Buckle Island

Buckle Island is a small uninhabited island about 24 miles from Winter Harbor.  As we left Winter Harbor we passed it's beautiful light house, lit by the morning sun, and framed by a questionable backdrop of fog.

 It was probably a pretty ride, but we had the densest fog I’ve ever seen – and that’s all we could see!  It wasn’t foggy when we left (or we would have stayed in Winter Harbor), but about an hour into our 5 hour trip, the fog billowed in.  We figured it was coming as we passed Cadillac Mtn in Acadia.

 It was the pea soup kind – we could see about 2 boat lengths around us and that was it.  It made looking for lobster pot floats and toggles, as we were watching our radar, course and location,  extremely difficult.  We ended up with Luke at the helm and me standing outside, watching for the floats to appear. Depending on the local current, it was toggles then floats, or toggles left and floats further left, or the opposite, all pairs connected with a rope waiting to snare our prop.  Not a fun trip. It did clear up about an hour from our new anchorage at Buckle.  The air was clear but not sunny as we approached the island. 


As we arrived, we were treated to a beautifully restored, old wooden lobster smack.

Never deterred, we dropped the dingy and off  to shore to explore Buckle.  The views from shore are completely Maine.  Here is the rocky beach where we could land the dinghy.

On the way to the beach, we ran over some sea grass.  Sea grass always wins – definitely slowed down the dinghy motor!

The rocky ledges, full of mussels (yes, we got some!)  You just lift the bottom layer of that seagrass at low tide and they are attached to the rocks.

Seals basking on some of the rocks.

The other side of the island is green and grassy.

The interior of the island was devastated by micro bursts a few years and is still a mess.  The trail around the island is an adventure in itself!

But the good parts of the trail are just beautiful.

Luke found his favorite place on the island – the mysterious green door.  The green door is where light meets dark. A walk through a dark part of the forest….

Leads you to the green door!

You can see the light on the other side –it actually opens to a less dense part of the forested island.  Light does meet dark!

On Monday morning we left Buckle early to beat the predicted rain.  It worked – we made the whopping 8 miles to an anchorage between islands Devil and Bold, about 1.5 miles from Stonington.  We did manage to make it to Stonington and back before the rain came.  The rain is steady now, but the wind is calm, so it’s a nice evening indoors.  The next blog will cover Stonington and, if the rain subsides, walks on the islands.  I’ve come down with the miserable beginnings of a cold and just wanna go back to bed for a while.