Industrial Lobster

I am not sure how to capture the level of, well, anxiety is not the word . . . so, what is the word . . . that cruising new areas brings. Carrie Rose and Sir Tugely Blue (our cruising companion) spent two nights in a big bay in New Brunswick where we were the only boats within sight. A few small local boats appeared but we were alone. It was rolling; both stabilizers were deployed as well as ninety feet of anchor chain as the tide went from 14 feet to 32 feet twice each day.

After two days the anchor was raised to cruise to Head Harbor on Campobello Island, the Canadian island made famous by the Roosevelt clan. To get there, Letite Passage, a place renown for outrageous tides, current and generalized maelstroms, needed to transit at near slack tide and then, with a favorable current.

By the way, did I also mention that there are a couple large ferries crisscrossing the passage every half hour? Carrie Rose entered at 7.7 knots and exited at over twelve with the help of the current. It is not that any of these passages are worse than say, Barnegat Bay in New Jersey; it is the anticipation that causes the stomach juices to churn.

The water east of Letite Passage opens to the Atlantic and is peppered with many small islands. Canada had extended the lobster fishing season by nine days this year and today was the deadline to get the traps in. Lobster boats were out in force scurrying from one buoy to the next.

Head Harbor is tucked behind a beautiful red and white lighthouse perched on equally striking weathered rocks. There are two ways in, one direct and the other around a small island, a detail I had not paid much attention to. Suddenly at the squeeze point, a smiling lobsterman was looking at me from his quickly moving boat. I pulled my throttle back to idle to access the situation.

The description in the cruising guide described this as a working harbor; really, it is a narrow inlet. There are two substantial wharves consisting of tall creosote wooden piles capped with concrete. And as seen in Chesapeake fishing communities, the rest of it is a haphazard collection of spindly sticks holding various floats and sheds in place. Two lengths of these headed back into the narrowing inlet and made up a channel. I told myself not to go down there but never the less did while searching for where to tie up.

This is the infrastructure of a worldwide lobster distribution system. It is downright industrial. I know that as a species we push to extremes and this place looked ready to burst. If the lobster catch plummets the lobstermen, their intermediaries, the bankers, and then the communities will disappear. I am stating the obvious. It is the same for any natural resource: plunder while plunder can.

The lobster boats populating Head Harbor were distinctive. The newer of these Canadian boats are almost square. In Maine the lobster boats are sleeker, retaining a higher ration of length to beam. And it is the odd lobster boat in Maine that has an inward facing windshield, whereas they all do in Canada.

Other differences between the two fleets are that the U.S. season starts May or June, and the Canadians are done in June only to start up again in November, while most of the U.S. boats are pulled for the winter.

This in itself would require unique design considerations. There are the intangibles of any design: what worked for my ancestors is good enough for me. The traditions and the specific requirements (i.e. water depth, weather, type of fishing, etc.) are what make each regions boats distinctive.

But to get back to my original thought, a word that is similar to anxiety but not anxiety. In Head Harbor, I was perplexed as to where to tie up in this morass of rough looking floats and deserted lobster boats. Dave on Sir Tugely Blue did the smart thing and asked the first lobsterman he saw, who was unloading his traps with a crane some twenty five feet up onto the wharf. Next, I heard on the radio, “We will tie to the blue boat and you tie to us.”

So I tied to Sir Tugely Blue, Sir Tugely Blue tied to the blue lobster boat, the blue lobster boat was tied to a float with a shed on it, which was loosely tied to the wharf. And this conglomeration of fine recreational craft, well worn working boat and decrepit shed were raising and lowering 17 feet every six hours.

To add to the excitement, substantially wide boats doing the work of a lobster boat repeatedly passed close to our stern. They streamed down a channel just wide enough for their width, spun around with feet to spare, docked, unloaded their traps, dropped off lobsters at the various sheds waiting to process them, and repeated the process until dark.

As I took it all in, I realized I had just done the same thing with no prior experience, in a foreboding place, and with the help of a cooperative local lobsterman and our fellow cruisers. I relaxed, but only a bit.

Tomorrow another new place, and the next day and the next, it has been that way for nine years now. There is a feeling of boredom (not the correct word either) when at home that takes weeks to unravel. The bungalow doesn’t move, the streets do not rise and fall, the city deals with our waste, and the utilities supply ample electricity. A drive to another state does not require contacting customs.

Once home, it is blah until it isn’t . . . and then it is time again to leap into the unknown. But it is not time to think about that yet. Now it is time to leap!

Mistake I. Harbor, Maine