4 mile until mid-afternoon.  Maine waters are pretty thick with lobster pots so we kept a careful watch!

We arrived in Gloucester on Friday night, and met my distant cousin Chris and her husband for lunch on Saturday - she's the family historian and they live in the area. We raised a toast to the Williams boys and enjoyed catching up on family and football.

Our friend Jason came in by train and we stopped at the grocery store to re-provision since he'll be cruising with us all this week.  We had a little bit of time to tour Gloucester, but we departed very early yesterday morning to continue our Adventures.

 Today we're in New Bedford and will explore this huge fishing port.

We arrived in Rockland, Maine about two hours ago after a 28.5 hour crossing from Shelburne, Nova Scotia.  We cleared Customs quickly and spotted a friend's boat in the harbor!  We're anchored near ALGONQUIN - a happy surprise, and have now had our lunch and showers - so we feel a bit more human again.

We had excellent weather for the first half of the crossing - the seas were like glass.

We have been in Shelburne for the past few days and will cross back to the U.S. tomorrow morning.  We're very sad to leave Nova Scotia, but we have the feeling we'll return for a third time - we love it up here: the scenery is stunning and the people are wonderful. 

We left Mahone Bay for the 90 mile cruise to Shelburne because the weather was changing and we would rather contend with smaller swells than big ugly ones.  Because of the long day's run we left before sunrise, and we've noticed that the days are getting shorter - it's dark before 0600 now.  The advantage of an early morning  departure is that the sky can be quite dramatic - I shot about 30 images of the pre-dawn sky, but this is my favorite.

After leaving Cape Breton we cruised south, stopping for just one night in lovely Liscomb.