Rockport to Isles of Shoals
Rockport to Isles of Shoals
The Isles of Shoals are a group of small rocky islands and tidal ledges about 7 miles off the east coast of the United States, straddling the border of Maine and New Hampshire. Four of the nine Islands are in New Hampshire waters with the remaining 5 “belonging” to Maine.
I’m not sure what attracted me to the Isles of Shoals in the first place, but they have been on our list for a good many years. They would be where we would lay claim to our Maine landfall!
Now, as I prepared to finally make this “epic” voyage, we found that the only harbor, Gosport Harbor, is known to have notoriously poor anchoring, with a bottom consisting predominantly of rock and kelp beds. So while we tend to trust our own anchor & chain more so than an unknown mooring, in this case, the best bet would be a mooring. Fortunately, the Portsmouth Yacht Club (PYC) maintains 6 moorings in Gosport Harbor that they generously make available to visiting yachtsman on a first come first serve basis. All they ask is that you give up the mooring if a member shows up.
This called for a change in approach; I did not want to get there at twilight only to find that all the moorings were taken, and so, as you already know, we lay in a course for Rockport, MA instead. We spent a day and a night there such that we would be within a few hours sail of the Isles of Shoals.
This would be one of the most straight forward runs we’ve made to date. Only about 3 hours away and almost dead North (20° Magnetic), we laid in our course and headed out to sea.
Making Landfall
Isles of Shoals comes into view – Land Ho!
At 10:19 we spotted land – White Island, just off our port bow. It’s an amazing feeling spotting land for the first time, even though we knew exactly where the islands were! I can only imagine the intensity of those feelings as experienced by those that spotted these islands for the very first time. We maintained our current heading and were soon passing the White Island lighthouse, with sights set on red nun #4.
We rounded red nun #4 and made our way into the harbor. Gosport harbor is, in essence, created by the addition of stone breakwaters connecting Star, Cedar & Smuttynose Islands. With Star Island off our starboard side, we headed for the moorings; a good number of boats were already moored here and a tour boat out of Portsmouth was tied to the dock on Star Island. We couldn’t seem to find any of the Portsmouth Yacht club moorings, so I grabbed a Kittery Point Yacht Club mooring instead. We needed to tie off somewhere and figured if someone showed up, we would apologize and vacate the mooring.
Once we cleated off the mooring pennant, we took the time to tidy up Rocinante, made lunch and started to plan our trip ashore. Fortunately, Maria spotted what she thought was a PYC mooring just to the north of us and a quick look with our binoculars confirmed it; perfect! We quickly started our engine, dropped our current mooring and motored back to grab it befoer someone else did!
Star Island – a bit of history
We decided to visit Star Island first, but couldn’t quite see where to land our dinghy since the tour ships were taking up all the space on the dock. Hoping we would find a spot around the other side, we got in our tender and headed off towards Star Island.
Over one-hundred years old, the Oceanic House is the largest structure on Star Island. Its main lobby, writing room, Pink Parlor, and dining hall provide a glimpse into the life of the Grand Hotel Era of the late 1800’s when Star Island attracted such notable artists and writers as Childe Hassam and Nathaniel Hawthorne. Air conditioning had yet to be invented, and the cool sea breezes were a perfect escape from the hot summers of Boston and New York. But according to an entry in Wikipedia, the resorts in the mountains of New Hampshire and New York grew and did not involve a potentially unpleasant sea voyage. By the 1890s, the island hotels were nearly empty.
It goes on to say that Star Island has been owned and operated by the Star Island Corporation since 1915 as a place for family, youth, and individual conferences and retreats. The Star Island Corporation has close ties to the Unitarian Universalist Association and the United Church of Christ. Conferences vary from a week to a few days, with some focused on religious themes and others on secular subjects (photography, arts, yoga, writing, science, etc.).
Exploring Star Island
Exploring Star Island
We managed to squeeze our tender in between a few others and got out to explore. Unfortunately, it became obvious rather quickly that this was not going to be our cup of tea. Now, as you know from some of our others posts, we’re not the types looking for pristine, sterile conditions. We appreciate the raw beauty found in weathered structures, etc. But something was off here and I’m still not sure what it was. The hotel was in need of repair, but to our eyes, it came across more as neglect than mother nature.
Star Island – a disappointment
Nevertheless, we decided to walk around and give it a chance. We climbed as high as we could and enjoyed some nice views off island, but with not much to see within the hotel itself, we soon left it behind to explore the island along the perimeter trail.
Unfortunately, the perimeter trail simply highlighted more issues with the management of this island. To our left were piles of debris; pallets, a piece of rusting exercise equipment (a stair climber?) and various other junkyard items. We continued past, hoping it was a one off. We came across an area with chickens containing a machine where you could purchase feed for them… ok? Then it really got bad. We started to see the gulls circling overhead just before the stench hit us. It seems they had decided to create a garbage dump right along the trail. It was so bad, we had to turn back!
We got back to the dock and signed out – total elapsed time on Star Island? 13 minutes! Thanks, but no thanks!
We got back in the dink and started heading back to Rocinante before hitting some of the other islands. Unfortunately, the winds had shifted to the northwest and intensified. Gosport harbor, of course, is open to the NW, so we now had 3 foot waves in the harbor! It took us quite a few attempts to get behind Rocinante and back on board, but once we did, we decided that we had seen enough and decided to call it a day.
Was it worth it?
Yes! Even though we were disappointed with the condition of Star Island, it was still an amazing voyage. BTW, If you’ve sailed to the Isles of Shoals and have had a different experience than we had, we’d love to hear from you! Please comment below.
Next stop, Portsmouth Harbor (Kittery, ME)
Till next time,
Carlos & Maria
SV Rocinante…_/)
Photos – Isles of Shoals, ME
White Island Lighthouse
Star Island, NH
Exploring Star Island
Next Leg – Kittery,ME
Isles of Shoals to Kittery Maine