Provincetown.
When I write of the friendly, helpful Newfoundlanders, I don’t want to forget a helpful man in the Massachusetts waters at Provincetown. At the start of our trip, we decided our step-off point to Halifax, NS would be Provincetown. Our anchor set well at Provincetown and even when the wind picked up to almost 30 somehow we slept securely. When we were going to pick up Steven and Daniel , our family "crew" to Halifax.
I thought we should move closer in to make the arrival with luggage by dingy easier. Dan motored the boat forward in the mooring field and I started the windless to raise the anchor. The windless began to struggle and Dan thought he should move forward to release the anchor. That still wasn’t letting our 65lb spade come free. Dan came forward and both of us watched in awe and horror as we lifted a 12’square, broken piece of metal consisting of three crosswise sets of round metal tubing and it was above the anchor on the chain. I had visions of losing the anchor and we had just sent the spare one home, so we didn’t have another good one if we lost this one.
Dan got in the dingy and we tried to maneuver the piping to get it off the anchor but not have it tip up and gouge the hull of the boat. The pushing and pulling and lowering the anchor alternately with raising wasn’t moving the debris and we were getting anxious.
Just then a fisherman in a metal motored skiff came over and basically took over the retrieval. He told us in accented English that he had been a dragger worker and that sort of thing happened all the time. He suggested we tie a rope on the metal piece and as he pulled the metal, holding it away with the power of his engine and the lift of our boat, then the anchor could be raised and disengaged from the mess and allowed to drop back down. He tied on the rope and stayed with us until we were free, laying the rusty piece against his little boat to protect our hull.
Nice man and thanks! He would not accept anything for his help. He waved us off and wished us well. I’ll bet a time will come when we will be able to pass on the generosity shown to us by another person of the sea. The “whatever” did drop back to the bottom and will probably catch someone else, but there was nothing else we could do. We later informed the Harbormaster.
A few pics of Provincetown .
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| Waiting for Steve and checking the weather |
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| An interesting and artsy town |
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