Western Islands

Having lived in New England with its numerous islands for some time now, myself and my partner Twixt decided it was about time we went exploring these islands in detail. What better way to explore in style than on our trusty Tetra 35. Although old, she is wonderfully detailed and the ample galley and bed will give us some measure of comfort on our odyssey

This is us on another wonderful New England sunrise as we set off on our journey of discovery.

From our home in Marblehead we headed south hugging the land until we reached the first channel then turned west continuing along until we reached Cape Poge where we then headed South West for the short trip to our first destination, Bay View.

This homestead has been created by Trudy Takacs, dedicated to celebrating the rich influence of the New England land to it's rich cultural heritage. Each building here has archival photographs from PLOWLINE images of rural New York, courtesy of the Farmers Museum. This was a fascinating place and we spent most of the morning exploring and taking pictures.

Inside the barn

Small Holding

The School House

The Barn

Looking round the school house









As we had spent most of the morning here we decided to have an early lunch on board washed down with a nice burgundy before setting off to our next destination.

With the meal finished and the dishes washed and put away, it was time for a quick check of the map before we raised sail and headed West once again, heading for Billingsgate.

The island is entered by a horseshoe shaped bay and is quite shallow but with some skilled seamanship from yours truly we safely moored up and went to explore.

We found this to be a really lovely Island with great views across the ocean from the top of the hill. Currently there is nobody living here which is a great shame considering how peaceful it is here.

At the other end of the island is a rocky outcrop leading down to a wonderfully deserted beach.

From the beach we could see, across a narrow channel, our next objective, Monhegan Island. We decided that it would be a good idea to work off some of that lunch, and burgundy, so we decided that with the boat safely moored we would swim across to the island. So we went back to the boat and changed into our swim things. The water was a bit chilly but then again it is October.

This is really quite a large island and again no one lives here at present. We spent a bit of time looking round and both said if only we could afford to live here. Started getting chilly so we swam back and quickly returned to the boat to change.

It was geting rather late by now so we decided to make this our overnight stop. Twixt cooked a lovely meal which was washed down with another bottle of the wonderful 69 Burgundy. It was a beautiful sunset so we took the bottle with us and climbed the hill behind us to watch, as it set over the ocean, before returning to the boat for an early night.