Med Mooring in Loring

August 29, 2017 Rich

(August 12th, 2017)

Morning in Loring was lazy. We eventually got dressed and moving, coming out on the dock for visiting with the other boats. About mid-day Jim decided it was time to “fix” the rafting situation and covert it to a med-moor setup. So we released the lines from Sea Pie and motored out of the way. Sea Pie untied from Foxy and motored out of the way as well, then Foxy moved out. After that, Sea Pie started first, dropping anchor 20 degrees to starboard and backing up to the dock. Foxy dropped their anchor directly off the bow and backed up along side Sea Pie’s port side. Then we dropped our anchor about 20 degrees to port and backup along side Foxy. All said and done we had 153 feet of boats tied to 45 feet of dock space, with everyone having direct access to the dock from their stern.

After that some of the crews explored the trails, collecting berries and plants. Other crews took their dinghies up to the rapids to check those out, and the rest just relaxed on the dock or in their boats.

The Loring stop would be our last flotilla mooring before Ketchikan where Sail Alaska officially ends so it was time for another cocktail hour and potluck. Ruby Slippers, Sea Pie, Foxy, Mobert, Corvidae, and Lori Lee — 6 of the 12 original boats. It was another fantastic feast, including the awesome focaccia bread Vicki from Sea Pie made. The next morning each bot departed one by one toward Ketchikan, the weather turning from the sun we have had for the last week or more into dark, cloudy, and drizzly. As we mooted toward Ketchikan it got progressively wetter and we tied up to our slip in 15knots of wind and heavy rain. We hunkered down in the boat to stay dry until it was time to head downtown for the group dinner. Since our experience at Dwyers last time was lackluster at best, we decided to try Fox Hill instead. This also happened to be a celebration for Jim’s birthday which we had all apparently missed on the 9th I believe. At Fox Hill we had a wonderful group dinner, with Grady presenting the gift of a chuck wagon feast on his ranch in Alabama to Jim. We taxied back to Bar Harbor Marina, got the girls to bed, and crashed.