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    Ruminations and Rumblings of a Rambling Sailor
    Ruminations and Rumblings of a Rambling Sailor
    Ruminations and Rumblings of a Rambling Sailor
    Ebook113 pages1 hour

    Ruminations and Rumblings of a Rambling Sailor

    By Dave Markle

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    About this ebook

    Certainly the quickest way to get from the cold
    waters of Maine to the warmer southern waters
    is to sail for Bermuda and continue south from
    there. In the fall, theres a good chance of taking a
    beating though.
    On the other hand, the coastal and intercoastal routes
    provide an opportunity for a broad contrast of scenery
    and an interesting assortment of bays, rivers, sounds
    and harbors. It is also the route of preference for those
    of us who desire to meet interesting people and boats.
    This is the route the narrator chose.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAuthorHouse
    Release dateJun 27, 2011
    ISBN9781463411190
    Ruminations and Rumblings of a Rambling Sailor
    Author

    Dave Markle

    The author lives and works as a cabinetmaker on Eggemoggin Reach in mid-coast Maine. He is a graduate of Silvermine College of Art in Connecticut. He has an avid interest in local and sailing history, particularly of the U.S. East Coast.

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      Book preview

      Ruminations and Rumblings of a Rambling Sailor - Dave Markle

      Ruminations and Rumblings

      missing image file

      of a Rambling Sailor

      Dave Markle

      missing image file

      AuthorHouse™

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.authorhouse.com

      Phone: 1-800-839-8640

      © 2011 by Dave Markle. All rights reserved.

      No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

      First published by AuthorHouse 05/24/2011

      ISBN: 978-1-4634-1120-6 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4634-1119-0 (ebk)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2011908635

      Printed in the United States of America

      All illustrations and the Eagle Eye Crew photo by the author. Cover photo of author by Bowey Markle.

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      For general information contact the author.

      Dave Markle

      PO Box 184 Blue Hill ME 04614

      Telephone (207) 359-8032

      Email waveymarkle@gmail.comList of Illustrations

      Contents

      Get Cracking

      A yawl finds a pleasant home

      Giddy Up

      Off to the Sound with the

      Puff Mamas

      Out of the Sound

      and into the Bay

      Down the Jersey Shore

      Up the D and Down the C

      Through the Dismal and

      Down the Alligator

      A Strange Christmas and

      Early Christian Cultists

      We make Miami and

      Long underwear comes off

      We adapt to the Urban Thing

      Off to the Keys

      Rumblings

      Ramblings

      East of North

      Back to Beaufort

      Heavy Rains to the Bottom

      of the Chesapeake

      We get a new Shadow

      The River the Sound and the Bay

      . . . And the Harbor

      List of Illustrations

      by the Author

      Crossing the Gulf

      Picking up the Puff Mamas

      Dolphin Ho!

      Hell’s Gate

      Chesapeake Surfing

      Wrestling match with the dock

      Croc Visions

      Back to Bucks

      The eagle-eyed crew: Bowey and Marilu

      Thanks to Phil Schirmer for designing the cover.

      Thanks to Debrae Bishop for all her efforts in getting the book moved towards publishing.

      Thanks to the eagle eyed crew for making it possible

      for me to never use my new Nikon binoculars.

      Get Cracking

      To approach life as an adventure is a good way to extract a lot from it. Some adventures are of our own choosing, some catch us by surprise like going from 5 to 0 knots in 2 seconds while under full sail with the sensation of 5,000 lbs. of iron grating on granite ledge running up through our body and hitting you hard in the brain. The grounding was an experience I learned from. The diagnosis of a terminal illness was that of a very good friend. The five or so years of his illness were more than an adventure. Watching death approach was very unsettling. We were the same age, 52, when he died and the fragility of life was becoming very clear to me. There was a knocking in my head and a voice saying something to the effect of get cracking or pay the consequences, that being an eventual sense of a lack of fulfillment.

      The week John died my girlfriend unexpectedly vaporized and a thick fog was setting in as the abandonment bells were sounding. I also had a looming sense of empty nest syndrome as my younger daughter prepared for her first year of college. Aside from me being excited for her upcoming adventure, I was a bit anxious about the prospects of being a somewhat bored, middle-aged kind of guy whose daughters had a lot less need for him than previously. So I was damned if I was going to spend the winter in coastal Maine if I didn’t have to.

      I know people who subscribe to the 5-7 year plan for getting ready to cruise. A lot of cruisers are semi-retired or retired. I’ll probably retire but not until my next life. My attitude is presently of the go now school and south sounds very appealing. I’ve never really sailed below the bottom of Chesapeake Bay and actually wouldn’t mind bypassing Florida and leaving this country, which is really grating on my nerves. It’s been 30 years since I’ve cruised the east coast and am expecting many upsetting signs of progress. Anyway it was kind of a pleasure to have this opportunity to be totally decisive.

      I’ve always thought that life is like hitchhiking and cruising, going good then bam or up one minute the next you’re down, 1/2 of water & you think you’re gonna drown (John Prine). Some are surprised when there’s a bam. They say, Oh here we go again or oh shit. Four months before blast off, the vaporization of my girlfriend evoked a sort of, Oh shit, here we go." But if she hadn’t vaporized, my older daughter Bowey wouldn’t have signed on for the trip. This turned out to be a great turn of events—she wanted to break out of Boston and south had that same sweet tone to her. I needed some dependable crew and this was a wonderful opportunity to spend a good chunk of time with her before she started a family of her own. The downside was that because she was no longer a teenager I would not be able to tap that bottomless wealth of knowledge that 98% of teenagers seem to possess.

      Every once in a while I read a book Yankee Prisoner in Hunland by my grandfather, Clifford Markle. It’s a thrill for me because I love seeing history as told from someone’s personal exerience. His time on a farm and in a shoe factory or attempting escapes in Germany in World War I, were just that. It’s a great opportunity to get to know the grandfather I never met due to his death in Tunisia during World War II. Thanks Grandfather Markle, without the book I would not have gotten to know you.

      I have another great treasure in my possession, 77 beautifully written letters from my great-great grandfather Augur to his wife to be Cynthia Blodgett. They were written during the four years of the Civil War that he traveled from New Haven, Connecticut to Atlanta, Georgia. He was an architect and his handwriting was very visually pleasing as you read the words. Unlike the typewritten word a part of the person’s craftsmanship is there. He handwrote the correspondence of the officers in his regiment and obviously enjoyed his craft. I thought of him as I sailed south 135 years after he trekked south with a rifle and pen.

      A yawl finds a pleasant home

      In 2001 I decided to shift from a wooden boat to a fiberglass boat and from 31’ up to 36’-38 ft. I went to 38’ but not to fiberglass. It seems very hard for a wooden boat nut to switch to fiberglass. I found the boat at a small yard in my hometown, on mid coast, Maine. She had been well cared for and was well equipped for cruising. She was a British built—1958 centerboard yawl, designed by Arthur Robb and built at Isle of Cowes. The 4-foot draft with the bronze centerboard up was quite appealing for southern east coast cruising.

      Somewhere along the way she went from being White Jacket to Grey Dawn. How she ever avoided disaster after name changing one just doesn’t know. Though she may have become Grey Dawn just before she went on the rocks in

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