killick's muse

view of the day

A lonely fishing stage near Quirpon, on Newfoundland's Northern Peninsula

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What happens to the cabin in the rough stuff!
copyright adam killick 2005

In lumpy seas near Cape Race
copyright adam killick 2005

Cape Race... nah, just kidding

...or How To Sail More Than Forty Nautical Miles and Still End Up Where You Started. So we left at 7:15, excited about the prospect of a westerly wind and a close reach to Cape Race. No such luck. Rather, it was 25 knots on the nose, eight-foot seas and a very rough ride. Until the motor broke -- again -- just a few miles from rounding the cape. The choice was to spend the next ten hours beating into the wind to get around Cape Race -- which I couldn't see for fog -- or to turn and run for four hours back to Port Kirwan for repairs. For safety's sake, there was only one choice. It's getting pretty depressing -- the weather isn't supposed to be like that at this time of year, but, as Gerald O'Neill, a fisherman here and, with his wife, Carol Ann, is one of the nicest people you'd ever care to meet, told me today after catching my lines: "There's nothing normal about this year." So I have to get the motor fixed -- I think it may be an air intake problem -- and then try again. That's all I can do.

A.

Tom Wright's dory. He built it with his dad, Don, when he was 13 in 1978. If nothing else, I'm having some creative photographic fun with the fog!
copyright adam killick 2005

Port Kirwan, Newfoundland

Well, I tried to get out of here. Honest. Friday, resigned to the fact that I am going to have to take strong winds on the nose whenever I leave, I set out for Trepassey at eight a.m. Motoring into the wind, I was somewhere near Cappahayden when the motor slowly lost compression and died. It's quite a feeling to be bobbing out there, with no motor. And it's not a terribly attractive feeling. I was left with two choices: Tack my way down the coast for the next two days to get to Trepassey, or turn around and sail back to Port Kirwan, and hope I could make it alongside the wharf under sail. I chose the latter, and had a pleasant run back to Port Kirwan, which I have taken to calling the Hotel California. Fortunately, the motor fired up as I approached the wharf and I managed to dock under power. So now I'm well behind schedule, but learning to accept the things I cannot change. Thanks to the help of Pat Aylward, who was an engineer aboard the Marine Atlantic ferries for 35 years, the motor is back on track. She was a little low on oil, it turned out. I had planned to make a long trip to catch up -- nonstop from here to Burin -- with Jim Miller, a friend from Holyrood and the man who runs the sea school there, but he had to back out. So my host here, Carolyn Adler, has graciously offered to take his place. So we'll try to leave tomorrow, and make the 30-hour trip in a 10-hour and a 20-hour segment. Meanwhile, the fog continues. But I was screeched in last night, and have the headache to prove it. And I'll get my second Port Kirwan jig's dinner today!

A.

Among the fishing boats in Port Kirwan
copyright adam killick 2005

At the foggy wharf in Port Kirwan!
copyright adam killick 2005

Port Kirwan, Newfoundland

I'm still in Port Kirwan, thanks to a nasty southeasterly, thick fog for three days and the remnants of Hurricane Dennis. But, since this is possibly the nicest village I've ever visited, it's hardly difficult. I don't think I'm going to make my goal of getting to St. Pierre for Bastille Day, but I am learning patience. And, hey, I won $25 at bingo on Monday night! Hopefully I'll be on my way tomorrow.

A.