Fall in New England

Ah fall! Glorious season?

The days grow shorter. The increasingly slanted sunlight is sparkly and crystal clear, but less warm. The leafs turn color and start to fall. The birds raucously fill the sky as they head for southern climes. The bugs die off . The cool breezes start to blow. The mice and squirrels have commenced their annual migration into the house. My wife (not me) starts dreaming of perfect turns on the ski slopes.

But I grow depressed; for me this season is bittersweet at best.

The dark, cold, boring, physically inactive time is coming. The good, warm, active times are ending. Hibernation is in store.

The boats and MGs, with all of the memories of summer places been, friends met and enjoyable miles traveled in them, have to be put to bed or, as in the case of the snowblower, revived (oil changes/anti freeze,etc. on 7 engines), the homestead buttoned up, the home and shop heating systems prepped and the prebuy on oil and propane dealt with.

The sidewalks get rolled up and the tourists depart. A summer tourist's town's mixed blessing: less congestion but less income.

I HAVE to find something to do with myself this winter.

Dave:

A suggestion might be to visit San Diego! I have great guest quarters and I could use an experienced first mate on a boat that you are quite familiar with.

Walt

Go SOUTH young man , go SOUTH .

The ditch (ICW) is a total low stress lark .

With a tiny bit of planning NO MARINA FEES will be required till well in the dug FL portions south of Daytona.

Sunshine!! Instead of the winterizing miseries.

FF

Walt and FF:

Would that I could. Sounds loverly. But am still tied to my work (what little I have as a self employed small town lawyer) until i win the lottery.

This displaced new englander still misses the change of seasons.....but not enough to move
from beautiful St Augustine Florida!
Jack

In the cold of the morning when the frost nips your nose,
When your shuffuling around with no place to go.
Come to my cuddy I'll be waiting there.
With a cup "O"hot coffee and a warm word to share.

A warm boat on a cold day is a good thing. Even if you are at the dock.
I'll talk boats with anyone anytime. Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter.

SD

I am with SD.* I love the mornings no matter what the weather on the boat. *Make a pot of coffee, read the news on the internet, check PMM/other sites. During the 9 months of winter we do more in door activities,* Go to the movies, eat out, visit family/friends, church/volunteer group, walk the docks/malls, read books, go to the golf driving range, bowl, play pool and did I mention shopping?


*
On really boring rainy cold days, I like to walk the malls, watch/talk to people and find that item that is calling out my name.* Fill, come find and buy me!* During the winter months, I tend to be shop alcoholic.* However, I tend to buy at thrift and pawn shops on my herbal tea budget. **Which is also good exercise as it takes a lot of time and energy to shop around, compare and buy at the lowest price.*


*
The trick is basically slow down and take the time to enjoy the moment.* *****

Unfortunately, the winters here are too brutal to leave the boat in the water even if there were such a thing as a marina with bubblers (not) and the nearest shopping mall worthy of the name is 60 miles away.

I usually keep heat in my barn workshop and do small projects (now that we sold our big wooden boat that was in a shed attached to the barn, there will be less of those), read magazines and dream. The new IG gets shrink wrapped and a zipper door for access, so on nice sunny winter days it gets tolerable under the cover and I can drive the 20 miles to the boatyard and dream and putter.

This too shall pass as it has done for my last (soon to be) 64 years.

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My reply from PMM site:

I know just how you feel. Though I'm on the Chesapeake the season ending and the sadness is the same. I'm sorry to say from early Nov till April I'll be lucky to see my girl more then once if at all. It's like 5-6months of nothing but waiting, thank God for the holidays to shorten the wait. I'm not whole if I'm not near or on the water even if just sitting dockside. The t-shirt I wear much of the summer has the Kenneth Grahame Wind in the Willows quote printed on the back with illustration "There is nothing-absolutely nothing-half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats. Simply messing." Godspeed!
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My summers in Alaska always are so hectic I look forward to winter. This summer we had beautiful weather May through early August. We were knocking ourselves out for weeks and then months thinking the good weather would end the next morning. It should have but it didn't and now I'm ready for a rest but there's still much to do. Hoping to play some next summer. So I'm looking fwd to reading and watching the snow pile up** ..* if it's that kind of winter. Of course we could always talk about how a wing works. FF thinks we don't know.

Eric Henning

Fall cruising on the Maine coast is great, my favorite time of year.* The sunny days are worth waiting out the cold rainy ones.* Make sure you have some form of heat!