(Republishing.  Some subscribers had this post go into their spam folder because of the previous title format.)

September 14-17

“Sea, wind, and beat of sea,

Broad lands stretching endlessly;

Where are bonds to bind the free!

All the world was made for me”

-Richard Halliburton

As rough as the trip to Martha’s Vineyard was, the trip back to Newport was like being in a different world.  It was sunny and clear with calm seas and the perfect amount of wind.  We flew towards Newport, enjoying the beautiful day.  I have to admit, I’ve been waiting and waiting to use the awesome quote above and smiled to myself during the trip, knowing that the time had come.

 

 

 

So why were we going back to Newport for the third time?  Yes, we love Lana and Dave THAT much.  We also wanted to attend the Newport Boat Show.  Chris, always on the prowl for more boat projects to keep him busy, wanted to check out the new boats as well as cruise the booth tents for watermakers, refrigeration, and who knows what else.

After pouting because the brand new boats made me green with envy, I looked at the nautical jewelry (just for fun), the watermakers, and the sailing magazine publishers.  I spoke to a few people who sounded promising about publishing one of my blogposts as an article in a magazine.  I am very excited about the prospect and hope to put something together by the Annapolis Boat Show in October.  We didn’t buy anything, except for some rope for $8.00.  And I bought a book about growing up on the Maine coast.  I’m like, really into Maine now…

 

 

After the boat show, we spent more time with Lana and the kids at their house, saw my cousin Marlene, and just enjoyed this lovely spot in the world.  Lana and I even got to go out together for dinner at an amazing little Mexican restaurant called Perro Salada.  The food was great and reasonable, and the atmosphere was so quaint.  Lana and I worked on her house a bit more, which I wrote about in a separate post.

 

 

 

Before we left, Lana and the kids came out to the boat for a farewell dinner.  We enjoyed Lana’s leftover Italian feast and the kids played.  We ate Dave’s birthday cake for him, since he was away in Chicago for his race, but we at least had him on the phone while we did it!  We also pre-celebrated Lana’s birthday a week early.

 

The next morning, we gave Patronus a bath at the dock while Lana kept us company.  As we were leaving, our old sailing friend, Mark Ploch, walked up the dock!  We sailed with Mark (who owns a Doyle Sails loft in Florida) for years on High Noon (Chris’ dad’s boat).  It was great to catch up with him.  I thought about how cool it is that the sailing community is so small and tight-knit.  At the boat show, we had seen Dave Dellenbaugh, who is also a Cornell alum and who raced against Chris in the Thistle class in the 1980’s.  We also saw our boat broker from West Haverstraw; Dave Armitage’s uncle, who had a booth at the show; and the women who created Sea Bags (see our Portland, ME post).  It is amazing that, after being out of sailing and racing for so many years, we have floated right back into the sailing world so easily.

Well, I can’t say that we had had our fill of Newport, but we left all the same.  Next stop: Bryson’s favorite place in the world, where we celebrated his tenth birthday last year.  Any serious blog readers out there remember where that was?  A huge hint: we spent his birthday riding bikes around this island…