The weather here has continued to be perfect, although we may have some drizzle tonight.  I am gambling that it will be insignificant and that I will be able to reach shore tomorrow without getting wet.

        Moderate wind has come up this afternoon. 

        Yesterday remained calm for most of the day, so I took a row of inspection around Pine Tree Island.  For a while my wake created the only ripples on the water, and the plashes of the oars the only sounds, other than calling birds.

        I paused from time to time to take photographs, including the one above of reflected clouds.   A cormorant sitting on a rock off Pine Tree island drying his outstretched wings did not make the cut; but this odd and apparently abandoned boat did.

She’s been on that mooring ever since I have been here and I’ve never seen anyone on her.  She is about as wide and has as much, or as little, freeboard amidships as did CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE,  but more at the bow and stern and is a few feet longer.  I always wonder about the story behind such boats.

        In the background is ONTONG JAVA, which seems also to have been untouched for months.

        I photographed this old wreck on the shore several years ago.

   It is difficult to say that she is more wrecked.  A wreck is a wreck is a wreck.

        And I have long admired this bow graphic.  The boat is named AMADIS, so I do not see a connection.

         Many years ago I went to the bow of RESURGAM to prepare the anchor as I was entering a small cove here.  As I knelt beside the windlass, I looked over the side straight down on a hammerhead shark about my size just below the surface.   He probably was not aware of my presence and it is unlikely that he was hoping I would slip.  

        The Avon is on deck, drying in the sun before being deflated.  My carry on bag is packed except for a few items such as this computer.

        I’ll do my exercises, close the seacock to the engine salt water intake, deflate the dinghy and bring it below, then watch the start of the Wednesday night race on deck.  Maybe have dinner there, too, as I did last night.

        Then on my way to fall and winter, fires in the fireplace, martinis, pizza, and being stung by the taste of a woman’s skin.