Eyeing the shore | A thick Down East fog prompts a lesson in navigation by spud
Some say it has to do with the way our barometric pressure changes so fast in the summer, others claim it has to do with our being at the 45th parallel. Whatever it is, Down East Maine in summer can produce some of the thickest fog ever seen on the planet. A thick wall of fog can change everything — lawn parties, garden weddings, yard sales and sailing trips. Although fog can adversely affect commercial fishing and lobstering, they say it has no effect on the region’s clamming and worm-digging activities.
Although other places in the world may have more fog than Down East Maine — by which I mean Penobscot Bay from where it widens out in Searsport, then north and east to Mount Desert Island and its surrounding islands and all the way down to Eastport — no place on earth makes thicker fog than what forms in summer Down East.
They tell stories there of fog so thick you could walk on it if you could find a way to climb atop of it. They talk about fog so dense it’s like walking through a damp snowdrift. Roofers are always telling tales of nailing rows of shingles right out across the fog bank without even knowing it until the fog lifts and the shingles come crashing to the ground.
It’s been said that stonecutters from the island quarries would take their stonecutting equipment and drill through the fog, cut it into blocks and stack it off to the side just to get it out of the way. I know it sounds like foolishness, but down there they claim it’s all true — and as a storyteller I believe every word of it.
Folks from away who’ve never been on a Maine vacation are often sold on the idea by color photos on some innkeeper’s website, pictures of the breathtaking scenery and quaint harbor-side villages. If they arrive in the fog, these holiday-makers will sit on the porches of their rented cottages and stare dumbly into a thick, gray wall.
Some of these summer visitors have been trapped in the thick fog for days while getting daily assurances from their host that there really is a quaint, picturesque harbor just beyond the lawn with colorful shops and restaurants and lobster boats bobbing at quaint and colorful moorings. After a week or two they begin to wonder what they’re doing in such a place.
I remember one time, as a kid, my grandfather and I went sailing in a homemade gaff-rigged catboat off South Addison. It was one of those bright, beautiful, sunny, dry, ideal summer days that Realtors like because they help drive up the cost of coastal property. We were heading toward Beal’s Island with the idea of going into Jonesport when a bank of fog came rolling toward us like an ugly, gray avalanche. In less than a minute, we were in the middle of it — a fog so think we couldn’t see the bow of the boat.
My grandfather, an experienced sailor, was ashamed to admit that he didn’t have a compass aboard and had no idea where we were heading. After thinking about our situation for a minute or two, Grandpa said there was only one thing he could think of to help get us out of this mess and back to shore.
“What’s that, Grandpa?” I asked.
“We’ll have to navigate by potatoes,” he said, like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Navigate by potatoes?” I repeated. “How do you navigate by potatoes? And where will we get the potatoes to navigate by?” I asked.
Even at that tender age, I’d heard of navigating by the stars, navigating by lighthouses, navigating by bell buoys, even navigating by the smoke stacks at the blueberry plant in Milbridge. I’d tried out a few of those navigating techniques while sailing on my own. But I’d never ever heard of navigating by potatoes.
“John,” Grandpa said, “you call yourself a Downeaster and you’ve never heard of navigating by potatoes?
“No, Grandpa, I haven’t,” I said.
My grandfather shook his head and then told me to reach down under my seat. Sure enough, I found a 25-pound bag of beautiful Kennebec russets. I pulled them out, put them on the seat next to me and asked what I should do next. Grandpa told me to haul the potatoes up to the bow and sit there, one leg to a side. Once I got settled, he told me he’d continue sailing along and he wanted me to throw a potato, one to each side, every minute or two.
“What good will that do, Grandpa?” I asked.
“Well,” he said, “I’ll listen to the potatoes hitting the water, and when I don’t hear a splash, I’ll turn.”
John McDonald, an author, humorist and storyteller who performs throughout New England, can be reached at mainestoryteller@yahoo.com.
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